Chapter 28

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Clark

I BUZZ THE WHOLE way to River’s place. I’m still reliving those moments in the hammock and under the tree. Even as I park outside River’s apartment, I struggle to believe how easily he forgave me, how easily he took me back after I was the one who ran away.

I owe him that same leap of faith in return.

I head up the walkway to his apartment, and River opens his door before I ever reach it. He’s wearing the same brilliant grin that lit his face in the forest. My heart flutters at the sight, my nerves giving way to a quiet, warm confidence, a steadiness I haven’t felt in years. Something soft and soothing wraps around me before River gets a chance to bundle me up in his arms and kiss me at the doorstep. Even without his touch, I feel him there with me, like a heavy jacket on a cold winter day.

River only releases me so he can close the door. He takes my hand, leading me into his apartment full of plants and tea.

“Can I use your bathroom?” I say before I get too lost in his touch.

He lets me go, and I retreat, but not for long. I need a moment to steady myself and splash water on my face. I hunch at the mirror, examining my own reflection.

We’ve come a long way, but there’s more to do, more to say, more to experience. I intend to push those boundaries tonight, and I think I know exactly how, but it’s been so long that a tremor quavers through my hands. It’s not fear. It’s … everything, so many emotions all at once. I’m like an electric wire sparking and spitting, the zaps licking the air, searching for a place to direct all that energy.

I huff out a breath of anxiety and push myself away from the sink. I force myself out of the bathroom and finally take off my shoes. When I head to River’s bedroom, he’s already there, reclining shirtless on his mattress with his arms behind his head. It’s not him showing off, though he certainly has plenty to show off. In the dim light, muscle cords his chest and carves his torso into enticing planes. But I know he’s not putting himself on display out of arrogance. He’s simply kicking back to relax, heedless of how good his body looks.

I peel off my shirt as I approach, and he sits up with a smile. When I climb onto the bed and into his lap, his hands go to my hips and mine drape over his shoulders so we can return to that kiss we had at the door. As I sink against his mouth, some of the energy buzzing inside me quiets. It’s like all that aura and energy stuff he talks about. River soothes my excitement and nerves, so when I pull away from him, there’s nothing left in me but absolute faith in the man holding me.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” he says.

“I am too.”

I go back to kissing him, shifting us all the while so I’m on my back with River above me. The same thought, the same desire, streaks through both of us, and our hips sway in time, but cloth stands between us, and the barrier quickly becomes so intolerable that we break apart gasping and scramble for our pants. River gets free first, having worn one of his simple baggy pairs of hemp pants, and he helps me match him.

“Wait,” I say before he can go back to kissing me.

He pauses, confusion streaking across his face, but he doesn’t complain.

“I want you to top me tonight,” I say. The words escape in a rush, my heart tapping at my chest rapid-fire when I hear them come out.

River chews at his bottom lip. “Fuck, Clark, I’d love to do that for you.”

He doesn’t ask anything further, apparently trusting the desire I spoke aloud, trusting I’m ready, trusting I trust him . He simply bends his head and starts kissing his way down my body, placing himself between my legs and wrapping his hands around my thighs. He kisses along my thigh, grabbing the sensitive skin between his teeth until I gasp, then going deeper with his tongue. My breaths waver as he licks around my sac and then lower still.

I push myself up on my arms, perhaps for a better look. Some part of me wants to watch, to check in, to manage this experience, but the moment I try, River pops up and settles me back down with a hand on my chest. He doesn’t press hard, but his hand is firm, and I go back down onto my back.

“Let me do this for you,” River says. “Let go, Clark.”

I do, just as I have every other time. He hasn’t always used those words, but any time he’s taken control, I’ve surrendered myself into his care. It’s so easy I don’t even have time to resist before I’m lying beneath him waiting for whatever he chooses to do next. All the control I need to exercise at work, in front of co-workers, around other people — it melts out of me when River asks me to trust him.

Maybe that’s why I never truly had any hope of running from him.

He’s unlike anyone I’ve ever known or been with, and my body responds to him on a level that isn’t even conscious. When he touches me with slicked up fingers, I open to him with hardly a twinge of protest. In moments, the instinct that made me push myself up onto my arms to micromanage this encounter is so distant and so faint it’s like a glimmer on the far horizon. I close my eyes and give myself to him, and it feels like the most natural thing in the entire world.

“Clark.”

His breathy whisper dances across my heated skin. He extracts his fingers, but I still don’t open my eyes, even when something far thicker presses against my loosened hole.

“Look at me.”

I obey. River stares down at me, his eyes so fixed on my face that what’s happening with our bodies almost seems incidental. He bends down to kiss me, and it presses him harder against me, but that’s just one sensation among many. I reach for him, wrapping my arms around him, and then a pressure too big to ignore invades my senses.

I whimper against him as he enters me, but he doesn’t stop kissing me the entire time. His slow entrance lets me feel every inch of him as he lights me up from the inside out. By the time he gets inside me, I’m digging my fingernails into his back and clinging to him desperately.

He finally backs away in order to gasp for breath. I’m panting just as hard, my body blazing around the blunt fact of his cock inside me. It’s been long enough that I’ve lost some of my sense for this fullness. It shocks me, stealing my breath away as my body burns in response.

River props himself up on his arms to move more easily. His hair spills past his shoulders. His stormy eyes remain fixed on mine. When he moves, my eyes snap shut, but I’m sure he’s watching my mouth spread wide around a wordless cry as his cock slides backward.

He pushes in slowly, giving me time to adjust. Amid the pinch and burn, pleasure blooms, even brighter and hotter than any of that. I cling to the sheets, having lost my ability to cling to River himself, and arch as he pushes into me yet again.

His long hair brushes my chest as he apparently bows his head. His pace picks up, his need on display with every restrained thrust and bitten back groan. We’ve come too far to hesitate now, though. Here at my most vulnerable, I have nothing left to hold back.

I force my eyes open.

“River.”

He lifts his head with an effort, eyes bright, like sunlight shining through that constant storm brewing in his gaze. I reach up to stroke his cheek as he bottoms out inside me.

“No more holding back,” I say. “I’m here. I’m with you.”

He holds my gaze for a moment as though deliberating. For a horrible beat, I think he might actually balk at my request. With my body on fire and screaming for more, it nearly becomes too much to bear.

Then he moves.

The sway of his hips rocks me on the bed and snaps my eyes shut. I arch, a moan jumping out of my throat. He doesn’t stop, bracing on his hands and thrusting at me with none of the careful hesitance he demonstrated before. River unleashes, hips slapping against me, cock driving hard and fast into me and chasing every errant thought out of my head.

For once, my mind goes truly, fully blank. There’s nothing left but him, but us, but the feeling of burning and tensing and careening toward some glorious height. I shout and moan, incapable of squashing the noise that pours out of me like water bursting free of a dam. My whole body surrenders, limp and tense all at once as River gives me everything I need and so, so much more.

He somehow manages to weave his fingers between mine during this, pinning my arms above my head, but, more importantly, giving me something to hold onto as the pleasure crests. I’m not sure if I’m clinging to him or he’s clinging to me. Perhaps it’s both. I tighten my grasp as his cock plunges into me with noisy results. Have I ever been so loud? The thought registers dimly that I might be alerting his neighbors to our activities, but I can’t quiet myself when the fire inside me is on the verge of bursting free, and River doesn’t ask me to. He just keeps giving me more of his cock, thrusting into me until I’m desperately untangling one hand from his to reach for myself.

He groans but lets me go. I grab myself roughly and stroke, artless and pathetic. I have no space left for shame. I need this. I need it so badly my own hand makes me shout at River’s dark bedroom.

That cry seems to spur him on. He keeps going, hard and fast and relentless, and I match him with my hand, pumping until the sensation threatens to overwhelm me.

And then it does.

It hits me all at once, lightning crashing through me. The storm in River’s eyes gusts through my body, howling and flashing and tearing me to shreds. I erupt over my hand and onto my torso, beat after beat of exquisite release roaring out of me as River thrusts furtively several more times before going rigid himself.

I’m not sure exactly when I come back down. It’s a slow process, like water filling a bowl one drop at a time. River takes care of me through the whole thing, only leaving my side very briefly so he can grab a towel. As soon as he can, he lies back down, bundling me in his arms so I can rest with my back against his chest.

That’s where it hits me, the warm finality of a decision long deferred. I didn’t return his feelings out there under his favorite tree, but that was pure cowardice. Once more, I’m late. Once more, I have to hope I’m not too late.

“I love you,” I say at last, and it feels like the truest words I’ll ever speak.

River simply hugs me tighter against him, nuzzling his nose against my neck. I expect him to return the sentiment, but that would be too simple and too obvious for River, wouldn’t it? Besides, he already said it out there in the forest.

“I told you it was never too late,” he says instead.