Page 117 of A Cold Hard Truth

Remington collapsed on top of him, and Sebastian squirmed onto his back and kissed the corner of Remington’s mouth.

“I have to tell you something,” he said, the feelings bubbling up unexpectedly.

“Hmn?”

“Are you awake enough for this?” Sebastian chuckled, wiping sweat from his eyes. He plucked Remington’s glasses off and set them carefully on the nightstand.

“I’m always here when you need me,” Remington said, and Sebastian felt the truth of it like a blanket.

They’d stumbled over a misstep because their relationship hadn’t been clear. They hadn’t talked, and this thing between them was so much bigger than either of them wanted to admit.

“I know,” he agreed, staring up at the ceiling of his childhood bedroom. “That’s…I’m scared.”

Remington was up before Sebastian could blink, hauling him up and reaching for his glasses all in the same fluid movement. Remington moved like the house was on fire, not like a man who’d just fucked all of the cum from his body.

“What are you scared of?” Remington took Sebastian’s hands and dragged his thumbs over Sebastian’s knuckles. His palms and fingers were still slick from the lube, and Sebastian smiled for no reason at all.

“This is a big thing, Remington,” he said. “That’s scary.”

“It could be so easy,” Remington interjected, taking the words out of his mouth.

He nodded.

“It almost feels like a set-up. Like it’s pretend.”

“You look very real to me,” Sebastian repeated the words he’d said to Remington when they’d uncovered their secret identities.

Remington’s mouth twitched into a tired smile.

“I want something real with you. I want to be with you, and only you.”

“Exclusive, you mean.”

“Yes.” He nodded again. “Exclusive.”

“I like that,” Remington said. “Why else are you scared?”

Curse the insufferably observant man for knowing there was more to his worries. There were so many feelings inside of him he didn’t know how to put words to, and the cool cum trickling out of his ass didn’t make them any easier to find.

“I’m embarrassed,” he admitted, reaching down and swiping his fingers over the pool of cum between his ass cheeks. He raised them to his mouth and poked out his tongue, testing the flavor of Remington’s spend and his own taste against his tongue. It wasn’t bad.

“Of being with a man?” Remington hedged.

Sebastian slid his finger out of his mouth. “God, no. Of most everything in my life, Rem, but never that. Never you.”

Remington’s entire body relaxed in the slightest, and Sebastian pulled them onto their backs, flinging his forearm across his forehead and letting out a breath.

“This room, to start,” he went on, gesturing toward the space beyond the bed. “My brother, this whole thing.”

When he said that, he meant more than the past week, more than the drama of earlier in the night. Sebastian was embarrassed for his entire life, for the person he’d become because he’d been too scared to be anyone different. For so long, Sebastian had wanted more, but he had done nothing to get it. Sebastian had watched his best friend fall in love and break away, and the only thing he’d done was bury himself into every bottle of alcohol he could find.

Sebastian had tried to hide, but he hadn’t even been able to do that right. For his entire life, he’d let himself get pushed and prodded around, dressed and told where to be and what to do. First his father, and then his brother, and he was done with it. While Sebastian had grown to like the structure of being told what to do, he wanted to have control over it. Which he knew sounded contradictory, but…

He wanted it to be his choice.

He wanted to choose to give up control.

And with Remington, he had the chance.