Page 17 of Love By Design

Especially because of who he was to me.

“Very serious.”

“How is this not embarrassing?”

“It was a scene, Silas. A scene gone wrong, but a scene just the same. Is it embarrassing when you come so hard you cry? When you get spanked until it’s difficult to breathe and you choke on air? When you have to ask for permission to crawl to the bathroom to relieve yourself after?—”

I stopped myself, covering my mouth with my hand to actually contain the rest of the words in my mouth. Silas’s lips parted, jaw hanging slack, and his fingers flexed against the outside of his thighs. He swayed forward, and I was more than ready to catch him if he fell.

“After what?” he rasped.

I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It very much matters,” he said quietly. “Marshall.”

I stood up, took a step toward him. He took a step back, not cowering, but so he had enough room to tilt his head to gaze up at me.

“Don’t play with fire, sweetheart,” I warned.

His tongue darted out to moisten the corner of his lips, and I zeroed in on the motion, the deliberate and teasing swipe,covering just the corner, then half, then the entirety of his bottom lip.

“I want to know,” he said.

I took another step toward him, and we were so dangerously close. I could easily slide my hands around his waist, pull our bodies flush, let him feel the way my cock throbbed for him.

“There you are!”

Lincoln, Silas’s distracted and horny friend called out from the doorway. His voice was like a glass of cold water, thrown on us both. Silas stumbled away from me, the backs of his legs colliding with another chair. His arms flailed out like propellers as his body swung back, ready to fall. I lunged forward, hooking my arm around the small of his back and sinking down into my own center of gravity to haul him to his feet. It brought us together like I’d wanted earlier, but with far more violence. He weighed more than I expected, and we both tumbled backward onto the couch.

I landed hard against the seat, legs splayed with Silas neatly tucked against me, protected from the fall. He wasn’t protected from my arousal, though. His thigh sank between my legs and the heat and rigidity of my erection were unavoidable. He sucked in a surprised breath, eyes going wide as his brain connected the dots of what was happening. I tightened my arm around him, a primal instinct I had no control over. His body felt so fucking good against me.

“Oh, shit.” Lincoln laughed from the door, another rush of ice over the top of us.

Silas scrambled out of my arms, and I cursed his friend under my breath as we both righted ourselves.

“I said I would come find you,” Silas said.

“It’s been over an hour.”

It felt like ten minutes.

It felt like the whole night.

“Are you okay now?” Lincoln asked. “Are you ready to head home?”

I bit my lips between my teeth to stop from snapping at him. There was no way Silas was okay, no matter what answer he gave. I knew that, and Silas knew that, but whether he would admit it or not was another thing entirely.

“I’m fine,” Silas lied, and I frowned at him.

He wasn’t looking at me, but anyone could see the tension in the fake smile he offered up with the answer.

“I feel horrible, Silas,” Lincoln said.

Another apology.

“It’s not your fault.”

I cleared my throat, and Silas did finally look at me.