Page 57 of When I'm Gone

I take pride in the fact that I can see pleasure on his face building by the second. He is struggling to hold onto control the further into my throat I take him. It creates a sense of achievement deep within my soul. Saliva runs down him, coating the way for me to take him deeper and deeper until his cock is cutting off the flow of oxygen from my lungs. Chase brings his hand to the back of my head, not to take control; more like he needs the contact to keep him grounded.

Feeling his eyes on me while I’m choking on him makes me squirm desperately against the mattress. It’s empowering, being able to bring this out in him. Perfectly composed Chase, all fucked-up just for me.

When I swallow, he barks out a strangled curse. My own poor neglected dick is about to burst without any attention at all, getting him off is almost too much for me without embarrassing myself. I ease up, both so I can suck in a much-needed breath of air and so that I can watch his face while I prepare to finish him off.

His balls are drawn up tight as I roll them in my palm, squeezing gently. His silky skin glides against my hand as I grip him and suck him simultaneously, pushing him towards completion.

Hearing Chase’s moans of pleasure has me fighting the need to explode.

“Chaos, your mouth feels too good, I can’t hang on any longer.” He warns me in case I want to pull off, but I have other ideas. With a gentle tug on his balls as I suck him deeply, his release hits him with a muffled shout. The salty liquid coats my tongue, filling my mouth with his delicious taste. It’s a bit bitter and a bit sweet and entirely Chase.

When he’s wrung dry, I shove a hand in my briefs and wrap it around my cock. I’m already so, so close. An obscenemoan falls from my lips, and suddenly I’m being hauled up to the top of the bed.

“No fucking way. Mine,” Chase growls, still breathless from his orgasm, but no less determined. He sits me high on his chest, scrambling my brain for a minute. His intent is pretty fucking clear, but I’ve only been on one end of this transaction. On autopilot, I pull myself out and feed it to him. The wet heat of his mouth almost has me coming before it can even start. Holyfuckingshit. Holyfuckingshit. It’s too good and Chase isn’t making it easy to hold out. His wicked tongue has me seeing fucking stars as he sucks me as deep as he can at this angle.

It’s fast and messy and so unbelievably perfect. “Chase,” I whine. It’s all I can manage to warn him before my orgasm crashes into me with a force I’ve never felt before. He sucks me through it until my vision is hazy and my bones are liquid. I’m not even sure what’s holding me upright at this point. But Chase has me, that’s the one solid fact that I latch on to. When he’s got me, I’m good.

He maneuvers me so that we’re laying side by side, swapping lazy kisses while we come down from our highs. As the dopamine wanes, I feel a sense of guilt creeping in. Those presents from his family did a number on me today, and he deserves to know why I was so on edge. I’m trying so fucking hard to communicate with him, but it’s an internal fight every single time. My past is warring it out with the present and it’s confusing. I’m not great at these things, but I want to make an effort. I know he’s not Aaron, and he wants me to talk to him. Doesn’t make starting the conversation any easier, though.

“I did a dumb thing,” I admit in a whisper. His expression is a mystery with how I’m laying on his chest, but his muscles contract beneath me.

“What dumb thing?” he asks in a perfectly neutral tone,his hand stroking up and down my back. If I couldn’t hear his heartbeat kick up, I’d think he was simply curious, but of course I fucked up already and worried him.

After clearing my suddenly dry throat, I push on. “I swear, I tried to get over it on my own. Even took a shower to wash away the bad feelings, just like you told me to.”

“Easton, what did you do, sweetheart?”

Breathe. Breathe. You’re not in trouble. “I opened all the presents.”

He exhales heavily. “Why was it hard for you?”

“Um.” That’s not what I thought he’d say. Also fairly complicated. “It was a lot. The art supplies. I haven’t exactly, um, since. Yeah.”

Good job, idiot. Not even English. “Easton, are you trying to say you haven’t been painting?”

Someone should give him an award for his fluent Easton-ese. “Yes.”

His next question is a blow, but I was expecting it. “Since when?”

“Since I got disowned.”

It goes down like fire, engulfing my esophagus and making its way down. I gave up an intrinsic part of me four years ago and admitting it out loud is as humiliating as it is painful. Looking back, abandoning art was one of the things that I did for him, when I should have seen him asking me to as one of the signs I should have ended things. There was only a short time in between that night I spent poolside with Chase that ended so horribly and moving in with my new boyfriend. My dreams were as big as the sky before everything went wrong. Art school and galleries featuring me as crystalline in my head as the visions of me burning in eternal fire. They mixed as well as oil and water but they were both there. Always.

Then he crushed my newly re-blooming passion underthe toe of his Tom Ford shoes before it even had a chance to unfurl, and I let him.

Chase’s voice is like that now. Like I stomped on something precious to him. “Sweetheart, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”

“I know. Please, don’t think I’m ungrateful. It just messed me up a little.”

He rests his cheek on the top of my head, a firm weight that eases a bit off my uneasiness. “I saw your hands. It looked like it messed you up more than a little,” he tells me.

The storm clouds that follow me are gathering, growing heavier and darker day by day, and my fingernails took the brunt of that impending dread today. There’s no denying it. With the absence of cuts and bruises littering my skin, I needed to feel the pain somewhere physical. Clenching my fists through the waves of anguish the art supplies brought up and feeling that electric jolt was grounding. Obviously, not foolproof, and definitely not the best way to keep the worst of it at bay, but it did help.

Carefully, I say, “It was a mistake. Doing it when you were gone and not telling you, it was still bothering me.” My voice is thick, the fear of disappointment an iron ball in my chest. “I’m sorry. I’m trying.”

One kiss to my hair, then another. “Easton, do you think I’m upset with you?”

It’s easier like this, when he can’t see me. Like admitting your insecurities to an especially warm and firm body pillow. “Always.”

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