Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 73240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Ash didn’t understand. What could be so horrible that he wouldn’t want to hear it? Unless…Brand was trying to tell him not to push. Not to make it more than casual sex outside the office. Ash lowered his eyes, lingering on the faint hint of the scar just barely peeking up past Brand’s collar.
“…tell me, Brand. Please. If I’m not just your job…what do you want me to be?”
“I…”
That was when Ash realized that cold, proper, unflappable Brand Forsythe?
Was nervous.
He looked almost as though it pained him to be uncertain about something, and Ash couldn’t help a fond smile, resting his hand to Brand’s chest.
“Take your time,” he teased softly. “They’re not letting me out of here until morning.”
“…you truly are a brat.” Brand made a huffy, irritable sound, but only tightened his hold on Ash, drawing their bodies together. “I would ask something of you, first.”
“I’m listening.”
“Tell me how you feel, when you are with me.” As blunt and straightforward as everything Brand said, yet it hinted at something unspoken, a leading edge. “Tell me why you kissed me that night.”
“For the same reason I called you to come get me instead of trying to get home on my own. I…”
Ash’s heart beat harder. Admitting this out loud, trying to quantify it…he didn’t know how. He didn’t know how to describe the feeling he’d had since the moment Brand had taken him in hand and Ash had realized he wasn’t spinning anymore, so long as Brand held him tight.
“I get confused with how I feel around you,” Ash confessed. “I…no one’s ever taken care of me like you do. Not really. I had discipline at boarding school and I guess that’s the only reason the worst things I do are waste money and act like a shiftless asshole, but…” He shrugged helplessly. “Being a harmless waste of space isn’t—it’s not like—just because I’m not bad, it doesn’t mean I’m somehow good. And now everyone’s expecting me to be better than I really am, and part of me wants to do it. Part of me wants to stand up and do right by my dad and not disappoint everyone. Prove I can do this. Be a functioning, independent adult.”
Brand curled his knuckles against Ash’s cheek, roughness grazing against his skin. “Am I standing in the way of that, then?”
“No!” Ash protested. “If anything, you…you make me feel like I can do this. Which doesn’t make sense, because I get this…” His pulse skipped and leaped. His stomach twisted, high with nerves, with fear, admitting this…this thing he felt that he didn’t know how to define, hoping Brand wouldn’t…laugh in his face, recoil in disgust, leave his heart in pieces on the floor. “I get all weird inside when you want to do everything for me. Because it’s not like…not like a hired servant helping me. Not the way you do it. It’s different the way you do it…like there’s this entire different meaning behind it.” Ash lowered his eyes; Brand was watching him so intently, stealing his breath, and if Ash looked at him he’d lose the courage to keep speaking. “It’s like you’re taking care of me because I’m…small and helpless, and I need it.” He winced at how that came out; God, he sounded weird. “But I’m not small. I’m not helpless. I’m used to no one…taking care of me like that. My parents never did.” He bit the inside of his cheek. He could barely get his voice out as more than a strangled whisper as he finished, “…so why do I get all weird and hot inside when you do?”
A full-body shudder went through Brand, so intense Ash could feel it with every inch of his body. That large, rough hand curled against the back of Ash’s head, drawing him in so Brand could kiss his temple, the corner of his eye, murmuring against his skin.
“There are terms for that, but I think if I told you, you would rebel,” Brand said, low and rich with a husky edge. “Suffice to say it brings me an equally deep pleasure to care for you.”
Ash leaned into that warm affection as if starved for it, soaking it in. “Are…we talking about the same kind of pleasure?”
“I should think so,” Brand said—then, at Ash’s skeptical look, clarified patiently, “Yes, my young Master. It provides me both emotional gratification and physical sexual arousal to attend to your every need.”
Ash groaned. “You would put it that way.”
“I speak in plain terms to avoid being misunderstood.”
“I don’t understand, though,” Ash admitted. “I don’t understand how I’m supposed to be self-sufficient in the office but also just…giving up any idea of self-sufficiency at all to let you be this way with me.”
“Few people truly stand on their own, young Master.” Brand’s touch left shivers over Ash’s skin as long, rough fingers wove into his hair, stroking slowly down to his scalp, a rhythm underscoring each word. “We all rely on those in our lives whom we care for, and who care for us. Even those who live independently draw comfort and strength from the relationships in their lives.”