Page 51 of Xel: Broken Bond

And here was Xel, looking at me with desire, and getting in people’s faces for being rude to me, and now we had Rohinavon, with all these dreams of changing not just this property, but the entire galaxy.

It was all somuch, and as ridiculous as it sounded, I was terrified that letting myself get close to Xel would be the one small move that would unleash a landslide that set everything else into motion.

But at the same time, I was privately forced to admit that I desperatelywantedhim. I hadn’t touched anyone in five years, and until recently, I’d largely given up on the idea of ever touching anyone, ever again.

Maybe I should take a leaf out of Rohinavon’s book and do something that would force me to commit to one course of action or another, without giving me the chance to back out.

But then again, if I was wanting to find something that would make me commit, didn’t that mean that I wanted things to change in the first place?

The truth was, I was getting bored. I loved my work, and I loved Bo and Leesha and the other casuals, but deep down, I knew I was capable of more than this. And while there wereplenty of people willing to be rude assholes about my scars, there was a growing list of people who treated me like a regular person. Aiden, Kade, Xel, Rohinavon… all of them had accepted me without judgement. And maybe that knowledge was starting to push me to go further out into the world.

With the initial check of the kennels finished, I closed the door and headed back to the cottage. Xel was just arriving as I got there, and we both pulled off our boots in the hallway. Rohinavon was still sitting on the porch, making notes on her comm about something or other… and a flash of inspiration hit me, as I stared at Xel’s backside as he bent to set his boots neatly on the rack.

“I’m going to take a quick shower before breakfast,” I said, before I could think better of the idea. “I didn’t end up having one yesterday.”

“Yes, sir,” Xel said, and in just a second or two, I knew he was going to volunteer to go and start making breakfast.

“How about you come and shower with me?”

It was hard to say who was more stunned by the invitation, me or Xel. “You want me to… showerwithyou?” he asked slowly, his frown showing that he thought he’d misunderstood me.

“Yes,” I said, desperately hoping I didn’t completely screw this up. A dozen excuses were on the tip of my tongue – that it would be quicker, that it would save water, that we had a lot to get done today. But I managed to just shut my mouth and let the statement stand. I wanted him to shower with me. And I waited to see what he would say.

Xel glanced towards the door, and I could almost see him thinking about Rohinavon, sitting just metres away. When he spoke again, he lowered his voice. “You want me to come and be naked in the bathroom with you?” The way he said it said that he knew exactly what I was asking, at the same time as having some doubts about whetherIrealised what I was asking.

Afraid that I’d lose my nerve if I stood there any longer, I rolled my eyes, then grabbed his wrist and gave it a quick tug. It wasn’t enough to force him to go anywhere, but it implied a certain insistence nonetheless. "Are you coming or not?" I asked, as I headed down the hallway. I phrased it that way carefully – a request, not a demand. I was aware that Xel wasn’t compelled to obey me, the way he had been with my uncle, but even so, giving him a direct order to allow me to molest him was treading on dangerous ground. I’d rather skirt around the issue with insinuations and implicit flirting, then, if he objected, he had a clear avenue to say so.

“Yes, sir,” Xel said, his tone sassy, almost mocking. “So you finally decided you couldn’t resist me?”

I shut the bathroom door behind us and glanced pointedly down at his erection – which had sprung to life in the last thirty seconds or so. “I couldn’t help noticing the massive erection you were carrying around for half the morning,” I said, feigning boldness to cover up the fact that my heart was thumping so hard I was surprised Xel couldn’t hear it. Not wanting to get caught up in more verbal sparring – for fear I’d reveal more than I intended to – I stripped off my clothes, dumping them on the floor, since I was intending to get a clean set before we started the real work for the day. Then, largely ignoring Xel, I turned on the shower and stepped into the bathtub. I hoped like hell that Xel was following suit, and that he wasn’t just going to stand there and think I was a lunatic.

A moment later, I jumped halfway out of my own skin as I felt a warm hand on my hip. Xel nudged me gently out of the way, to give him space to join me in the tub. He was naked, and yes, he wasveryerect.

He turned me to face him, and I found myself staring at his chest – not because I was appreciating his muscles, but because I was suddenly unable to look him in the eye. Maybe this hadbeen a bad idea, after all. It was more than I was ready for, and as impulsive as it had been, I’d given no thought at all to how this was actually going to play out. Sex in the shower was never terribly comfortable, and Rohinavon was sitting outside, waiting for breakfast, and maybe we should just stick to something simple, like blow jobs, except that I wasn’t the slightest bit hard, and what the hell was Xel going to think, when I’d been the one to start this, but now I was completely incapable of following through?

“We don’t have to do this,” he said gently, and I could feel his eyes on me, as I continued to stare at the beautiful sky-blue scales across his chest. “We can just have a shower. Get clean.”

I looked up at him, determined to get a handle on the chaos in my own head. “Sorry,” I said. “I thought… I wanted…” I sighed. What had I wanted, exactly? “I don’t like the idea of leaving you frustrated all the time,” I said eventually, and that had been at the root of this idea. He both wanted and needed sex, and despite giving him permission to masturbate, I was doing nothing to take responsibility for my end of that. I understood now why Aiden had said, right at the start, that parts of this were going to beuncomfortable. And also why he hadn’t told me about the sex part of it during that first meeting. If he had done, I’d probably have run a hundred miles in the opposite direction.

Xel smirked, a tiny lifting of the corner of his mouth that nonetheless said clearly that he thought I was nuts. “I don’t have to be frustrated,” he said coyly. And then he reached down and wrapped his large hand loosely around his own cock. “Perhaps you would just like to watch?”

That was tempting. Tempting to watch him put on a show for me, as he inevitably would, but also tempting to delegate my own responsibility in this.

But according to Aiden’s manual, that would not be enough in the long run.

I leaned into him, nudging his hand out of the way. “How about I do that for you?” I asked, my voice suddenly husky. God, he was tall, standing so close to me, and I looked up into his piercing blue eyes, as bright as the sky on a summer’s day. He was staring down at me just as intently, and then his body twitched as I tightened my hand on him.

He felt so much bigger than me; not so much longer as thicker, and I glanced down, seeing how well he filled my hand. I gave a few experimental strokes, and Xel gasped, then reached out to steady himself against the tiled wall. “Oh, sir… that is wonderful…”

I kept it up, running my thumb over the head on the up stroke, watching the muscles of his abdomen tense and flutter. Remembering something else Aiden had said, I told Xel, “You can come any time you like.” Given the permission to masturbate, I wasn’t sure if I needed to give separate permission now, but figured it couldn’t hurt to make sure.

“Thank you, sir,” he said, his voice deep and desperate. “Oh stars, I… uhhnnnnn…” A moment later, I felt a hot spurt of fluid over my hand, and I glanced up to see Xel’s head thrown back, his eyes closed.

That had been quicker than I’d been expecting, but if Xel had enjoyed it, I wasn’t going to complain. But at the same time, the ease with which he’d climaxed niggled at my guilt again. If his sex drive was high enough that he was practically bursting after just a couple of days, then I was going to have to pay a lot more attention to how often I was touching him.

I gave him a minute to catch his breath, then reached for the wash cloth. “Come on,” I prompted him. “We do actually need to get clean. I get the feeling it’s going to be another long day.”

With gentle fingers, he took the cloth from me, then worked up a lather with the soap. And then I was suddenly being treated to a whole new understanding of what his training as an eroticcompanion meant. He lifted my left arm and began to wash me, paying close attention to every inch of my skin. He washed each finger, then my thumb, then the inside of my wrist, which suddenly seemed more sensitive than usual. He continued on up my arm, being quick but thorough, his eyes on mine the entire time. And I understood that he had beentrainedto do this, to please his master in such a slow and sensual way. There was apparently a whole lot more to being an erotic companion than just sex, and I felt a nervous thrill at the idea of finding out what else he’d learned to do.