CHAPTER 24

Levi wants to go hard.

I feel it in the way he fists my collar when he reaches up to grab hold of me. In the unabashedness of his groan when our lips meet.

Everything in me roars to the surface, demanding to meet him where he needs me, but I shove those demons down. He says he's stable, but I don't know him well enough yet to know if he really is stable or if he's just good at concealing it.

Even if he is stable, like he says, I can't take the chance of heading down that road again. Hard kisses always lead to hard sex. And hard sex – manic sex – always leads to blame games later. You knew I was manic, Hayden. You should have stopped us. Nicholas was the most beautiful human I ever knew, but his self-hatred almost destroyed us many, many times.

My conscience wars with my body now, refusing to allow for the rough, uncontrolled sex Levi is begging me for, what my body is begging for too.

I close my hand over Levi's – the one clutching my collar – easing his grip, and I kiss him gently.

But he's so fucking greedy.

"Your garden is lovely," he says when I pull away. But how would he know? He hasn't taken his eyes off me since we stepped out here.

"Thank you. It's . . . private."

Levi comes in for another kiss. Biting down roughly on my bottom lip. "Private. Just like you." He buries his face into the side of my neck, inhaling. "I've wanted you since the first moment I met you, Hayden. Can we skip the pleasantries?" he whispers against my skin.

"Would the pleasantries be that much of a chore?" I am endeared to his eagerness, but, I realize, my radar for mania is as sharp as it has ever been.

"It's a chore waiting for this to happen," Levi moans against my mouth, kissing the corner of my lip. "You said you won't tell. I'll get to keep my job and my reputation, and I'll get to fuck a really nice guy for the first time in three years."

Three years?

Levi pulls away. Panic overshadows the horror on his face, but just barely. "I'm sorry. I'm oversharing. I know what that looks like, but I'm not manic. Not even the start of it. Daniel won't really fire me, and I don't think he'd mind anyway. I just don't want him to know because you're a client, and I don't want to complicate things with him. I swear I'm not manic."

"I believe you," I tell him, but I don't know if I'm being entirely truthful.

He pulls his bottom lip into his mouth. Chews at the skin there. "I'm responsible about this shit. I took my meds. I'm not lying. I promise. I know I just overshared and I'm sorry, but I'm really okay. Let's not stop."

A small part of me wishes I could tell him it's been a long time for me too. That I have not felt the need for a sexual relationship since Nicholas died. Not until now.

I take his chin between my thumb and index finger, lifting his face. "You don't have to be sorry."

"Trust me, I usually do," he whispers. "I'm always doing something I have to be sorry about later."

I understand. Whether in the throes of mania or the darkest depths of depression, there's always something not right.

"I'm pretty sure I know why I'm here, Hayden," Levi says, his eyes searching my face. "But – but I need to hear it from you. What is it that you want?"

I love his directness. I love that he tries to be clear in his communication. It must take a lot out of him to be this way, so I return the honesty. "I wanted you, too – the first moment I saw you at the gallery. I wanted to fuck you right there and then. I hated how much I wanted you."

He doesn't flinch. "Do you feel guilty? Because of – of your fiancé?"

I enjoy him so much. I'm made alive by his trueness. "Yes," I tell him. "Because of Nicholas."

"It's only your body you'll be sharing with me. The rest of you still belongs to him," Levi says earnestly. The innocence in his words reverberates within me. He doesn't know that I'm beginning to crumble before him the same way he crumbled before me the first day we met.

I think I'm capable of sharing more than just my body with this man. He has too much depth in him, and I'm too interested in what lurks within those depths. But for now – for this very moment – he's right. I'm sharing only my body with him. It"s like he said. It"s just sex. Even if want to slam him into the soft earth beneath our feet and fuck him so hard he"ll feel me inside his soul.

It"s just sex.

Levi lifts his face to mine. "Just fucking kiss me, Hayden. It's just a kiss. And then fuck me – out here, or in your bed, or in your office. I don't fucking care. It's just sex. It doesn't have to be anything more than that." He rubs his lips against mine and begs, "Please, just fucking kiss me."

I kiss him, careful not to give in to his demanding hands and his harsh grunts for a harder physical connection.

His arms snake around my neck. His fingers anchor into my hair at the back of my head, pulling me close. So close our noses bump together when he tries to eat my mouth. I shove his tongue out of my mouth because if I suck on that tongue, I might lose myself in this kiss.

Levi hates that and presses his thumb to the corner of my mouth, pushing inside, demanding re-entry. When I refuse, he bites down on my bottom lip, forcing me to open. Capturing my tongue, he sucks so hard.

So fucking delicious. Where did he learn to kiss like this? It's so fucking gorgeous, what he's doing to my mouth.

Levi rips his mouth from mine, grabs my hand, and pulls us back toward the house. Inside, his mouth is on mine again. "Where?" he asks between bites of kisses.

"My office," I rasp.

With no conscious recollection of how, we end up in my office. Levi is wild, ripping into my clothing until my shirt is no longer a barrier, and my belt is unbuckled.

"You're so fucking hot, Hayden," he moans into my mouth. His palms slide over my shoulders, down my pecs, pebbling my nipples when he pauses there to rub his thumbs over the spot.

I try to slow our kisses down, but he's just so fucking wild. Maybe, at some point he'll ask himself the same question I'm asking myself. Is he manic?And if not, will this trigger a manic episode?

If it does, he won't be able to stop. Even when his body is exhausted and his mind is in pieces, his need for sexual gratification won't slow down. And after that? Will he blame me for not putting a stop to it? For wanting him only when he's manic?

My head buzzes with old memories. Like little demonic creatures, hissing with high-frequency screams only I can hear.

Levi lets me slow us down. "I'm sorry. I forgot, you're a missionary guy."

"A what?" I ask against his lips, forcing old fears out of my head.

"Never mind. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to get so feral. You're a gentleman—"

"Gentleman?" If only he knew.

"—I get it. But, Hayden, I need you to know that I really, really, want to have sex with you. Right now. I'm down for straight up missionary. Nothing nasty. I get it. But please. Just don't tell me you want to get to know me first."

Oh. Missionary guy. I get it. It helps that he thinks I'm a prude. I'm humored by his assumptions.

I undress him, and, contrary to our agreement that it's nothing personal, uncovering Levi's nakedness feels like a ritual I must honor. I brush my lips over the gooseflesh spreading across his exposed shoulder. Scrape my teeth up and then down the column of his neck. My knuckles drag over his abdomen while I unbutton his shirt.

Levi moans. My cock hardens at the sound, and I wonder if sex is really as impersonal for him as he seems to think.

I provide the lube.

He's not in the least bit shy about the fact that he arrived at my house with a condom.

I thought it would be exactly as he said. Just sex. But when Levi is naked in front of me, I am thrown off my axis. Maybe because it"s the first time in so many years that my body has craved the physical touch of another man – a feeling I'd long since forgotten. Maybe it's the perfection of his body. Slim arms, veins roping prominently from the back of his hands all the way up to the inside of his elbow. My eyes drop to his erection, curved toward his stomach. Heavy and thick and surrounded by trimmed pubic hair.

And his tattoos. Fuck. He's stunning. He lets me take my fill of the ink covering various parts of his body. So many references to Bipolar Disorder I can immediately identify: A lifeline across his left pectoral, a yin-yang symbol on his bicep. Below the black and white symbol is a butterfly with its left wing in vibrant colors of orange, yellow and black. Its right wing is broken and designed with dull gray colors.

Then, starting from his hip burning all the way up to his ribs on the right side, a phoenix rising from the ashes. On the left side are two wolves. One is standing tall and proud, its face raised and howling. Next to it is another wolf, lying on the ground, its face lying on its front paws and a single tear running down its left eye. On his left hip bone, a small, caged bird. The cage is decorated with bright flowers. The bird is gray and white, and its wing is broken.

Levi's left hand is a full sleeve tattoo of skulls. Some skulls are brightly designed. Others are in morbid grays with tornadoes swirling out of the top of each skull.

The duality represented in each tattoo tells me how in tune Levi is with his disorder.

"You can ask me anything you want about them later," Levi says, reaching for me.

He presses his body to mine. His lack of modesty turns me on more than I was prepared for. I kiss him back hard and then drop to my knees, desperate for this. So desperate, I can't stand the thought that it'll soon be over. I feel the end before any of it has even begun. My need to prolong this supersedes my desire to chase an orgasm with Levi. He'll mistake my slow pace for prudeness, but that's okay.

Pressing my nose to the coarse hair between his legs, I inhale deeply. Levi threads his fingers through my hair, pressing my face further into his groin. His heavy breaths reach my ears, and I can't remember a time I felt this alive. I'd forgotten how good a man's body could feel.

I grip him, enclosing his cock in my fist. He's uncut. Thick foreskin moving with the upward slide of my fist.

It's just sex, yet—

Levi's soft grunts fall onto my skin like early summer rain. I absorb his sounds into my psyche for a moment, then I tune them out because I know how dangerous it would be to get lost in him like this. Because if I get lost, I might not be able to find him if he gets lost.

His fingers tighten in my hair. I catch his precum on the pad of my thumb, pulling a deep groan from him. Levi yanks at my hair. I listen to him, rising to meet his lips with mine. He pulls us toward the couch, dropping us both. I hover over him, shoving away the need to just fucking destroy his body. Resisting the urge to bury my face inside his armpit and inhale all of him, to lick the sweat off his body. It's just sex I tell myself over and over. Even if it gets nasty – which it won't – it's still just sex.

But he's so beautiful. He feels so good beneath me. His skin, warm. The soft hair covering his body from chest to ankle calls for the exploration of my fingers.

I shove down all attempts to turn this into something intimate. I don't know which would destroy us more – the gentleness of this intimacy trying to fuse us into a single heartbeat, or the ruthlessness of the fucking if I allow it.

The furious pulse at his neck begs to be suckled. I ignore it. I turn away from the comforting tickle of his chest hair when my cheek accidentally brushes against his pec.

I kiss my way down the trail of hair leading to his cock. He lifts his hips, grunting and babbling at the same time. "Hayden, yes. Hayden, please. Please, Jesus, fuck."

Dragging my tongue from the base of his cock to the top, I swipe across the tip. The bitter taste of his precum sinks into my taste buds, and fuck, I need more. Levi's unabashed moans add to the thickness in the air. I sink the tip of my tongue into his slit so we can both die with this suffocating freedom from self-imposed celibacy. Levi is like an instrument. His body humming along with the sound of his pleasure. I'm so impressed by him.

He's not manic. He said so. He's stable, and he wants this. He won't hate himself later and maybe he won't hate me, and I'm enthralled.

I pull the head of his dick into my mouth, sucking hard, but not hard enough to cause him pain – I don't know yet if he would like that. Or maybe a part of me thinks that he will, and we can't lose control like that.

When I take him right into the back of my throat, Levi's body bucks off the couch. His fingers pull hard at my hair, and he gasps loudly. Hmm. Has no one taken him so deep before?

I give his balls a gentle tug, and he lets loose. With both hands buried in my hair, he fucks up into my mouth, uncaring for how far down my throat he's going. I can take him.

What I can't take is how much I want this to be more than just sex. How much I want to be normal again and explore this without feeling like I'm dying from a broken heart every day. Or for him to not be ill so we can date and see where it goes without the dark cloud of his Bipolar Disorder hovering above us, threatening to burst and drown us with its torrential rains. And while I let him fuck my throat, my face burns with shame that I would have these thoughts about such a beautiful human being.

He's skilled. Despite the monstrous throat fucking, he's in perfect control of his orgasm. I ease back, letting his dick slide over my tongue and slip out of my mouth.

Levi pulls me up to his face. "I want you to fuck my throat just like that, but, fuck, Hayden, I need your dick in my ass right fucking now. Please, raincheck on the return blowjob?"

I chuckle lightly. I like him. So much. I reach for the lube and the condom. Sheath my dick, then shove his legs up to his chest to expose his hole. And groan with the instant need to blow.

"I don't need to be prepped, Hayden. Just fucking fuck me," he says desperately.

Oh, Levi, you beautiful fucking whore. "You'll want me to remove this fucking plug first," I say hoarsely. My eyes devour the sight in front of me.

He groans. "Missionary-guy, please. I beg you. Remove the fucking plug."

Our groans mingle as I slowly ease the plug out of his ass. Levi's asshole is freshly prepped for me. I push into him, unable to think of a single reason why I didn't fuck him the very first time I ever saw him.

I slide in and out of him, hissing from the way his body pulls me in, holding me in a vice grip.

He moves his hand to jack himself off, spewing every variation of every profanity you could ever think of. I don't think either of us is going to last long.

"Fuck, Hayden. Give it to me. Give it to me fucking harder. Harder. Harder, Hayden. Fucking please." Garbling, begging sounds. "Fuck, you have the best fucking dick. Fuck my fucking ass, Hayden. Fuuuck, I'm gonna come. I'm fucking coming, hot guy. Give it to me, Hayden. Come in my ass."

I fill the condom while deep inside his ass, and he coats his and my chest with his spunk.

It's just sex, I tell myself, as I collapse on top of him, unable to fucking breathe.

Great sex.

But still, just sex.