Page 23 of Depths of Desire (The Saints of Westmont U #4)

SEVENTEEN

OLIVER

The water stilled around me. My fingers brushed the edge of the pool, and I surfaced slowly, breath hitching as Coach called out the times.

“Good work, Hayworth.”

I nodded, shaking the water from my ears, heart still hammering against my ribs. My body buzzed with the familiar aftermath of exertion, effort, and a faint burn in the shoulders. I hoisted myself out of the pool and peeled off my cap, blinking against the overhead lights.

“Wait up,” Coach called as I grabbed my towel. “Just a heads-up. Nationals moved. Second week of June.”

I froze. “What?”

“All qualifiers are being shifted. You’ll get an official notice soon, but…yeah. Second week of June. Keep training like you’re heading in hot.”

My towel slipped from my shoulder.

Second week of June.

I stood there, wet hair clinging to my forehead, chlorine in my throat, lungs half-full of water and panic.

That was the week.

The week Lennox had booked the trip.

The lodge. The mountains. The second shot at the place that changed everything.

The place where we’d begun.

I’d said yes. I’d meant it. I wanted that trip more than anything. Not just for the nostalgia. Not just because it was romantic.

But because it was with him.

Because it mattered.

And now, this.

Nationals.

The place where everything had gone sideways. The competition that had taken my confidence and driven it into the dirt. Olympic silver had stung, but it was Nationals where I truly fell apart. No one even talks about sixth place. No one remembers that.

And I had sworn— sworn —I’d come back stronger.

What was I supposed to do now?

Withdraw? Skip it all for a trip I’d said yes to before this new timeline? Try to explain that I was in love with someone who made the air taste sweeter, and I couldn’t let that go?

I didn’t know.

I couldn’t know. Not now. Not with the echo of last year screaming in my blood.

I clenched my fists around the towel and shut it down. Compartmentalize. That was what I was good at. Not tonight.

Tonight wasn’t for decisions.

Because Lennox was at my apartment.

He had a key. I’d given it to him last week, casually, like it didn’t mean anything. Like I hadn’t looked down at the spare in my palm and thought, This is what trust feels like .

I stepped out into the cool night, muscles tight, mind spinning, and walked hard. Feet on autopilot, emotions locked in a box. The world spun around me, too fast, too loud.

But I only thought about him.

About his smile. His voice. The sound he made when I kissed the side of his neck and he tried to play it off like it didn’t wreck him.

I took the stairs two at a time. I unlocked the door with trembling fingers. The apartment was warm.

Dim lighting pooled on the wooden floors. There was no noise, just the faint hum of the fridge and the ghost of shower steam still curling in the hall.

I stepped inside.

And stopped.

There it was. That smell.

His shampoo. His cologne. That earthy, citrusy mix that had burrowed so deep into my senses that I sometimes swore I could smell it even when he was gone.

I turned down the hallway, the tension breaking, bleeding into something else. Something deeper. Heavier. Hungrier.

The bedroom door was half-closed.

I pushed it open.

And there he was.

Lennox, in my bed.

One arm stretched lazily above his head, his fingers curled against the pillow like he’d been waiting there forever.

The sheet rode low over his hips, a careless slant of white against gold skin.

Nothing else. No shirt. No pretense. Just bare limbs and that breath-stealing calm he wore like a second skin.

The soft light from the bedside lamp hit him just right, gilding the peaks of his chest, catching along the fine edge of his collarbone, drawing long shadows down the ridges of his abs.

His hair was damp and tousled from the shower, curling slightly where it touched the nape of his neck, like he’d towel-dried it in a hurry.

His cock lay thick and semi-hard against his thigh, visible through the thin sheet that did nothing to hide the outline of him. My mouth went dry at the sight.

His eyes found mine immediately. Half-lidded, slow to blink, and full of something wicked. Something soft. Like he’d been expecting me, counting the seconds. And now that I was here, the game could finally begin.

He looked like a dream I’d had a hundred times. Only better, because this time, the dream looked back. And he didn’t vanish.

He smirked faintly, just with the corner of his mouth. His gaze drifted down my frame and back up again like a deliberate drag of silk across skin. His free hand moved to palm himself through the sheet, slow and teasing, watching my reaction.

“Fuck,” I breathed.

He didn’t move otherwise. He didn’t need to.

He just was.

And he looked like he was mine.

My chest rose too fast, like my lungs had forgotten how to measure air. My skin felt too tight. My blood ran hotter. Heat pooled low in my belly, and I could feel myself getting hard just from the sight of him.

There was no pressure here. No expectation.

Just the electric hum of awareness threading between us like an invisible wire.

My pulse kicked up, sharp, hot, and alive.

Not from panic, but need. The kind of need that made the whole damn world go quiet.

Nationals didn’t exist.

The water, the whistle, the failure, all faded.

Time didn’t exist.

Deadlines. Races. Promises. Gone.

Only this.

Only the way his lashes flicked as I stepped into the room.

Only the rise of his chest, slow and steady, like he knew I’d come and wasn’t the least bit surprised.

Only the heat blooming in the space between us like a storm front about to break.

Only him.

I crossed the threshold without a word, heat licking down my spine. Every part of me was drawn forward by gravity, desire, and something deeper I didn’t have a name for.

The door shut softly behind me with a click that might as well have sealed the world out.

I didn’t need anything else.

Not answers. Not plans.

Not even a breath.

Because the only thing that mattered right then was this moment. This room. This man.

And everything else could wait.

He didn’t speak when I stepped closer—just watched me with that half-lidded look, full of fire and certainty. His fingers flexed against his cock through the sheet, stroking slowly, putting on a show that made my knees weak.

I did.

I let my gaze drift down the slope of his neck, the subtle movement of his chest as he breathed, the obvious outline of his erection beneath the thin cover.

“Were you trying to kill me?” I asked, voice low, rougher than I meant it to be.

Lennox smiled, slow and smug. His hand squeezed himself harder. “You like it?”

“I haven’t decided if I like it or if I’m about to combust.”

“Then come closer and find out.”

That did it.

I braced a knee against the mattress and leaned over him, planting one hand beside his ribs. The lamplight curved around the planes of his body like it belonged to him, and I traced that light with my eyes, burning it into memory.

He tilted his chin, challenging. “You’re still dressed.”

I smirked, but my hand moved to the sheet. “Let’s fix that problem first.”

He watched, pupils widening, as I pinched the edge of the cotton and tugged, slow, deliberate, teasing. Inch by inch, I uncovered him. The ridges of his abdomen, the lines of his hips, the powerful slope of his thighs.

And then his cock, fully hard now, thick and flushed and perfect. Precum beaded at the tip, and I had to bite back a groan.

My breath stuttered somewhere between my chest and throat.

He was stunning.

But it wasn’t just his body.

It was him.

My fingers skimmed the length of his leg, up and around his waist, finding the familiar groove of his hip bone and anchoring there. I dipped lower, over his stomach, deliberately avoiding where he wanted me most. He made a frustrated sound that went straight to my cock.

“Tease,” he breathed.

“You started it.” I leaned in to press a kiss just above his navel, then lower, following the trail of dark hair that led down. His skin shivered under my mouth.

His cock twitched against my cheek as I kissed him along his hip bone, so close but not touching where he needed me.

“Please,” Lennox whispered, and that single word nearly undid me.

I looked up at him, hair mussed, lips parted, eyes dark with want, and couldn’t resist anymore. I wrapped my hand around the base of his cock and took him into my mouth in one smooth motion.

“Fuck!” His back arched off the bed, one hand flying to tangle in my hair.

He tasted like salt and heat and everything I’d been craving. I worked him slowly at first, savoring the weight of him on my tongue, the way he filled my mouth completely. His thighs trembled on either side of my head.

“God, yes, just like that,” he panted, his hips rocking up slightly. I relaxed my throat and took him deeper, until my nose brushed the short hair at his base. The sound he made was inhuman.

I set a rhythm, slow pulls, quick flicks of my tongue, hollowing my cheeks until he gasped my name like a prayer. His free hand gripped the sheets, knuckles white with the effort of holding back. But I didn’t want him to hold back. I wanted him falling apart.

I slipped a hand between his legs, fingers finding the tight ring of muscle behind his balls. He was already slick there, he’d prepared himself while waiting for me, and that thought made my own cock throb painfully in my shorts.

“You planned this,” I said, pulling off him just long enough to speak.

“Hoped for it,” he corrected breathlessly. “I always hope for it.”

I circled my finger around his entrance, applying just enough pressure to make him gasp. “How long have you been ready for me?”

“Since you left this morning.” His voice cracked on the words. “Couldn’t stop thinking about you. About this.”

I pushed one finger inside him, and he was so hot, so ready, that I had to pause and breathe through the rush of arousal. He clenched around me, pulling me deeper.