Page 55 of Take You Home (Redwater Demons #3)

T he rough press of Obie’s lips on Chester’s is like an electric shock to his entire body. Obie’s hands are tight on either side of Chester’s face and his mouth is firm, insistent, demanding? ? —

Not forcing Chester into anything, but giving him everything. Laying all of Obie’s cards on the table and making it clear that Chester is going to have to be the one who pulls away first.

And Chester doesn’t ever want to pull away. He fumbles for a grip on Obie’s wrists, decides to grab on to his shoulders instead, somehow ends up with his fingers tangled in Obie’s shirt??—

Mine.

All mine.

He can’t tell whether the voice in his head is Obie’s or his own, and right now, he can’t bring himself to care.

He was so convinced that Obie could never want someone like Chester, could never overlook his years as an interrogator, could never see him as anything other than the tolerable lackey who accidentally spellbound them together?? —

But Obie is nipping lightly at Chester’s bottom lip, sending sparks dancing down Chester’s spine.

Chester parts his lips on a soft exhale, hesitant and shaky, and Obie hums with approval, licking his way into Chester’s mouth to deepen the kiss, to pull him closer until Chester barely knows where he ends and Obie begins.

But it’s still not close enough, and this stupid interrogation table is in the way. Growling with irritation, Chester climbs over the top of it, sitting down on the opposite edge so he can wrap his legs around Obie’s waist, cinch his ankles behind Obie’s back, and pull them flush together.

Obie shivers. “You’re so perfect,” he mumbles against Chester’s lips.

The words make adrenaline sing through Chester’s veins. “Yeah?”

This time, Obie doesn’t even break the kiss, his answer floating through Chester’s mind.

Yeah, he says, and without warning, Obie grabs one of Chester’s legs, swinging it up and backward.

Yelping with surprise, Chester tangles his fingers into Obie’s shirt as Obie manhandles Chester onto the table, laying him down on his back with Obie straddling his waist.

Exhilarated heat roars through Chester, spiking high into his flushed face and low past his belly. “Yes,” he manages, the word higher and more breathless than he’s used to, and he drags Obie down to kiss him again, Obie’s body solid and heavy on top of Chester’s.

It’s perfect. It’s heaven. It’s everything Chester never let himself think about, everything he never thought he deserved, all coming together at once.

Obie’s lips move away from Chester’s mouth, pressing hard kisses down the side of his neck, licking a stripe up his throat that makes him gasp, lightly scraping his teeth down the line of Chester’s pulse??—

Obie stops short at the neckline of Chester’s shirt, abruptly pushing himself onto his hands and glancing around like he only just now remembered where they are. “Oh,” he says, his dark eyes finding Chester’s. “Ah, bedroom?”

His voice is hoarse and husky and holds a promise that makes Chester’s head spin. To his own surprise, he reaches up to stop Obie from getting off the table. “No, let’s?—let’s stay. I want this here. Want you here.”

Obie goes still. His head tilts to one side, but instead of looking disgusted or exasperated, he just looks intrigued. “Really? Why?”

“I?—?” There’s a blur of emotions swirling in Chester’s chest and a jangle of thoughts whipping through his head, too hard and sharp and fast to fully unpack, but he catches something about??—

About role reversal. About petty revenge.

About taking this place that ripped away Chester’s childhood and using it to spite the very people who took it from him. He meets Obie’s eyes. “Because I really like the idea of a demon god having his way with a Sanctum hunter right on one of their interrogation tables.”

To Chester’s delight, a slow smile spreads across Obie’s face. “Aw, puppy. Our love language.”

Ah, yes. The all-important sixth love language: vengeance.

Relief floods through Chester. “You get me,” he whispers.

“Of course I do.” Obie leans down, pressing a kiss to Chester’s lips. “We’re the same like that. And just in case…” This time, when he pushes himself up again, it’s only to snap his fingers, making the door’s lock click into place. “There. Now I can take you exactly how I want you.”

The words are more teasing than anything else?—just a casual way for Obie to play into Chester’s fantasy?—but they still make Chester’s breath hitch in his throat. “Yes, please,” he rasps.

“Good,” Obie murmurs, leaning down to claim Chester’s mouth again. Chester melts into the kiss with a quiet moan of approval, parting his lips to give Obie everything he wants to take. Obie doesn’t need to be asked twice, taking Chester’s invitation and making him see stars in return, and this??—

This is real.

Chester really gets to have this. He takes a deep breath, starts to slide his hands down from Obie’s shoulders, down towards his belt??—

Obie breaks the kiss again, pushing himself up despite Chester’s grumble of protest. “So, ah.” He clears his throat. “How deep do you want to go into this petty revenge sex fantasy?”

Chester squints up at him. “What do you mean?”

For a long moment, Obie hesitates.

And then, ever so slowly, he wraps his fingers around Chester’s wrists, tugs Chester’s hands away from Obie’s waist, and pins his arms out to the sides?—exactly where Chester would usually strap a prisoner’s wrists to the table. “Like that,” Obie says, his eyes not leaving Chester’s.

For a split second, the world goes very quiet around Chester. “Oh,” he says, tugging experimentally on his wrists; Obie twitches above him, but he doesn’t let go. “Like?—like that.”

“Yeah.”

And Chester??—

Chester has never really let himself dwell on the finer points of sex before, and he’s certainly never let himself dwell on anything remotely resembling kink.

Sure, he understands the general mechanics of it, and sure, he idly researched the safe, sane, and consensual philosophy of BDSM as a curious teenager, but he never really thought to apply any of that to himself.

But the simple act of Obie pinning his wrists down is making Chester’s brain go haywire and his body respond in a way that he’s never felt before.

Because if Chester lets Obie take control, then he doesn’t have to worry about his next moves or second-guess everything he does.

He can turn off the part of his brain that exists in a near-constant state of anxiety and just trust Obie to take care of all the little details. To take care of him.

It kind of sounds like a dream come true. “Well, how?—how deep do you want to get into it?” Chester asks evasively.

Obie arches an eyebrow. “I asked you first.”

Of course he did. Chester drags his teeth down his bottom lip, trying to organize his thoughts; Obie’s eyes flicker down to track the motion.

“Well, I?—?” Chester begins hoarsely, and he clears his throat.

“I feel like I’m on the verge of discovering several things about myself, so yeah. Yeah, I?—I think I’d like that.”

“Good,” Obie murmurs, his hands tightening on Chester’s wrists as he leans down to kiss him again, keeping it slow and sensual. Chester strains against Obie’s grip, trying to push closer, but Obie moves just out of reach, grinning down at him.

Chester scowls back. “Buzzkill.”

Obie’s smirk widens. “But you’re enjoying it?”

Yes, Chester pushes through the bond. Out loud, he adds, “But that doesn’t mean I’m not annoyed about it, too.”

“Good,” Obie says smugly, and he goes back to kissing him. For a few minutes, Chester lets himself sink into the sensations: the taste of Obie’s mouth, the weight of his body on top of Chester’s, the heat of his palms pinning Chester down??—

But it’s altogether too soon when Obie releases Chester’s wrists with a grimace, glaring at the leather restraints next to Chester’s hands like they’ve personally offended him.

“I can’t actually tie your wrists down?—those straps have corrosion spells on them?—and I need my hands for…

” Chester’s breath stutters when Obie’s fingers slip underneath the bottom hem of Chester’s shirt, massaging slow circles just above his waistband.

“Other important matters right now. But I’ll definitely keep this in mind for the future, and??—?”

An idea sparks through Chester. “Wait,” he blurts out .

Obie pauses, his eyebrows furrowing. “Yeah?”

“Well, your…” Chester’s throat feels like cotton. He swallows hard and tries again. “Your true form. It has tentacles, right? So you could, um. Use those to tie my wrists down. If you want.”

Chester thinks this just might be the first time he’s ever managed to render Obie speechless. For a long moment, he stares down at Chester with his eyes wide and his mouth hanging slightly agape, the black of his pupils nearly swallowing up the streaks of amber in his irises.

Eventually, Obie seems to come back to himself. His tongue sneaks out to lick his lips. “Are you… still discovering things about yourself?” he asks carefully.

Chester smiles awkwardly. “It’s okay. You can laugh at the fact that it apparently took me twenty-two years to figure out that I’m kind of kinky. I can take it.”

“Chester,” Obie says, “there aren’t enough words in the English language to describe how turned on I am right now. I’m not laughing.” He takes a deep breath, meeting Chester’s eyes. “My true form. It won’t… scare you?”

“Honestly, I…” Chester switches to their telepathic link, wanting Obie to know that he isn’t lying. I’ve been trying to find an excuse to ask you to show it to me again for weeks. I loved it.

A grin jumps onto Obie’s face. “Yeah?”

He looks so genuinely happy about it. Chester’s heart swells. “Yeah.”

“All right,” Obie whispers, and his appearance ripples before Chester’s eyes, shifting into something ethereal, something more than human. Ram horns curve up from just above his ears, bat wings stretch out from his shoulders, tentacles unfurl from the middle of his back??—

All those weeks ago during the blackout, Chester didn’t have the presence of mind?—or the lighting?—to notice the smaller details, but now, he drinks them in.

He remembers the half-dozen eyes blinking from Obie’s forearms and the mouths dotting his torso, but he wasn’t fully able to appreciate the colors: the patch of black scales on his left cheek, the puff of white fur on his right shoulder, the smattering of silvery feathers on his hip??—

And Obie’s true form doesn’t scare Chester. Not exactly. But he does feel that same overpowering sense of awe from so many weeks ago, that same dryness in his throat and weakness in his knees at being so close to such unfiltered divinity. “Nostringvadha,” he whispers.

Obie’s lips curve up. “I prefer ‘Obie,’ actually,” he says, and he leans down to kiss Chester again, softer this time. “So you… like being restrained?”

Chester answers through the bond again, sensing that Obie needs concrete reassurance here. Yes. And I promise I’ll tell you if I stop liking it.

“Okay,” Obie murmurs, and two of the tentacles rippling out from his spine glide through the air, coiling around Chester’s wrists and tying him to the table. “Okay, good.”

“Although…” Chester fidgets against the restraints, secretly pleased when they don’t give an inch. “Although I am sort of curious about how I’m supposed to, ah, get naked like this.”

Obie’s lips twitch. Delicately, he places a hand on Chester’s shoulder, and Chester jumps when his t-shirt disappears. “Pocket dimension. I can pull your clothes out again for you later.” His grin widens. “After I’m finished with you.”

Obie should not be this good at pushing Chester’s buttons within ten minutes of being given access to them. “That’s?—that’s cool,” Chester says weakly, and he squirms his legs. “How about, uh, down here? ”

Obie raises his eyebrows innocently, drumming his fingers against Chester’s belt. It vanishes into thin air. “You mean that?”

“Well, like,” Chester says, “almost that.”

“Hm…” Obie sits back on his heels, snapping his fingers. A sudden chill wraps around Chester’s feet as his sneakers and socks disappear. “That?”

“Obie,” Chester whines, and even he’s surprised by how breathless and needy his voice sounds. “Come on.”

“Settle down, puppy. We have all the time in the world, and I’m planning on enjoying you slowly.” Obie wraps his fingers around the waistband of Chester’s jeans and, after a split second of hesitation, slips them past the elastic of his boxers, too. “Yes?”

Finally. “Please,” Chester whispers.

His jeans and underwear vanish, leaving him completely bare underneath Obie. Another wave of heat throbs through him as Obie’s gaze travels deliberately down Chester’s body, taking in every inch of him, and Chester bites his lip, trying to force down his knee-jerk embarrassment.

Judging by Obie’s borderline reverent expression, Chester has nothing to be embarrassed about.

Obie’s eyes find Chester’s again. His hand settles on Chester’s hip, his voice winding through Chester’s head. I’ve wanted this for… longer than I care to admit.

Chester’s breath shudders out of him. It’s one thing to get caught up in the heat of the moment and Chester’s impulsive confession and their petty revenge fantasy, but for Obie to definitively say that he truly does want Chester??—

That’s another thing entirely. Same, Chester whispers through the bond.

Obie smiles. Deliberately, his hand slides downward. And you’ll tell me if you want me to stop, right? Or slow down ?

Yes, Chester pushes into their link, and meaningfully, he rocks his hips upward. And I’ll also tell you when I want you to start, which is right now. Chop-chop, Nostringvadha.

“Wow,” Obie says out loud. “You’re bossy when you’re tied up, aren’t you?”

“Obie!”

And Obie laughs as he leans down to kiss Chester again.