56. Varian

Hope bloomed in my cold, dead soul for the first time in seventeen years.

The way he kissed me was nothing like those nights we'd met in hotels.

We'd slept together then, but he was cold. Broken. Checked out.

This was like the sun returning after the long, dark night.

His warmth spread through my veins, reminding me how it felt to be alive.

How it felt to be alive with him.

Fear crept up my throat. I didn't want this because he felt bad for me. I wanted my best friend back in any capacity he'd let me. I clung to him as our tongues twisted. He gripped me just as tight, which gave my anxiety some relief.

He walked me backward until my ass hit the counter. The pressure of our hips coming together nearly sent me over the edge. Electricity crackled over my skin. I touched every place I missed. Every part of him I'd dreamed about for so many years.

He dug his fingers into my thighs, picking me up to sit me on the counter.

"What the fuck?" He'd never have manhandled me like this before.

"I'm not the same person you knew," he said between gulps for air.

"You feel the same to me." I shoved my hands under the back of his shirt, desperate for nothing to be between us. Not clothes, not the years of mistakes we'd made, not the weight of what other people wanted from us. I wanted our rawness back.

"I've embraced who I am. All of me. All the parts I buried away to be palatable for society." His green eyes burned with a fire I'd never seen before.

"I want it all." I want you. I was too scared of scaring him away to admit the last.

"Are you sure you can handle it?" He got a curl to his lips that sent a spark into my chest.

"I'm sure."

Arik grabbed me then, hauling me off the counter, hands on my ass to carry me toward the back. "You better have a fucking bedroom back here instead of a lounge."

I tightened my legs around him, caught off guard. "When the fuck did you get so?—"

"I told you, I stopped covering my rough edges." Arik slammed me into the door, using the opportunity to grind his hips into my ass while he reached for the handle.

I arched into him as the door gave and he stumbled into the room, but he didn't go for the king-sized bed. Instead, he pinned me to the wall again. "You better have condoms."

I kissed him instead of answering, reverting to the thing we were always best at. Breaking only long enough to pull up his shirt and yank it over his head, worried not having condoms would detour him.

He slid his hand into mine, locking it over my head. The message was clear: He was in control. His lips burned across my throat. That didn't stop me. I reached between us, getting at his belt.

He grabbed my wrist, lifting his head to look into my eyes. "You don't have condoms."

"So what? We're going to come in our pants? I don't care." I fought his hold.

"Do you know how impossible it is to say no to you?"

I put my mouth over his. "I need you inside me."

Arik made a frustrated sound in his throat, chest heaving. It gave me the time I needed to open his button, to find his cock almost bursting out of his pants. I lowered his zipper, freeing his hard-on, and not wasting a second, I wrapped my palm around it.

His head dropped to my shoulder, watching as I stroked. "Fuck. No one feels right but you."

I smiled even though it hurt. I wish no one else had ever touched him. He was mine. "Take me to bed. I need you inside me."

He rocked his hips, fucking himself into my hand. I almost thought he was going to resist before he dragged me off the wall and threw me on the bed.

I ripped off my shirt and got my pants open before he was on me. He grabbed my arms, pinning them as he pushed his knees into my armpits, straddling my chest. His jeans were only low enough to have his cock out.

I picked up my head to swipe my tongue over his tip.

He closed his eyes for a second, hissing.

I opened my mouth, presenting my tongue when he looked at me again. His hips surged forward, letting me take him into my mouth. I closed my lips around him, sucking, trying to control the pace, but he kept me pinned. He fed me an inch at a time, back and forth maddeningly slow.

"This is torture." And I knew he got off on it.

"You keep rushing. I don't want to rush. I want to take my time." He switched his grip, getting both my wrists in one hand while his other grabbed his girth to rub his tip over my lips. "I love how you look with my cock in your mouth."

"I look even better with you buried in my ass."

His lip curled in a growl. "You don't have condoms, so this is all you get."

I whined, bucking my hips into nothing but needing the little friction the movement provided of my dick against my jeans.

"So impatient."

"Do you blame me? It's been way too long." I pulled against the hold, against the slow, against anything that kept him from me fully.

"I like it." He shoved himself further into my mouth before I could respond.

I circled my tongue around him, tracing his veins, welcoming every inch. The backs of his knuckles brushed my throat, and I swallowed around him.

He edged us with this push and pull until I was ready to burst. Urgency coiled in my body; I was like a rubber band ready to snap.

Finally, he broke, fucking my mouth with abandon, filling my throat to grind against my face. I took it all and wanted more, rewarded with his cum. He cried out, rutting in frantic strokes. Riding his pleasure out on my face.

He sat back, breathing hard. Beautiful and spent. Strings of saliva still connected us. "Do you even know how much I love your mouth?"

I smiled, face hurting. It had been a long time since I smiled for real. "I felt it. I love when you use me."

"But I want you to get off, too. I love making you come."

"I don't know if I'll be able to get it up. I told you, it's been an issue since I went on these meds since my breakdown. That doesn't make it any less fun."

"Then why do you want me to fuck you?"

"Is that not obvious?"

He shook his head.

"The closeness. I want the intimacy, not the orgasm."

He clenched his teeth, clearly fighting a war with himself. "If we do this, neither of us will be able to stop."

"I don't want to stop."

"There is so much more to it than what we want. Remember last time?"

I cupped his face, kissing him. "I'm not listening to anyone else this time. I made the biggest mistake of my life that night, and I won't let anything take you from me again."

He rubbed his nose over mine, stubble burning my lips. "I'm not twenty anymore—you'll have to give me like twenty minutes."

I laughed. "That's all? I'm impressed."

"You've always made me hard like no other." He grabbed my hip, pulling my body to his. "Can I try something?"

"What?"

"I want to get you off."

"I told you?—"

He cut me off. "I'll go slow, and if you're not into it, I'll stop. Plus, touching you will only make me hard faster."

"You can—" I started, but he was already moving, digging in my drawer for lube. Thankfully, I had that. "I just don't want you to get frustrated if it doesn't work," I said as he moved to the bottom of the bed.

"If it doesn't work, you'll be nice and wet and stretched out for my cock."

I lifted a brow, breath catching. "What are you going to do?"

"Flip over. I'll show you."

I turned to my stomach, looking over my shoulder. He unzipped his pants and knelt between my knees and set the lube aside. Questions sat on the tip of my lips, but he dropped down, taking my ass in both hands, spreading me.

Oh! Never in my wildest dreams would I have expected what happened next.

The straight, inexperienced guy of my past teased his tongue over my ring.

I buried my face in the sheets and groaned. "Motherfuck..."

He turned enough to bite my cheek and smiled against my skin. "How is that?"

"Wow."

He chuckled and turned back, flattening his tongue to swipe over me.

I melted into the mattress when he pushed inside me. "Arik…"

He pushed a hand under me and stroked my dick. I was harder than I'd been in years. I lifted, pressing back into his mouth. He forced his tongue deeper, and I fucked myself on it, wanting more, so much fucking more.

"Stop."

He did at once. "Are you okay?"

"I don't want to come without you inside me."

"You're close?" Hope sounded in his voice.

"Yes." I met his eyes. "Please."

He groaned, digging his fingers into my flesh. "You're determined to ruin me, aren't you?"

"If you're going to make me come for the first time in ages, I want it all."

He didn't speak, and I thought maybe he wasn't going to do it, but then the bed shifted under his weight, and his tip pressed against my hole. The cap popped open on the lube, and he rubbed it over his cock while teasing me with his tip.

"Are you hard already?" It hadn't been that long.

"The sounds you make helped that."

I pressed back, unable to stop myself, encouraging with a silent plea. He grabbed my hip, guiding himself. I dropped my head, bearing down. The burn came white hot, and I couldn't breathe.

"I forgot how thick you are."

He stroked his thumb over my skin, not forcing more in. "I wanted to prep you more."

"I want this burn, not your fingers," I said in the rush of an exhale as he slid in another inch. "Fuck."

"I love how tight you are." He withdrew, and I whimpered at the absence only to have it back and more. He worked me slowly, letting my body get used to his until he had his full length inside.

I reached back, grabbing his thigh to keep him there. "Stay."

We both knew I didn't just mean for this minute.

"I will." He dropped forward, giving me his full weight, flattening me into the mattress. Fully enveloping my body with his.

The comfort was everything I ever wanted. We moved together, lost to the storm of lust. He covered my shoulders and neck with kisses. I twisted to meet his lips, lavishing moans over his tongue.

Our pace picked up, and his hand slid under me, stroking my cock in time with his thrusts. Pleasure coiled inside me, ready to snap. He tilted his hips, finding the hidden pleasure center. I pulled a knee up, opening myself to get him deeper. The moans he made went right to my cock.

His lips found my ear. "I need to feel you come on my cock."

I snapped, coming completely unraveled, jerking violently, driven by ecstasy. Riding out our high and coming in his hand.

"Give it all to me," he rasped, meeting me with long thrusts.

I collapsed into the mattress, a spent mess, and he took out the high of his lust, slamming his hips into my ass. All I could do was take it, trapped in endless pleasure while he drove into my prostate.

Warmth flooded inside me while his cock pulsed. I grabbed his ass, forcing him deeper, wanting all of his cum. He stilled where he was, face pressed into my cheek. Not moving to withdraw. Cock still throbbing.

I didn't want to move. I didn't want it to end.

Fear returned, knowing he could leave like he'd done so many mornings after, leaving me alone in hotel rooms.

When he finally shifted, it wasn't to get up. He laid out with an arm and leg draped over my bare skin. I kissed his chest. Then, I noticed the collection of ghosts he'd added to the one. Each of them with something else in their hands.

"You'll have to tell me what all these mean at some point."

"I will." The simple reply promised more time with him, easing more of my anxiety. "I like that I got you to come so easily."

"It shocked me." I laughed, pressing my face into his neck. "Your tongue…"

"Liked that, did you?" I liked the happiness in his voice.

"Almost as much as your cock." I slipped my arm around his chest, hugging him. "We should shower."

"How nice is the shower in here?"

"Magnificent, and there is actually hot water and room for two." I reluctantly detangled from him.

"Two?" he asked playfully as we got up.

"You don't think I'm letting you out of my sight, do you?"

"I'm not the one who leaves without a word."

I cringed. "I deserve that."

As many times as he'd left me in a hotel room the next morning, he never did it without a goodbye. Even if it was cold and he was distant, he did it to my face, and now I knew it was pointed. My ribcage ached a little.

He caught my arm after I turned on the water. "You have to talk to me."

I searched his face. "I know."

"No, you don't. I can see you spiraling and overthinking. I need you to talk to me because I can't go through you leaving me again." Pain swirled in his eyes, the green like a dark forest. His sweet soul believed I could ever leave again.

I cupped his cheek, knowing my words wouldn't be trusted. I had to show him. "I will talk, I promise, but I'm not going anywhere. If you want me to leave you alone, you're going to have to tell me to go."

He closed his eyes, leaning into my touch, while our lips found each other.

We kissed, not breaking even to step into the shower. Making out under the spray, I grabbed his hips, dragging them to mine.

"There is no way I can get it up again. Just because you found the fountain of your orgasm youth doesn't mean I don't need some recovery!" He laughed, wrapping his arms around my neck.

"That doesn't mean I can't touch, right?" I slid my hands to his ass, bringing our bodies flush.

"You're incorrigible."

When we were showered, he took me back to bed and wrapped himself around my body.

"Are you really separated?" he asked.