Page 84 of Worth the Wait
Nathan smirked behind him, lips ghosting Freddie’s skin. “Shoulda said. I’m trained in many forms of torture.”
Freddie turned in his arms, coffee in one hand, the other bracing against Nathan’s bare chest. “Don’t doubt it. You’ve been torturing me for years.”
Nathan leant forward until their foreheads touched. “Same.”
There was a long breath between them, then Freddie ghosted his fingertips across the ink scrawled on Nathan’s chest. The compass, stark black on golden skin.
“Always north, huh?”
“It’s an infantry thing.” Nathan opened his eyes. “First thing they drill into you. Know your north. Know it blind. So when you’re dumped in the middle of nowhere, you can find your way out. Find your way home.”
Freddie slowed his thumb over the N, grazing the point like a question.
“This letter’s different.”
“Yeah.” Nathan swallowed. “It’s also for Nate. For me to remember who I am. Or… who I was meant to be. Something to hold on to. In case someone, somewhere, gave a fuck whether I came back.”
Freddie drew in a breath, then looked straight into Nathan’s eyes, unblinking. “I did.” His voice cracked, quiet but full of weight. “Always did. ‘Cept you never came back. Not to me.”
Nathan pulled away enough to meet him properly but kept his arms firm around Freddie’s waist. “I thought I was doing the right thing.”
“Okay, yeah. Fine. You were becoming a dad. Needed stability. A job. That part I understood.” He blinked hard, looking past Nathan for a second as if the words hurt more coming out. “Eventually.” He turned back. “But you didn’t write. Didn’t call. You just disappeared. You didn’t just leave for the army, Nate. You left this town. You leftme.”
“That’s not true.”
Freddie scoffed. “Did I miss all those other knocks on my door?”
“You werefurious, and I thought…I thought you needed time. Told myself I was giving you space. That if you wanted to see me off, you would have.”
He ran a hand through his hair, shoulders tight, voice cracking open.
“I got on that bus and kept looking back. Half expecting, halfpraying, I’d see you running after it. But you didn’t. So I thought… you’d made your choice. That you’d decided to let me go. And I never blamed you for that. Not once.” Nathan’s throat burned. “I figured I had to let you move on. Live your life. The life I couldn’t. Not with the uniform. My old man. You got to live free. I only knew how to survive.”
Freddie closed his eyes.
Then he twisted away. Not in rejection, but to set his coffee mug down on the counter. When he turned back, theair between them had changed. His eyes were dark, burning. And he gripped Nathan by the back of the neck andhauledhim in to kiss him.
Nathan stumbled forward with the force of it, mouth crashing onto Freddie’s. No space, no breath, only fire and teeth and years of hunger pouring into a single brutal moment. Nathan let Freddie take control this time. The way he always had, and Nathan had always loved. Freddie had been the instigator, the one to show Nathan what to do, how to do it, and kissed away his fear. So he moaned into it, shuddering when Freddie slid his hand under the waistband of his jeans, gripping his hip as if heownedhim.
Nathan’s phone rang in his back pocket. A shrill vibration against his skin. He ignored it. Not that he could answer, as Freddie broke the kiss to drop to his knees and Nathan had to lean forward to brace his hands on the counter for balance. But Freddie shoved him back, guiding him until he hit the wall with a solid thud, then made quick work of his jeans.
The phone kept ringing.
Nathan let it.
Freddie yanked his jeans down far enough and freed him, then his mouth was on him.
Nathan gasped.
Loud.
Helpless.
Freddie wrapped warm lips around Nathan’s cockhead, swiping his tongue along the underside. Then Freddie took him in deep. Confident.Hungry. And Nathan nearly buckled, shooting one hand out to brace against the wall, threading the other into Freddie’s thick mound of dark hair.
The pressure. The heat. The fucking rhythm.
It was obscene. The slick sound of it. How Freddie used his mouth as if he’d missed this. As if he knew exactly what Nathan needed to fall apart.
