Page 23 of Should Our Stars Collide

Since Kieran has proven to be a rather high mountain to top—punabsolutely intended—Ash is likely headed into a looong dry spell. Ah, well, that’s fine. He has no doubt it will all be more than worth it in the end. So, so worth it.

6

Being sexually frustrated, as Ash has found out, has one advantage—increased physical endurance. Which effectively turns his morning jog from five kilometers to eight. How convenient. He recently started noticing a little pudge growing on his tummy, but it’s hard to resist when his patients regularly supply him with chocolates or home-made cookies.

Hopping into the shower once he gets home, he decides to quickly rub one out anyway. It’s healthy! Science says so.

Kieran’s grumpy face exorcises any other thought, getting his dick hard in two seconds flat. He gives himself a firm, languid stroke, summoning the memory of what it felt like to hold Kieran close. How his fingers curled in Ash’s shirt so tightly it tore open, and how Kieran seemed to push closer for a moment before realizing what he was doing. How he demanded Ash let him go, but made no attempt to step away himself. The light, coconutty scent of his shampoo tickling Ash’s nose. Kieran's tightly corded muscles under his hand, when his arm was wrapped around him.

God, Kieran was so tense. He's always on edge, and not just around Ash. Just observing him for a bit and having a quick peek at his thoughts had revealed how highly strung he is on the regular.

Ash loves it.

And he would love it even more if he could discover all the ways he could make Kieranrelax.

He lets his imagination run wild, increasing the pace of his strokes when he feels himself getting close. What tips him over the edge is the look he imagines in Kieran’s eyes, full of fire and wonder, while Ash rocks his whole world.

Although, given how Kieran manages to occupy his every thought despite only meeting him twice, it wouldn’t be just Kieran’s world getting rocked.

Turning the water temp to cold when his dick expresses interest in round two, he quickly scrubs himself down. It doesn’t help much.

After drying himself off and wrapping a towel around his hips, he grabs his phone, doing a quick review of his appointments for this week. Almost fully booked, as per usual. That’s good, he needs a distraction.

It’s a shame he’ll need to wait to see Dawson until next Friday. After what happened last Saturday at the cafe, he’d really like to do a check on him. It’s not every day that you find out your husband is actually not your husband, but a reaper who had just snatched the husband’s body and managed to lose all his memories in the meantime.

Gabe seemed confident that everything would be okay. Ash doesn’t really have an opinion. He’s never met Cal, never got the opportunity to get a read on him. But after hearing what Cal used to be like before his accident and seeing him in Dawson’s thoughts and memories, he doubts things can get much worse for Dawson. He’s probably a million times better off with a reaper from the beyond than the man who used to be his husband.

Thinking of Dawson brings him back to Kieran and last night. After having a quick glance at his thoughts, it became obvious that the main thing on his mind hadn’t been a potential hookup. It had been Dawson, and his immense worry for his best friend. How he’d created the worst-case scenarios and played them over and over in his mind like a horror movie.

It was also obvious that he blamed Ash for failing Dawson, ‘because if he’d done a good job Dawson wouldn’t have gone back to his abusive husband’. It took a lot of self-restraint notto tell Kieran everything and alleviate his anxiety. So he resorted to the next best thing—flirting.

It helped. Kieran hadn’t thought of Dawson after that,andAsh got to have some fun.

A message notification lights up his phone. He’s surprised to see it’s from Zeke. He could count on one hand the number of times they’ve exchanged messages.

Zeke:

Hola! You planning to drop by today?

How random. Except Zeke doesn’t do random.

Wasn’t planning on it.

You should

Ash checks the time. He still has two hours before his first appointment, so he might as well.

Is there a special occasion?

You could say that xD

As he suspected. And now he can’t wait to see what that’s all about.

After he arrives at the café, it doesn’t take long to find out why Zeke wanted him here.

Stopping in the doorway, Ash takes in the unusual scene in front of him. For once, Zeke is behind the till and serving a customer, while Gabe is…well, he should be making coffees. Instead, he’s deep in conversation with the man on the other side of the counter. Judging by the googly eyes Gabe is making at him, it must be the infamous Ellis.

Finally, Ash will get to see for himself if the guy his cousin has pined for is worth the time of day. He has no doubt Gabe would avoid introducing the two of them if he had his way, so this works out perfectly.