23. Cam

Athrill ran through me at the praise, and I breathed in the clean scent of Grady's skin as my fingers explored him, his quiet groans and the heat enveloping my fingers a mouthwatering cocktail that eased my nerves and ramped up my arousal until I was insane with the need to push inside him.

He was a landscape of sinew and skin spread out beneath me, the muscles of his broad back flexing with the press of my fingers, his skin silky under my touch as I traced the slope of his spine with my free hand. My heart pounded in rhythm with my own eager arousal as I pulled my fingers free and dipped lower to brush my lips over the curve of his shoulder.

"I want you." His voice was husky and low when he turned his head to glimpse me over his shoulder.

I kissed him and eased lower, molding my body to the back of his, my cock slotting into the seam of his ass, where I couldn't resist a slow thrust that lit a gratifying ache of anticipation inside me. I did it again and again, my eyes drifting shut at the sensation of the full-body contact. Grady's tongue was like velvet in my mouth, and I sucked it in time with my rhythm. The undulation of my hips grew slippery with precum dripping from my cock as my muscles tightened with tension and need. "You feel so fucking good, even like this."

"Cameron." The sound of my name on his lips, the strained way he whispered it like a sultry punctuation to my thrusts against him, was a catalyst that consumed the last of my hesitation. "Fuck me."

I took a deep breath and shifted so I could press my cock against his entrance. I wanted him just like this, our bodies sealed together, no distance. When my cock kissed the rim of his hole, Grady whispered a curse, shifting under me. My fingers dug into the lean musculature of his ass as I spread his cheek and nudged the head of my cock closer.

"Oh fuck," I panted, voice shaky as I felt him relax and heat grip me. "Fuck."

Grady responded by pressing back against me, drawing a gasp from me that reverberated through my core and lit me up with the tight clench of his ass on my cock.

"Feels so fucking good," I moaned. I'd fucking adored every sexual encounter we'd had. Feeling him push inside me was its own kind of stratospheric high. Swallowing his cum and him swallowing mine made me weak in the knees. But sliding inside Grady Lusk was on another level.

Cracking my eyes open, I caught Grady's lust-drunk gaze as I began moving slowly, not wanting to give him too much too fast. Or me. Because feeling him surrounding me had me on edge already, my body tight as a bowstring.

I let go of his asscheek and dug my fingers into the sheets near his head, knuckles turning white as I rocked myself in and out of him, slow but steady. His breath hitched, and undiluted pleasure ricocheted through me, setting my nerves on fire.

"That's it, baby. Like that." Grady's body arched and writhed in rippling waves of pure heat, and fuck, watching him lose himself was infinitely better than any drug I'd ever tried.

Every low, throaty grunt he made urged me on, and I moved faster as my desperation grew. My body thrummed with arousal that wound tighter with each thrust. Grady's ass clenched around me, creating a delicious friction that pulled a groan from deep in my chest.

"You like it?" I whispered, pulling out and sliding back in, firm and deep.

"I…fuck yeah, gonna make me come. Don't stop." He reached a hand back, blindly grasping my thigh, and I laced the fingers of our others, gripping tight and using the leverage to pump deeper inside him.

"Oh fuck, oh fuck," I chanted as he stiffened and cried out with his release. The inferno in the pit of my stomach raged out of control with the sweet, slick friction of him against me and suddenly exploded in one giant shock wave that swallowed me whole. With a hard thrust, I buried myself deep inside him and let go, my orgasm pulsing out of me in electric bursts that stole my breath and made my hearing go funny.

Grady's ass tightened, squeezing every drop of cum from my balls. And then he went slack, ragged breaths steadying as I collapsed on top of him. We were quiet except for the occasional low hum of satisfaction I murmured against his skin while I softened inside him.

I wanted to stay like this, buried inside him and surrounded by the musky scent of sex and sweat, but eventually, I pulled out carefully, loving the low sound of protest he made and the sight of his hole glistening with my cum. I rolled onto my side next to him, and as Grady shifted to face me, a strange sensation burgeoned inside of me, a kind of fragility mixed with confidence I'd never felt before. I wondered if this was what true intimacy was, this feeling of being attuned to him in a way I'd never been attuned to anyone else, this harmony of understanding and desire and adoration all tangled together the way our limbs were.

Grady reached out, a lazy smile on his face as he ran his thumb along my lower lip. "What is it? What are you thinking?"

"I…I just…" I started. My throat felt raw. My gaze fell on his lips, plump and kiss-swollen, and my chest got tight with emotion that was stronger than lust or satisfaction. "I'm thinking that I'm glad I came here. There's nowhere else I'd rather be, and I don't want to forget this. And also—" I paused, letting my eyes fall shut as he ran a fingertip down the length of my throat. "I want to do this again."

Grady pulled me toward him with a chuckle and kissed my forehead. "We can definitely do it again. Though, maybe we should change the bedspread first. Feels like I'm lying in an ocean."

The interiorof Grady's car was spotless. He could've driven it off the lot the previous day, and I wouldn't have known the difference. It was weird to be riding with him, one of those reminders that our time together was slivers of larger lives. I couldn't help but be curious about him and who he was outside the classroom, especially when he wasn't with me. I'd started thinking about that a lot more recently, and it was kind of a bummer because I loved seeing these slivers, gathering them up inside me and piecing them together.

But we'd agreed to a dead-end road, and I'd been one hundred percent okay with that at the time, so I wanted to stay true to my end of the bargain. He'd surprised the hell out of me by inviting me to his sister's for the weekend, and I probably should have said no because that, too, seemed to be a little beyond the scope of what we'd agreed to. But the idea of a change of scenery, a real change of scenery where I could exist beyond my job, schoolwork, and parents, had been too tempting to refuse. Plus, the sex. I still couldn't get enough. After the night before, I longed for more of seeing the professor undone, of seeing him outside of stolen moments. Even if we were hanging out with his family, for two whole nights, I'd have him to myself. We wouldn't have to hurry or worry about anyone seeing us together.

Before we'd left, Grady had messaged his sister, letting her know he would be bringing a friend with him. I knew that arrangement was mostly him taking pity on me, but still, spending more time together thrilled me.

I stole glances at Grady as he focused on the road ahead, hands steady on the wheel. His profile, framed by the sunlight streaming through the windshield, was a blend of concentration and contentment that made my stomach swoop.

"Are you sure your sister won't be pissed you're bringing another person?" I didn't ask the burning question which was what had his sister said when he'd told her he'd be bringing a someone with him?

Grady feathered a touch over my thigh, and I widened the splay of my legs automatically, hoping he'd leave it there. "Cameron, my sister has three kids under eleven. She's already got the basement ready. One more person won't make a difference. Fair warning, though: the basement is also the playroom, and last time I slept on the pull-out couch, I woke up with back pain that lasted a week. Turned out there was a Hot Wheels under the mattress."

"Like the Princess and the Hot Wheels."

He chuckled, the light touch on my thigh turning into a stronger squeeze.

"What's your sister like?"

Grady glanced over at me, a small smile tugging the corner of his lips, the warmth in his eyes softening the seriousness that so often clouded them when he was talking about his work. I wondered if he was aware of the shift or how sexy it was.

"She's the kind of person who can juggle three wild kids, a part-time job, and still want to host a dinner party. She's smart, funny, spontaneous, and incredibly kind. She eats chaos for breakfast."

"Unlike you?" I teased, and a shadow inexplicably crossed his face.

"She's much better at balance, that's for sure."

I leaned back in my seat, the mixture of nervousness and excitement knotting in my stomach and settling as uncertainty.

"You're starting to fidget," Grady observed. "They'll like you, don't worry."

"Do they know I'm your student?"

Grady scratched his jawline and made a face. "I didn't get to that part. I wasn't exactly sure what to say, if I'm being honest. It was such a spur-of-the-moment thing…" He trailed off, and I didn't know what to say either. I'd spent every moment since getting out of rehab focused on being honest, with myself and with everyone else, and now found myself in the position of carrying two secrets. But it was Paul's request that weighed heavier on me.

"Cameron?" Grady's voice broke through the storm cloud of my thoughts, and I shook my head.

"It's fine, I trust you. We can say we met on an app or something. We don't even have to say I go to the U." I shrugged. Easy peasy.

"So give us the details,tell us all about how you met," Sandra said when she finally sat down at the dining table later that evening. We'd arrived about an hour before dinner. Sandra, her husband Mike, and all the kids had swarmed out of the house en masse, surrounding the car like little hellions. Hugs and introductions had been exchanged. Just as Grady had promised, Sandra was warm and gracious, and the nieces and nephews were fucking adorable. Being an only child, the chaos of multiple young kids caught me off guard. The last time I'd been around it was Homecoming, when Sam's entire family of eight had overtaken the house after the game. I'd fucking loved it, though, and got the same vibe at Sandra's as soon as we'd walked through the door. I liked the noise and the distraction. Kept me from my own thoughts.

But of course, that was the first fucking question we got asked once everyone was finally in one place and relatively still, except for Hardin, Grady's youngest nephew, who kept popping out of his chair to crawl under the table or go pester his brother or sister.

"It was a club, actually," Grady said mildly, and Sandra's brows shot up, though it was her husband, Mike, who chuckled and said, "There's no way you're going to convince me you two met on a dance floor."

"It was like pulling teeth to get Grady to dance at my wedding," Sandra explained.

"Hey, I dance to slow songs," Grady protested. "I can't keep up with whatever the dance trends du jour are."

"Technically, you don't have to in a club. A little shimmy or grind is all you need." I laughed, trying to imagine Grady shimmying. The man was a lot of things I fucking adored, but he wasn't a shimmy-er, and the playful swat he gave me was enough to confirm. "It wasn't on the dance floor, though," I added, turning the conversation back to the topic at hand. "It was in the bathroom."

Grady cut a sharp look my way, nostrils flaring at my shit-eating grin. I mean, technically, it was true.

"I was on a date with someone else. Possibly the worst date of my life." Grady picked up where I left off. "I was going to the restroom for a moment of quiet to debate my life choices. He was coming out as I was going in."

"We bumped into each other." I grinned wider.

"So to speak, yes."

"How…romantic?" Sandra ventured and then broke into a chuckle.

"It was something, that's for sure." Beneath the table, Grady squeezed my thigh and then let his hand linger.

I could feel the warmth seep through my jeans, and a shiver ricocheted up my spine. When I met his eyes, I felt the same heady excitement that had pulsed through me that night in the club. "It was definitely something," I echoed, unable to suppress a small smirk.

"He intrigued me immediately," Grady continued, expression softening. "A magnetic person I couldn't help but to be drawn to is the best way I can explain it."

"He forgot to mention how irresistibly handsome I am," I joked, despite how his compliment fluttered around in my chest. I leaned closer, my shoulder brushing his as a ripple of laughter ran around the table.

Grady gave me a mock-stern look, then winked at me. "I was getting to that part."

"Well, we're so glad you joined us, Cameron," Sandra said. "And maybe someday, you'll get Grady on a dance floor."

The conversation moved on to other topics soon after, thank goodness, filled with stories of the kids, updates from Sandra's and Mike's lives, and Grady's upcoming book. The meal was delicious—Jesse would have approved. Despite my initial trepidation, I was having a good time, saturating myself in the pleasant sort of chaos, far removed from the frenzy of college life and…other things. Things that I pushed into the far reaches of my mind when they tried to invade.

"That was really nice, what you said at the dinner table," I said later, once Grady and I were lying on the sofa bed in the basement, the warm yellow glow of a butterfly nightlight diffusing the thick darkness. We'd jokingly checked underneath the mattress for stray cars and Legos before we'd crawled beneath the covers, and had cracked up after discovering several of each.

Grady wrapped an arm around my waist and kissed the tip of my nose, then brushed one over my lips for good measure. "It was true," he murmured, and I hummed beneath the warmth of his mouth on mine, lingering in that sublime space for as long as I could before pulling back a bit and finding his eyes.

"You're magnetic to me, too, you know. I really fucking like you," I whispered.

"I really like you, too, baby."

We said it frequently to each other, lately. So frequently that I wondered, sometimes, if Grady was like me, a tongue slip away from "like" turning into "love." Sometimes the way that he gazed back at me, as he did then, made me think he was.

And I didn't know what the fuck we were gonna do about that. So like the other things I was trying not to think about, that, too, got shoved into a far corner of my mind.

"Can you dance at all?"

Grady echoed my lazy laughter and sealed his chest to my back when I rolled over, fingertips drifting along the length of my flank. "I can dance, goddammit. I'll show you sometime."

"Promise?"

"No." And then, after a beat of silence, came, "Yes." His hand moved lower, sliding behind the waistband of my pajama pants. "I love when you make that noise." The words spilled across the back of my neck as my breath hitched.

"I love the way you touch me," I managed as he gripped my base and stroked me slowly to hardness. "Reminds me of the first time you ever touched me. Fuck,"I ground out in a harsh whisper as he squeezed.

"Pull your pants down."

I scrambled to comply. Cool air washed over me as Grady peeled back the covers far enough to slip beneath. Wet heat enveloped my cock, and my hand tangled in the strands of his hair as he sucked me, slow and intense, until I spilled into his throat with a quiet moan, limbs boneless, and me satisfied in every way possible.

Pressureon my chest had my eyes popping open the next morning, and in my bleary, dream-addled state, what I'd thought was a rock turned out to be Hardin peering down at me from his perch on my chest.

"Hey, little man," I mumbled groggily, cutting my eyes aside to find Grady still asleep. God, was it really morning? My body was heavy with both post-orgasmic satisfaction and the stubborn remnants of sleep.

"Morning," the boy chirped, bouncing on my chest with a toothy grin that made my heart squeeze. He seemed unfazed by my morning breath. "Do you like waffles?"

I tried to sit up without dislodging him, a delicate operation. "I love waffles."

"With toppings?"

"What toppings?" I narrowed my eyes at him.

"All toppings. Did you know Uncle Grady once ate so many waffles he threw up on the floor?"

I ruffled his hair as he slid onto the mattress. "Maybe we shouldn't give him any waffles, then. What do you think? Maybe I can eat his."

"I was five. Cut me some slack." Grady groaned as he rose up on an elbow and rubbed a hand over his face. He was somehow both adorable and sexy as fuck in the morning, I was learning. A pang of sadness hit that the last few days were likely the only ones I'd ever get to experience mornings like this with him. Soon enough, it'd be back to the cafe and classes.

"I'm five, and I've never thrown up waffles."

Grady chucked Hardin under the chin. "There's still plenty of time before you're six. Want to go give it the old college try? Your mother will be delighted, I'm sure."

Hardin squealed as Grady tickled him while I rolled fully upright and put my feet on the floor. Despite the aggressive awakening, I was ready to get the day started, hell-bent on savoring all the time I had with Grady while I could.