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)
“Do you doubt that I find you attractive?”
“It’s not about me being hot. Something like this…it’s not about looks.” Or maybe that was what that quiet, needy part of Ash wanted; to matter to someone as more than a pretty face. He ventured, “Would you want anyone you worked for to be dependent on you like this?”
“No. Not like this.” No less dry and factual—yet no less sincere, either, honest in that raw way of Brand’s that cut right into Ash’s heart. “I am not sure I have the words for it. It is simply…an innate sense. A rightness. As if I can see the shape of an absence inside you, and where the edges are…they match the shape of an absence inside me. Your mother described it as the red string of fate.”
Ash stiffened, gut lurching, horror drying that molten pool of desire to just crumbles. “You talked to my mother about this?”
Brand trailed into low, thunder-murmur laughter. “No. Not in so many terms.” That laughter gentled into a smile; Brand’s fingers slipped down the line of Ash’s jaw, leaving trails of heat. “She only tried to advise me on whether or not I should let you run…” Then his fingers were against Ash’s throat—gentle, but encircling nonetheless, capturing him with his breaths hitching and his heart stuttering. “…or if I should hold you down and refuse to let you go.”
Ash took several frantic, shallow breaths; he didn’t know if he was frightened or painfully aroused or maybe both, when both seemed to be what made this work. “Y-you know codependency is really fucked up,” he whispered. “There’s like…DSM shit about what it does to people.”
“I know.” Yet Brand’s hand remained where it was, massive and making Ash feel so delicate, his neck so slender and easily crushed if that touch turned from gentle to cruel. Slowly, deliberately, Brand’s thumb traced down over his jugular, teasing a line of rough fire-touch over Ash’s skin. “But I also know that sometimes we choose for ourselves what feels right, what feels best, as long as it sates both our needs.”
Ash held completely and utterly still, yet his entire body was shaking, his heart slamming painfully against his ribs. What Brand was asking of him might seem simple…but it required trusting Brand the way Ash had never trusted anyone in his life.
It scared him.
Yet there was some quiet, hungry part of him that liked being scared; that liked the thrill of that hand against his throat, and the promise in that tall, hardened, weathered body that made him feel so small and vulnerable and young.
“It’s…” His voice trailed off into a soft whimper as Brand’s hand tightened subtly; a rush of need surged right to Ash’s cock. “I-it’s…just a roleplay thing with sex and private time anyway, right?”
“If that is what you wish it to be,” Brand murmured, and yet something in those dark, hypnotic eyes said no.
No, it was so much more than that.
And it was so much more than a simple agreement, when Ash licked his lips and mustered his courage and whispered, “Yes.”
Brand made a low, pleased sound. His hold slowly curled tighter against Ash’s throat, fingertips against the back of his neck, drawing him in. “Then you will do as you are told?” Brand rumbled.
Ash peeked up through his lashes, meeting that deeply possessive gaze…then swept his lashes down once more, bowing his head obediently, his entire body taut and burning with the rush of anticipation. “…yes.”
Clenching fingers. Just a touch of pressure, and his body responded with such explosive heat he nearly whimpered, shifting restlessly, aching to rub his entire body against Brand’s to ease this sudden hot, desperate feeling.
“Say ‘yes, Brand,’” Brand commanded softly.
“Yes, Brand,” Ash repeated, then licked his lips when he could almost feel the words caressing them, as if sealing this with a phantom kiss.
“Very good, my young Master.”
And then that grasp was drawing him in, thumb catching under his jaw and tilting his face up, exposing his vulnerable throat…and pulling him in to the lips that descended on his, smiling with a promise and a hunger that said Ash would beg for Brand’s particular brand of control very soon, teasing with a confidence that whispered of a darkness waiting to be explored. “Very good, indeed.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
IT WAS ALMOST ANTICLIMACTIC, THE following morning, for Ash to get up and just…leave the hospital. Just like that. Especially after nearly dying in a hit and run.
And especially after a night spent trembling in Brand’s arms, soft and submissive while the man simply kissed him in a way he’d never been kissed before in his life.
He was accustomed to quick, rushed, messy kisses. Aggressive and pushy kisses that tasted of Jaegermeister and hot young hormones, thoughtless and acting on sheer instinct and self-gratification.
The way Brand kissed…it was with slow, lingering deliberation, intimacy. Brand kissed with purpose—and that purpose was to leave Ash completely vulnerable, completely exposed, no part of his mouth left untouched, untasted, unexplored.