Page 105 of Leave

I couldn’t stay hard. I couldn’t even stay in the moment. At least if I went soft when I bottomed, no one noticed, but when Itopped—which was when my demons were the loudest in my ear—it was tough to hide.

Tough to hide from the man who wanted to get fucked and was about to be sorely disappointed.

With a defeated sigh, I sat back on my heels. “Goddammit.”

Riley tensed. “What’s wrong?”

“I…” I put up my hands and shook my head as heat rose in my cheeks. Great—I could get the blood running into my face, but apparently it didn’t want to go near my cock. For fuck’s sake.

He sat up and touched my arm. “You okay?”

“Yeah.”Liar. “I, um…” I met his gaze as shame turned my stomach. “I don’t think this is going to work. Again.”

He stared at me for a second as if he needed a moment to comprehend what I’d said. I nodded downward. He glanced down, and… yeah, he figured it out. It was pretty fucking obvious at that point.

“It’s not going to work,” I said again, mostly to head off any reassurances that we could salvage the situation. We couldn’t. It wasn’t happening. Not tonight.

Dammit. Today had been goingso good.

“Okay,” he said softly. “Then let’s not push it. There’s still plenty we can do.”

There was that. He was still hard, and I could at least get him off. Might as well do that before he realized what a turnoff it was for—

“Nolan.” He touched my face. “You still with me?”

“Yeah.” I couldn’t look at him. “Just… didn’t think this would…” The embarrassment was borderline unbearable. I should’ve known this wouldn’t work—that last time hadn’t been a fluke—but I’d been too turned on to think, and now… goddammit. “I didn’t think it would happenagain.”

“Hey. Look at me.” He touched my face and made me look in his eyes. “You’ve been carrying what happened for years. We’ve got time to get you past it.”

“Doesn’t seem like much of a turn-on, though. Trying to get fucked by a dick that won’t stay hard.” Ugh, I hated this so much.

“I’m sure it’s rough for you,” he whispered. “That’s the part I’m more concerned about. And I mean it—we’ve got time. You’re not going to get past all your trauma overnight.”

“But none of that trauma is because of you.”

“No, it isn’t. And I don’t want to make more trauma for you by turning this into something that’s stressing you out.” He tipped up my chin and kissed me softly. “We havetime, Nolan. I’m not going anywhere.”

Those words had me suddenly choked up. I’d been running away from everything—my past, the people who’d never understand—and the few people who got close to me never stayed that way for long. As soon as the cracks started to show, they’d leave.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, because I didn’t know what else to say.

“You’re not the one who should be sorry for anything.” He carded his fingers through my hair. “You haven’t done anything wrong. And it’s going to take time for the side of you that’s traumatized to trust thatIwon’t do anything wrong.”

I squeezed my eyes shut. “I know you won’t. I’ve never thought you would.”

“But someone else did. You know it’s not me, but some parts of your mind don’t. I can wait while they catch up.”

I touched my forehead to his and exhaled. After all this time, I’d found someone who not only got it, he was willing to stick around while I worked through it?

He touched my face and looked in my eyes. “Do you want to stop?”

“No!” I winced. “No, I don’t. I want to get you off, and I’m… I swear, I’m horny.” I gestured at my useless dick. “I really am.”

He didn’t bat an eye. “I know you are. And I know what you’re up against right now.” He drew me in and kissed me so softly, I thought I might cry. “We can still make each other feel good. Just like we always do.”

“We’re starting from scratch,” I muttered. “Since I killed the damn mood.”

Riley was already shaking his head. “No, you didn’t.”

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