Page 49 of Want Me
I slid around next to him, popped the cap, and tossed the Advil back, dipping my head to the sink to cup water from the faucet. I straightened and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. “When did you leave?” The sheets had been cold when I’d stretched my arm over where he’d lain next to me after we’d finally gotten home. No one had heard us come in, thank God.
“Right after you fell asleep. Didn’t want to chance running into your parents.”
“Gimme that.” I stole the razor from his hands and ran it under the water, then focused on a patch of scruff on the left-hand side where his jaw met his neck. “You always miss this one spot.”
“I do?” He blinked at me, one hand rising touch the spot where I’d laid the razor. I flicked my middle finger at his hand to keep it out of my path and angled his head slightly to get to the tiny patch of hair. “Mm-hmm. Probably no one ever notices it but me. It’s been driving me crazy for weeks, though.”
“Hmm.” A smile played over his lips as I finished up the spot and set the razor down, rubbing the smooth skin with my thumb before letting my touch trail down the side of his neck where his pulse beat strong. His eyes widened in surprise when I leaned in to brush a quick kiss over the spot I’d just cleaned up.
Leaning back against the counter, I exhaled deeply, meeting his eyes. “I need you to be patient with while I…uhhh…figure this out.” I gestured between the two of us and hoped that between the mishmash of words and action, he’d get my drift.
Eric gave me an easy nod in response. “Not a problem.” For a second, I wondered if he really meant it. Would he go months…longer, even, sneaking around on the sly—and doing it far more carefully than before—if I couldn’t get my shit together? At the same time, I felt no sense of pressure in his lingering gaze.
After a moment, he picked the razor back up and went to work on the right side of his face as I watched. I’d never really paid attention to a guy shaving before. Of course, I hadn’t had a lot of opportunities either. And it was just shaving, right? But you would’ve thought I was watching a fucking three-ring circus the way I stood there fixated on the tips of Eric’s fingers gently stretching the skin of his cheek, the way he swished the razor under the water three times before shaking it and drawing it down the side of his face in a precise, steady drag that had me salivating because somehow it was perfectly him: smooth, well practiced, unhurried. He flicked his gaze aside to me, then lower, a slow smile turning up his lips.
I glanced down at the semi starting to tent my boxers and groaned. “Jesus, you fuck me up. Is it always going to be like this?”
He shrugged and blotted his face with a towel that he then snapped at my chest. “I’m a pretty sexy bastard.”
I made a face at him, but he was. That had never been in question. “Hungry?”
“Starving.”
When I started to move past him toward the door, Eric shot his arm out to block me, and in a nanosecond, I found his palm in the center of my chest as he shoved me up against the wall, his gaze locking to mine. God that gaze and the way it coursed through me, made me feel vulnerable and horny and understood all at once. “What I said last night wasn’t drunk rambling or some ploy to get another fuck out of you. I meant every word.”
I felt my jaw tighten, and my heart beat wildly against the palm of his hand. I looked down at it pointedly, and he gave me a soft smile. “I know. Same goes. Morning breath,” I warned, as he leaned in.
“Don’t give a shit. I like you dirty.” His lips brushed over mine once, twice, and the last dregs of tension drain from me, like his touch had loosened the plug that’d been holding it in. I reached for his waistband, pulled him up against me, and let my hand skim over his flat stomach. Now that I’d given myself permission, there was so much of him I wanted to explore, so much I’d held myself back from doing, scared out of my mind of what it might mean, what I’d be telling him with the action, or that he’d know by my touch just how fucking much I wanted him and how mindlessly stupid he made me. I thought he got it now, though, and that was a relief, too.
Jesus, did we have time for a quickie? I was rock hard, grinding against the hand Eric snuck down between us as he licked into my mouth, while my fingers dug into his waist. I wanted to get down on my knees for him right there and let him order me around with his cock down my throat or his fingers while I jacked him off. I was on my way toward doing just that, my shoulders sliding down the wall while his fingers wound through my hair when my mom’s voice chirped out from downstairs. “You boys up? Could use some help down here.”
“Definitely up,” I called out, and Eric snickered as I levered myself back upright with a groan.
“To be continued,” he promised as he shoved the bathroom door wide and bullied me through it.
“It’s a running theme for us, huh?” A moment’s hesitation ran through me for theus, but Eric only laughed.
“Lucky we’re good at grand finales.”
Well, eventually.
* * *
It wasn’t justthe Finleys for Thanksgiving lunch. The Rosens came, too, with their two preteen twins and a six-month-old baby that in the first half hour managed to cram in the entire fucking pantheon of human emotion from happy gurgling to a ragefest that ended in projectile milk vomit. My mom darted around the kitchen like a dragonfly in overdrive, stress lining her face over the last-minute addition. Even Dad was in there, trying to be helpful before Mom finally shooed us all away.
“Nate, y’all take the kids outside to play some basketball or something.Please,” she added, and I didn’t even give her any guff because I could hear the strain in her voice. In the next second, she was barking at my father for turning the oven on too hot.
“She does this every year,” I told Eric as we headed outside. “She always thinks she knows who’s coming, then more people show up and she panics. I don’t know why she bothers.”
Eric dribbled the basketball I tossed him a couple of times as the twins dropped down at the edge of the driveway near the basketball goal. “She must get something out of it,” he mused, then aimed at the net. The ball bounced around the rim before swishing through and Ross, the Finleys’ ten-year-old, retrieved it.
“I don’t know what, other than compliments on her cooking, which she’ll dismiss anyway. Then tonight she’ll pop two Advil, pour a glass of scotch, and say ‘never again.’ Watch.”
Eric grinned, thenoofedas the basketball nailed him in the stomach. “A little heads-up maybe?” he called to Ross, who grinned.
We made it through five slow rounds of H-O-R-S-E with Ross and his incredibly uncoordinated sister, Jane, while the twins looked on, whispering and giggling frequently.
“You’re cute,” the one whose name I was pretty sure was Lexi said finally with a nod, as if they’d come to some sort of agreement and now were now announcing the mutual judgment call. Eric cut a glance aside at me as I dribbled back from under the net.