Page 42 of The Sun & Her Burn (Impossible Universe Trilogy #2)

SEBASTIAN

T he soles of my Italian leather loafers echoed through the surprisingly quiet hall as I stalked away from the VIP section toward Sinclair’s office. It was a fitting soundtrack for the lonely walk, a hollow ring like the beat of my heart.

Cold sweat beaded on my brow that I wiped away with the back of my hand and I had to force myself to take a deep breath before I entered the office because I felt almost sick with anticipation.

That I might be able to touch and taste both the people who had come to haunt my dreams and waking hours was almost too much to bear.

My hand shook as I reached for the doorknob and even when I shook out the nerves, I felt weak as I turned the handle and pushed inside.

I had expected to find Linnea waiting, but the masculine office was empty.

Unease thrummed through me as I walked deeper into the room, stopping at the large antique French desk dominating the back wall of the space.

There was something about the old European furnishings and dark, warm colors only illuminated by a red glass desk lamp and a dimmed overhead chandelier that set the stage for salacious fantasies.

There was a silk privacy screen in one corner that begged for some kind of strip tease, a leather ottoman Linnea would look beautiful bound to by the wrists and ankles, a deep velvet sofa I could imagine sinking into with the weight of both lovers pressing into my body.

I planted my overwarm palms on the cool desktop, leaning into them even as I spread my legs slightly, closing my eyes to imagine Adam ordering me into the position so he could touch me again.

Maybe he would have Linnea on her knees in the small space between my hips and the table so I could fuck into her mouth while he reminded me what it was like to be spread open on her fingers.

Cazzo .

It had been so long since I had been with a man in any kind of way I almost felt like a virgin again at the thought of doing something—anything—with Adam.

As if summoned by my dark thoughts, the door opened and, after a brief pause, closed behind me.

I did not turn around.

A little shiver ripped down my back like a ghost had taken hold of my spine.

The ghost of the many, many nights I had spent in Adam’s thrall a decade ago.

I was so fucking weary of the distance between us, of the time that had past and the awkwardness that remained. I longed to have things simplified just for a moment.

I longed to submit as I once had into the strong, sure arms of a lover who would ply me with pleasure until I was weak-kneed and empty minded.

So I stayed facing away from the predator even though the hairs on the back of my neck and arms raised with apprehension.

My position was subtle enough that he could construe it as weariness instead of a sexual proposition, but after the closeness we had shared on the dance floor, and the fact Adam had already admitted he was going to blame whatever transgressions he made tonight on the alcohol, I had hopes for more.

The sound of the lock catching on the door was as loud as a gunshot in the heavy silence.

He didn’t make a noise yet I was so aware of him that I could feel him come toward me on slow, measured strides. The touch of his gaze on my body was a physical caress and, as if I was eighteen again, my cock was an iron bar in my trousers.

It felt good to be studied and measured. I wanted to pass muster more than I wanted my next breath.

“What a pretty gift Linnea has left for me,” Adam said finally in that cold as iron voice that never failed to make my heart rate kick up.

I made a questioning noise in my throat but did not speak. I thought, however foolishly, it would break the spell between us.

Suddenly, his hand was between my shoulders, pressing hard enough to push me into a deeper lean over the desk, my ass canting toward him as a result.

“I received a text that Linnea was held up but that she left something pretty for me in this office,” Adam explained as that hand moved slowly down my spine to the small of my back and around to my hip.

I sucked in a sharp breath as he clamped his fingers around my side to steady me while one foot kicked between my spread feet, urging them wider.

I obeyed without thought, thighs burning slightly at the strain.

“And pretty you are, Sebastian.” His voice was a low, throaty rumble as if he had left his humanity on the other side of the locked door. “What should I do with such a present?”

Open it , I thought with an edge of desperation even though a part of me was unused to submitting, especially to a man.

There had been none since Adam. The very idea of being with a male other than him made me break out into a cold sweat even though I still found men attractive and often longed for the kind of intense, masculine-edged sex I had only ever experience with another cock in my hand, in my mouth, stretching my ass.

Those were memories sacred to my time with Adam, very much like threesomes and polyamory, which I had also eschewed for years.

Some things were too holy to recreate, like religious ceremonies without the proper props and relics.

And now here I was in an office that felt like a sanctum with the only man I had ever worshipped.

My pulse hammered, echoing in my ears.

“I think I’ll open it, shall I?” Adam mused, reading my thoughts as he had always been able to do in these situations.

I shivered almost violently as he hands came around my front and smoothed down my chest, mapping the contours and tracing the ridges of muscle with heavy strokes as if he wanted me to feel the difference between him and any of the many women who had touched me too.

The petting was possessive and just shy of demeaning, a way to reacquaint himself with his property.

“You’ve filled out.” His voice was still cold, but jagged.

“Every inch of you hard and sculpted. Did you know how much I might love to feel the curve of your biceps—” His hands found the muscles as he spoke of them—“the swell of your pecs above that hard groves of your abdominals and the arrow of your obliques as they narrow into your groin.”

I hissed as his hands followed that arrow and just ever so gently brushed over the straining bulge in my trousers before trailing back up my torso.

He had barely touched me and already precum was leaking from my cock, staining the placket of my pants. I was breathing as if I’d run a marathon yet I hadn’t even moved.

Slowly, agonizingly, Adam began to undo the buttons of my shirt while he spoke to me almost conversationally.

“It has been so long since I touched you,” he mused. “I am almost at a loss about what to do first. My mouth is watering at the thought of baring all this olive tanned skin to my gaze. Perhaps I will borrow some of Sinclair’s brandy and make a game of tasting you.”

I groaned affirmatively, which made him chuckle, a sinister sound.

“Very well,” he agreed as he sloughed my opened shirt off my shoulders and down to my wrists, unable to remove it completely because of my palms on the table. “Just indulge me in this and I will give you so much pleasure you’ll be coming all over yourself before you can help it.”

Merda , I had forgot how incendiary his filthy mouth could be.

“Turn around, keep your hands on the table and rest your hips on the edge of the desk. There, what a sight,” he praised, moving his hands over my exposed torso, tweaking my dark nipples, scratching lightly down the rippled expanse of my abs and then tugging lightly at my treasure trail in a way that had my cock spitting precum.

“Isn’t he pretty, Linnea?” he asked in a low, dark coo.

It took my overheated brain a moment to realize who he was speaking to and then to search the room for her.

She sat on the velvet couch by the private screen and I realized she must have been hidden behind it when I first entered the room. Her legs were crossed, one elbow propped on the arm of the seat, a glass of liquor dangling from her fingers as she watched us with heavy-lidded eyes and parted lips.

“Very,” she agreed in a husky murmur. “He looks like an idol worthy of adulation.”

“Doesn’t he,” Adam confirmed, stepping back slightly to study me in a way that made me shiver.

I was an actor, it made sense in small way that I would like to play the exhibitionist. Still, there was something that squirmed inside me to be put on such display by two people I adored but had no idea how to label in regard to our relationships.

This was a new frontier.

And an old, archaic part of my brain was embarrassed to have Linnea witness how utterly undone I was by another man. It had been too long since I indulged, and old Italian prejudices flared under my skin.

Movement pulled my attention to Linnea, who slowly unfolded herself from the couch and came toward me, hips a slow pendulum hypnotizing me with every step.

She stopped beside Adam in front of me, sipping from the glass as her eyes traveled thoroughly and languidly up my body.

“I think,” she said softly, a wickedness in her eyes that almost alarmed me, “he would look even better kissed silly. Don’t you, Adam?”

Adam hummed, rubbing a hand over his stubbled chin as he considered me, head cocked like they were viewing art in a gallery.

“Yes, I think you’re right. Would you like to do the honors?”

“No.” The word sparked between us. “I want to you see what happens when you kiss him. He is almost shivering with want for you, Adam. Put him out of his misery.”

Cazzo , I thought, almost woozy with desire.

Adam did not hesitate for a moment, stepping between my spread feet to palm my throat the way I had done to Linnea on the dance floor, canting my chin up to just the right angle for his kiss.

“Kissing you undoes me just as much as it does you,” he murmured against my parted lips a second before he sealed them with his own.

And I lost myself to him.

He tasted of peaty Scotch and something rich but undefinable that was pure Adam.