Page 59 of The Official Problem
Matthieu shook his head. For a heart-stopping second, Kieran thought he might snap. Then something shifted in Matthieu’s eyes, shock and betrayal giving way to heartbreak. He shoved off the wall and strode towards Kieran.
“You fucking idiot,” he growled before slamming his lips against Kieran’s in a bruising kiss.
The kiss was nothing like the one they’d shared minutes earlier. There was no restraint, no pretending they could still hold back. They crashed together like thunder, wild and consuming. Years of aching, silence, and heartbreak finally erupted in a frenzy. Kieran’s hands trembled as he gripped Matthieu’s face, his thumbs brushing over skin damp with tears.
Matthieu responded like a man starved, clutching Kieran’s shirt and pulling him in until there was no space left between them. Kieran gave him everything. Every emotion. Every ounce of pain and regret and hopeless longing.
Each brush of his lips was an apology. Each soft moan was a plea. The firm grasp on Matthieu’s chin was a promise he would never be so stupid as to let him go again.
“Don’t you get it?” Matthieu muttered against his lips, drawing back far enough to speak but not far enough to break the connection. “I would have faced anything with you. It would have all been worth it—if you’d only fought for me.”
TWENTY-TWO
KIERAN
If only you’d fought for me.
If only you’d fought for me.
If only…
The words pounded in Kieran’s mind like a curse, mocking and merciless. How had he been so blind? So stupid? If only he’d stopped for one second—just one—to think about how those words would have hit Matthieu, he would’ve known. Kieran would’ve chased him across the damn continent if it meant Matthieu knew he was the only person who ever mattered. Instead, Kieran had let him go.
Sure, he’d called. Texted. Left voicemails that got no reply. If he’d truly understood what Matthieu believed—what he felt—Kieran would’ve jumped on the next flight to New Jersey. He’d have hammered on his door until his knuckles bled. Instead, he let the years pass—years where Matthieu truly believed Kieran never loved him, that he was disposable. Just a chapter in Kieran’s story, not the whole damn book.
Now Kieran had to live with that. The pain he’d caused. The time he’d wasted. The distance he’d forced between them like a battering ram. That knowledge might split him in two.
He broke the kiss with a gasp, forehead pressed to Matthieu’s, their breaths tangled in the narrow space between them. “I didn’t know,” he whispered. “If I’d known what you believed—God, Matty—I never would’ve let you go.”
Matthieu’s jaw twitched beneath Kieran’s hand. His gaze dropped, as if he couldn’t face the weight of Kieran’s grief—or maybe his own. But he didn’t pull back, didn’t move.
Kieran cupped his cheek, thumb brushing the corner of Matthieu’s perfect mouth. “Let me fix this. Let me try.”
Was it even fixable? How could anyone erase years of damage they’d carved into someone else’s heart? If there was even the slightest chance Matthieu could forgive him, if any road back to them still existed, Kieran would take it. He’d do whatever it took if Matthieu gave him the faintest sign there was still hope.
“Anything you need, Matty. I’ll do anything you need me to.”
“I need you to take me to bed.” Those eight words weren’t spoken; they were prayed—a plea disguised as a command.
Who was Kieran to deny Matthieu anything? He gripped Matthieu’s thighs and lifted him easily into his arms. Matthieu melted against him, mouth finding the pulse in Kieran’s neck, lips working over the sensitive skin. Soft, indecipherable words slipped from his lips—words Kieran couldn’t catch, but felt like heat branding his skin.
Kieran had never been to the apartment before, but Matthieu’s bed was visible through an open doorway at the end of the hall. It only took a few steps, one’s he wouldn’t even remember later, before he was inside. He laid Matthieu down against a tangle of uncharacteristically rumpled sheets.
He tugged the Seattle hoodie over Matthieu’s head slowly and reverently; a quiet ache settled in his chest as it hit the floor. He wanted to be fucked by Matthieu in that hoodie. Or better, in his jersey, number twenty-five stretched across his arms as he drove into him, pounding Kieran closer and closer to the edge.
He wanted Matthieu’s skin more, needed it.
Kieran would trade every atom of oxygen in his lungs to taste Matthieu again. He wanted to trace every ridge of Matthieu’s shallow abs with his tongue, to press sweet, tender kisses into the light dusting of hair on his chest. To suck the soft, dark skin of his nipples until Matthieu was shaking, vibrating with uncontrollable need.
Kieran took his time, dragging his mouth slowly down Matthieu’s body as if searching for salvation in his flesh. And he was. Matthieu wouldn’t let him continue his worship for long, Kieran knew that. However, there was something in the way Matthieu looked down at him—soft, open, stripped bare and raw in a way Kieran had never seen. It made him think that maybe, just for tonight, he would. Maybe Matthieu would let Kieran be his salvation, too.
“I love you,” Kieran whispered into the soft flesh at Matthieu’s waist.
Matthieu jolted beneath him, a sound, half-gasp, half-moan, torn from his lips.
“I want to show you,” Kieran murmured, steadying him with one hand. “How fiercely I missed you. Every day. Every night. All these years.”
He kissed lower, teasing his tongue beneath the fabric of Matthieu’s sweats, then back up again. Slow. Torturous. He left no inch of Matthieu untouched. Unloved. Kieran’s obsession in every brush of his lips. Matthieu writhed under him, each breath ragged and broken as he begged for more. For anything.Everything.
