Page 9 of Hook, Line, and Tentacle

“But if you’re going to take away my voice,” I continue, tone still soft so he knows I’m not upset, “then I need a safe gesture too.”

He sobers in an instant, expression going taut with concern. “I didn’t mean—”

I frame his face before he can spiral, brushing my thumbs gently across the sharp ridges of his cheekbones. He’s unfairly beautiful. “Hey. It’s okay. You didn’t do anything wrong. I just want to be clear with you. I’ll tap you with the back of my hand if I need to stop. Okay? Like this. ”

I press the back of my hand to his shoulder, tapping a few times.

It’s a gesture I learned from a previous partner who sometimes went non-verbal when overwhelmed.

We decided that, like a safe word being one you wouldn’t say by accident, the back of your hand isn’t likely to come into play intentionally during sex.

Cal nods, curling the soft end of a tentacle over my hand and holding it there at his shoulder. “Okay.”

“And, just so you know.” I tilt my head as I search his face. “The safe word and gesture are for you too. You know that, right?”

His brows furrow. “Why would I need them?”

I snort. “Just because you’re a big scary tentacle god who could fold me up like a lawn chair doesn’t mean you might not need to stop. So, tell me you understand.”

He frowns, but pulls me down to kiss me, slow and pliant. “I understand.”

“Good,” I breathe.

He tilts his head as I sit back. “I’m not a god.”

I scoff, dragging my hands down his chest to the soft, warm curve of his stomach. “Then it’s very unfair of you to look like this.”

His expression shifts, genuine confusion suffusing his features. “Like what?”

“Come on,” I mutter, glancing down at his body and then back up. “Have you seen yourself?”

“Yes,” he says, completely serious. “For a very long time, in fact. I wasn’t under the impression there was much special about me.”

The flare of indignation cutting through me is so sharp it’s startling. I slide my hands across the soft slope of his waist, up the breadth of his chest, back to the strong line of his shoulders.

“You’re wrong,” I whisper. “Maybe it just takes the right person to see it.”

When I trace my hand lower, over the firm swell of his hip and the base of one of the tentacles, it curves lazily toward me.

I glance at Cal to find he’s watching me. “Does this hurt?”

His mouth quirks. “No. Not unless I’m trying to hide them. That’s why I wear the big hoodies.”

“I like the big hoodies,” I murmur. “I want to steal one. Hide in it. ”

He chuckles, low and rough. “One of mine would drown you.”

“That’s the point.” I slide both palms down to his belly again, dragging slow and deliberate. “Plus, it’d smell like you. I like that.”

He groans, lifting his hips slightly into my touch. My fingers move with care, rapt as I trail the soft curve of his stomach. He makes a low, uncertain sound.

“I don’t think about my body much,” he admits, voice quieter. “At least, not the human part. But this—” His hand hovers over his stomach, gesturing vaguely. “This might be my least favorite. It’s not... conventionally attractive, from what I’ve gathered.”

I hum, glancing up through my lashes. “You’re wrong again.”

His brows lift, uncertain.

“I love it,” I say simply. I lean down and press a kiss above his navel. His breath catches.

“Why?” The confusion in his voice is genuine.

“I don’t know.” I drop another kiss there, then another, then my tongue darts out to drag a slow line upward, to his chest. A shiver rolls through him, but he doesn’t stop me. “It’s just sexy. I like that you’re not perfect. I’m not perfect, so I don’t want a perfect thing.”

His gaze sharpens. “Now you’re the one who’s wrong. You are perfect. And I don’t like hearing you say otherwise.” The words are clipped and his tone emphatic, but not unkind or harsh. “Don’t say it. Don’t even think it.”

I smirk, dragging my hands over his ribs, his sides, the plush give of his waist. “Then you don’t think it either. We can be perfect together.”

He huffs something close to a laugh, although it’s still a little disbelieving, like he can’t understand quite how he gets to be here. I feel the same. I thread my fingers through his hair again, stroking along his scalp like I did before, slow and deliberate.

“Do you like this?” I murmur.

His eyes flutter half-shut, and he makes a soft, satisfied sound. “Mmhmm.”

“I like your hair,” I muse, dragging my nails lightly across his scalp, then curling my fingers again. “It’s thick. Sexy.”

He doesn’t respond, but he leans into my touch like he’s chasing it .

“I’ve been wondering…” I trail off thoughtfully, then give a slow, deliberate tug at the roots.

Cal’s whole body tenses. A quiet, strangled sound punches out of his throat—half growl, half moan—and I grin as his hips lift on reflex.

“Okay, yes,” I whisper, pleased. “You like that.”

His tentacles slide over me again, at first only seeming to explore, gentle and curious.

Then, without warning, he flips me, fast and sure.

I land on my back with a breathless gasp, naked beneath him, where he’s still in his jeans.

He cages me with his weight braced over me, his tentacles spreading around us like a net.

He smirks down at me, voice low and teasing. “Greedy little trespasser. You wanted to know what sounds I make as well?”

“Yes,” I breathe.

He hums thoughtfully, tilting his head. “Maybe you’d like to learn what kind of sounds I make when you suck my cock.”

My breath catches. I know my eyes must be wide as saucers, but I nod without hesitation. “Yes, please. I want to see the tentacle cock.”

He chuckles. “It’s not a tentacle, remember?”

I bite my lip. “Can you make it like one?”

His laugh turns dark, rough with arousal. I feel it pour over my skin like static. “You really are a dirty, needy little thing, aren’t you? You want to be filled up with all of me?”

“Yes,” I gasp. “Yes, please.”

He sits back on his knees, then stands, and I gaze up from where I’m sprawled beneath him. He moves slowly, deliberately, pushing his jeans down, followed by his boxers, just enough to free himself.

I forget how to breathe. It’s a distant memory, breathing. But that’s alright, because if he fucks me with that thing, I know I’ll die happy.

Finally, a startled exhale escapes me, sharp and involuntary, so I guess I’ll live for however much more oxygen that gives me. I take that time to absorb the sight of him.

His cock is thick and heavy. The same deep gray-blue shade as his tentacles, flushed darker at the tip, like storm clouds swollen with rain. It’s patterned in ridges—subtle but unmistakable, winding along the shaft like the currents of some ancient tide.

It’s also… sheening. Glossed in something faintly iridescent, like light moving over fish scales. Pearls and seawater and dark things pulled from the deep.

“You said—” I start, stall. My voice sounds weak and distant. I flex my fingers against the couch cushions. “Uh… not a tentacle dick?”

He glances down at himself, casually fisting the length and dragging a slow, deliberate stroke from root to tip. I watch the way it glistens, how even his large hand only wraps it with about an inch of overlap at his fingertips.

Yes, I’ll definitely die, but I’ll definitely die happy, if he fucks me with that.

I really want him to fuck me with that.

“It’s not a tentacle dick,” he says simply.

My brain stutters. “It’s got ridges.”

“Yes.”

“It’s sparkling.”

His eyes widen with affront. “It is not.”

“It’s… blue.”

“It’s not a tentacle.”

I lift my gaze to his face, trying—and probably completely failing—not to look completely rapt and ruined at the sight of him. That’s fair enough, I think I’ve already laid my cards on the table at this point.

“It’s not a human penis,” I point out.

Cal smiles. Not just any smile. A wicked one. The kind that coils heat low in my stomach, that makes me feel hunted in the best possible way. He’s the predator and I’m the prey, and I want it to be that way.

“No,” he agrees, voice like smoke and deep water. “It isn’t. Does that excite you, love?”

I suck in a breath that goes absolutely nowhere, nodding wordlessly.

He hums, mockingly sympathetic, like he’s humoring me. “Do you want to taste me?”

“Yes.” The word all but bursts out of me .

Desperate much?

I wonder distantly what’s happened to me, that I used to be saner than this, surely—then I dismiss the thought, because no, I didn’t.

Cal’s laugh is low and pleased, one tentacle curling around my wrist and gently tugging, guiding me upright.

I rise shakily to my feet in front of him, every nerve lit up, body thrumming with need.

He pushes his jeans and boxers the rest of the way down, and then he leans in—slow, almost tender—and kisses me.

I melt into it, soft and sweet and dizzy from everything—the kiss, the sight of him, the want clawing up from my core. His want, mirrored back at me, because he’s as needy here as I am.

Then all the softness is gone. He pulls back, and his eyes burn into mine. “Kneel.”

I drop instantly, knees hitting the floor with a solid thud. The rug beneath me does nothing to cushion it. They’ll probably bruise. I don’t care. I’d bruise for him.

A sound rumbles in his chest, almost like a purr. “Such a good little trespasser. So pretty down there for me.”

I glance up, heat blooming in my cheeks, breath caught somewhere in my throat as I watch his cock bob just inches from my face.

“Tell me your safe word.”

“Cthulhu,” I answer instantly, with a smirk that bites at the corners of my mouth.

He barks a laugh. Quick and delighted. “Your safe gesture?”

I raise my hand and tap the back of it against his thigh. “Like that.”