I was alone when I woke up. It was pitch black outside and the fire still burned, so I probably hadn’t slept long. But the space Axel had occupied was empty, and I shivered despite being covered by the blanket. I gazed up to the loft, but it was dark and I couldn’t see anything.
Sighing, I closed my eyes, but the couch was too big for just one person. I—who slept by myself most nights—was lonely. I got up, drank a glass of water, and managed to find the bathroom where I couldn’t resist the calling of the shower.
Freshly showered and dressed only in my boxer briefs and undershirt, I leaned against the handrail of the stairs leading up to the loft. I wanted to go up there and join him. Wanted to be surrounded by his woodsy scent and listen to him humming in his sleep.
But I shouldn’t, right? Even if I hadn’t imagined the interest I’d sensed from him, he wouldn’t want me up there uninvited, would he?
I rolled my neck. I’d better get back to the couch and get some more sleep. Nodding, like I was trying to convince myself I’d made the right decision, I moved. But my feet didn’t listen to my brain and instead of returning to the sofa, I started climbing the stairs. Hesitantly on my tippy toes at first, but after a couple steps, I hurried my pace until I was jogging the last bit.
Axel lay sprawled out on the bed with an arm thrown over his head and a leg dangling over the edge as if he hadn’t been able to decide whether to stay in bed or get up. A night light on the bedside table illuminated his face and made his eyelashes appear longer than they actually were. The black tattoos covered his arms and shoulders and continued up his neck, but the skin on his well-defined chest was unadorned like a blank canvas. He didn’t even have chest hair.
His nipples were pebbled and I wanted to pull up the covers to make sure he wasn’t cold, but I was frozen to the floor. Pulled in two different directions. I knew I should stop staring at him while he was sleeping, go back downstairs, and leave him the fuck alone.
Instead I took a step closer.
His unexpected gentleness had gotten under my skin. The honest vulnerability he hadn’t been afraid to show, made me want to wrap him up in my arms and protect him. To give him the same support he so generously gave to others.
And I wanted to kiss him. Find out how those scarlet lips would feel pressed against mine. I wanted to be surrounded by his blackened, steely arms and caressed with blazing palms. But most of all I wanted him to look at me with those melted eyes as if I was the best thing in the whole wide world.
Fuck. I was in so much trouble. One day with him and my knees were wobbly and my tummy full of buzzing bees. I’d better get out of here before I fell for the man.
I pressed my hand against my stomach and rubbed it, as I drank him in one last time. Just as I was about to walk away, he turned on his side and scooted back on the bed. Without opening his eyes, he held up the cover in invitation.
My brain screamed at me. Run. Save yourself.
My feet crossed the floor in two quick steps and before I knew it I lay next to him in his big, warm bed, facing him.
He pulled the cover up to our ears and laid his hand on my waist. “Turn around,” he mumbled, voice hoarse with sleep.
I snapped my mouth shut around the ever-present questions and did as I was asked. A heartbeat later I was pulled against his body—my back plastered to his front—and cocooned in his heat.
“I was beginnin’ to think you’d stand there all night,” he said.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to creep you out.”
“I’m happy you decided to join me. I was hopin’, but I wasn’t sure.”
“Awww, shit!” I groaned.
Axel snickered. “Filter malfunctionin’ again?”
“Yes.”
“Wanna try that again? With filter turned on for easier understandin’?”
“I’m in so much trouble.”
“What do you mean?” He let out a displeased grunt, pulled up my T-shirt until he could touch my skin, and fanned out his fingers on my belly. “Ahhh, much better,” he mumbled.
I drew in a shuddering breath. “I mean I like you way more than I should after knowing you for half a day.” I pressed my back against his torso.
“Take off your danged shirt if you’re gonna do that.” He fumbled with the offending garment and helped me wiggle out of it, and soon we were back to the previous position. Skin against skin.
Rubbing his nose up and down the line of my neck, he inhaled deeply and let out a happy humming noise. “Mm, I like it when you smell like me.”
“Awww, fuuuuuck,” I whined. He was killing me with his sweetness but at the same time, I wanted more. Craved more.
He rested his lips against my skin and I squirmed. It was the most delicious form of torture, and the bees in my belly had multiplied and escaped to the rest of my body.
“If it makes you feel better, I like you too much, too,” he mumbled into my neck.
I wasn’t sure it did. “What are we gonna do about it?”
“Are you always questionin’ everythin’?”
“Pretty much.”
“How about we just see what happens?”
I didn’t do well with uncertainty. I hated unanswered questions and googled everything I didn’t know. I wanted to make informed decisions and always planned everything down to the tiniest detail. Never did anything on a whim.
Except for storming out of my mom’s house on Christmas Day and getting into a truck with someone who looked like a serial killer but acted like a cuddly teddy bear, apparently.
Still, there I was. Considering his suggestion. He must have cast a spell on me with that damned deep voice of his.
“I…I don’t do things like this.”
“Like what?”
“See what happens.” His fingertips danced all over my upper body, driving me out of my mind. “I can’t think when you do that.”
“Good.”
It didn’t help matters that all the blood had rushed south from my head and I was harder than a lake frozen solid in midwinter. And judging by the thing poking me in the ass, Axel suffered from the same condition.
His hand closed in on my nipples but veered off at the last second and I swallowed a disappointed groan.
“I don’t bottom,” I gasped out, desperately trying to come up with reasons we shouldn’t do this. I was no stranger to hookups—hell, my entire sexual diet these last few years had been one-night-stands—but Axel would be so much more than a fuck-and-run, and I didn’t know if I could handle it.
“Excellent news because I don’t top.”
Another of my preconceptions of him that he smashed to pieces with only a few words, and yet I wasn’t surprised this time.
His fingers pitter-pattered their way back to my nipples, and this time he graced them and set off fireworks in my chest. His teasing fingers drove me out of my mind. His hot breath on my neck made me want to scream. His pulsing cock against my ass would be the death of me.
The sensations overwhelmed me and I choked on my breath. I needed to think. “Axel,” I pleaded.
He stilled. Our labored breathing permeated the room. He trembled against my back and I was comforted by it. I twisted in his arms and when I faced him, I cupped his hollow cheeks. Ghosted my fingers in the indents and gazed into his shiny eyes.
“If we do this, it will be more than just sex.” I wanted to see his reaction to my words and didn’t blink for fear of missing it.
Dipping his chin, he said, “I know.” No deception. No fear. Only acceptance.
“But I live in Chicago.”
“I know.”
“And you live here,” I said.
He leaned closer and nudged my nose with his. “I know that, too.”
“We don’t know each other.”
“No, we don’t.” He wrapped his hand around my hip.
“What if you hate me?”
“What if I don’t?” The way he met my every doubt with calm should have infuriated me, but it didn’t.
I threw my arms around him and hid my face in his neck. “What if I fall in love with you?” I asked and pressed my mouth against his pulse point.
“Would that be so bad?”
His heartbeat was rapid but steady against my lips. “I don’t know. I haven’t really been in love.”
“Are you afraid to try?” The grip on my hip tightened.
Shaking my head, I asked, “What about you? Have you been in love?”
“Yes.”
“What happened?” I hooked my leg over his thigh.
“We grew apart.”
I grabbed his shoulder and pushed him until he ended up on his back, rolling with him and climbed on top of him, straddling his hips. He lay his hands on my thighs and gazed at me with endless patience.
“My dad left my mom for another woman.” The words spilled out of me. I’d never voiced my fear openly to anyone; I wasn’t even sure I’d recognized it until now.
He curled his hand around my neck and pulled me down until I rested my forehead against his. “And you’re afraid the same will happen to you.” It wasn’t a question but I nodded anyway. “There are no guarantees, Danny. But if I wanna leave, I promise I’ll stay long enough for you to ask all your questions. I won’t abandon you.” He squeezed my neck with strong fingers, massaging the tension out of me.
“Cross your heart and hope to die?” I would believe him if he made me that promise. He’d given it to Beatrice, and he would never let her down.
“Yes.” He wiggled his other hand between us and drew a cross over his heart. The small, childish gesture set my racing mind at ease and I collapsed on top of him.
“Got more questions?”
I nodded and said, “No.”
He chuckled. “Let me know when you make up your mind.”
We lay in silence for a while. I loved how I rose and fell with his breaths and how his fingers played with the short hairs of my neck. Outside the cabin, the wind had picked up again and howled its way through the trees, but in here we were warm and safe.
“I know one thing,” I whispered.
“What’s that?”
“I want to kiss you.”
“What’s stoppin’ you?
I got up on my elbows and looked down at him. His lips were parted and he stared at my mouth. I licked my lips and lowered myself but I didn’t kiss him. Instead, I hovered over him, drawing out the moment before our first kiss. Torturing him. And myself. For once my mind was blank and I existed only in that moment.
Then I couldn’t wait any longer. I closed the distance and—finally—our lips met. The bees were back with a vengeance and buzzed like crazy. He opened his mouth and my tongue accepted the invitation. Axel tasted of hot chocolate and hope and I never wanted to stop kissing him.
His hands roamed my back, and mine gripped his upper arms. Our legs tangled into a knot of limbs. I tore my mouth from his and rained kisses all over his face. My dick roared back to life and I ground my pelvis against his. When our cocks touched through two layers of underwear, he moaned and the sound rolled around the room like a persistent echo in a valley.
I kissed down his throat until I reached his pulse point. Opening my mouth, I sucked on his flesh. Carefully at first, but then his palm landed on the back of my head, and he pressed my face into his neck as he growled, “Do it.” I sucked hard, desperate to leave my mark on him. Neither of us cared that it would be visible tomorrow.
We thrust and rubbed and pushed our cocks against each other as if we were dueling. Our loud noises mingled, our movements grew irregular and hurried, and hands scrabbled and groped.
I kissed him on the mouth—ignoring his unhappy noise as I let the abused flesh on his neck go. The kisses were gentle and sensual, a stark contrast to what our bodies were doing. It was the kisses that propelled me over the finish line and I panted into his mouth as I exploded in my underwear. Axel’s eyes widened and he tightened his arms around me, rolling us until our positions were reversed and I was on my back. He pushed his pelvis into mine, threw his head back, and yelled out his pleasure. His dick throbbed and trembled against mine as he shot his load.
My head spun and I held on to him as if he were my anchor. When our breathing evened out, we managed to wiggle out of our underwear and clean up without ever letting go of each other. He positioned himself on his back and pulled me to him until my head rested in the crook of his neck.
With his arm wrapped around my shoulder and his nose pushed into my temple, I was the happiest I’d been in a long time. I tangled my legs with his and flung my arm around his waist and if it had been possible, I would have crawled into him. Existing in the same space as him felt right. Like I belonged.
And for the first time ever, my mind wasn’t buzzing with a million questions about the future. There and then, I was happy to live in the moment, not knowing what was coming next. It was probably just the post-sex endorphins talking, but it gave me hope. Maybe we could make this work? Maybe he was my future?
All I knew was that I wanted to kiss him some more, so I cupped his cheek and turned his face toward me, and pressed my lips against his.