Page 108 of Seven Lost Summers
Every step seems to anticipate the other, their bodies syncing until it comes across less as cleaning and more as some quiet, practiced ritual. Nate reaches for the dish towel at the exact second Theo passes it over without even glancing. Seamless. A rhythm built over years of knowing each other’s every move.
I sit on the couch, beer sweating against my palm, one leg hooked over the other. From the outside I probably look relaxed, bored even.
Except my body is wound so fucking tight it hurts to breathe. I’m staring.
My beer’s gone warm in my hand and I don’t even care. My eyes keep finding Nate.
He’s locked in that quiet focus he slips into when he’s working. Shoulders squared, forearms flexing each time his grip tightens on something. His shirt sticks to the shape of his back, the fabric damp near the collar from the heat spilling through the open doors.
Theo’s beside him, humming under his breath the way he always does when he disappears into the task. His hair falls into his eyes, and I catch the way he pushes it back with his fingers. Then he reaches up to slide a bowl onto the top shelf, that narrow line of muscle vanishing into his jeans.
Every detail pulls me further under.
I tell myself to look away, but my eyes won’t obey.
Nate leans in behind him, saying something I can’t catch. Whatever it is makes Theo grin. The easy way they shift around each other, all that history folded into muscle memory, is too much.
If they turned right now, if either of them caught me staring, I wouldn’t even have an excuse.
I take a sip of my beer to cover the way my pulse is thundering. My breath goes shallow as my mind drifts where it shouldn’t, slipping straight into places I’ve been trying to avoid since I got here. What would it be to stand in that space between them, pressed into their bodies while they moved around me with that same effortless rhythm? Hands, mouths, cocks working me open until I couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began.
Heat crawls over my skin, wrong as hell but so fucking good I can’t swallow it down.
Theo slides another plate into the dishwasher, water dripping down his wrist as he murmurs something to Nate. Mid-laugh, Theo glances up and catches me staring.
The grin spreads slow across his face, and my stomach drops.
His gaze holds mine, and it tells me he knows exactly where my heads at.
I drag my eyes to the beer in my hand, desperate for a distraction, but his stare pins me in place. My chest hammers, breath shallow, every beat too loud in my ears.
I curse under my breath.
Get your shit together, Quinn. Stop being pathetic.
You’re here to capture the band. Do the job. Not to sit here stripping them bare in your head while they rinse out the fucking sink.
Because if he knew… if either of them knew, that I’ve been imagining both of them pinning me down, cocks hard, mouths on my skin, he’d either laugh his ass off or drag me in there and fuck me until I couldn’t walk.
I tip back the last of my beer and push to my feet, clinging to some illusion of control.
“I think I might call it a night,” I say, trying for breezy but landing somewhere between shaky and strained.
Nate’s mouth curves, subtle but knowing. “What? Q, you don’t have to go yet. We haven’t even caught up.”
Theo drops the dish towel, eyes cutting to mine with that wicked glint. His mouth hooks into a smirk.
“If you’re heading to bed, we could, you know… keep you company. Warm the sheets. Test the mattress. Strictly quality control, of course.”
Heat slams through me so fast it knocks the breath from my lungs. My heart kicks hard against my ribs, and my mouth moves before my brain catches up.
I laugh, shaking my head. “Please. You’d trip over your own ego before you even made it to the bed.” My gaze lingers on him, lips curving slow. “You honestly think you could handle me in bed, Kade?”
Something sharpens in his eyes. That lazy grin twists into something feral.
“Oh, sweetheart,” he murmurs, voice dropping low and rough. “I wouldn’t just handle you. I’d ruin you.”
My knees nearly buckle.
