Revived (The Dungeon Black Duology 2)

“He’s not messing with your head, Max. He likes you. A lot. Maybe you’re just subconsciously reacting to his vibes. Feeding off his attraction or something.”

Max nodded. Made sense, in a roundabout way. “He does like me. Wants to date me. I think he’s getting too attached. I keep forgetting he’s new, not used to this kind of arrangement.” His stomach shifted anxiously. His mind churned in thought. “I’m leading him on. I should stop this. Find him a new Dom. Things’ll only get harder if I don’t.”

“For who?” Scott murmured. “Him or you?”

Max cut him a scathing look. “Don’t start with me again.”

Scott held up his hands and chuckled. “Just asking. You seem a little attached to him, too.”

Max narrowed his eyes. “Stop talking. Go away.”

“But I thought you needed help with the—”

“I’ll manage. Get lost.”

Scott grinned infinitesimally. “Alright. Getting lost.” He stood up and casually made his way to the door. “Oh, by the way.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Your little scene with Sean? Five stars.”

TEN

Sean sighed down at the face slowly appearing in his developing tray. The stubborn, black and white features of his Dom. He rocked the pan gently under his darkroom’s red light, watching as the chemicals did their thing. Gradually bringing to clarity one of several leftover images that he’d taken for an assignment several weeks ago. Where Max had been his subject… on the night of their first scene…

Sean blinked away the musing before it could start, and glanced at the clock to his right. Yup, time to move things to tray number two. Aka the stop bath, where all developing ceased. Didn’t want Mr. Moody to get too dark. Using special tongs, Sean transferred the sheet, then rocked that tray just like the first. Max’s image swayed gently in the clear solution, the shallow waves making his eyes appear to glimmer. Sean smiled. He loved Max’s eyes, so green and intense, ever betraying his emotions.

Another minute passed, so he moved things again, this time to a tray of fixer. Which pretty much set the image in stone, ensuring a nice finished product. More easy rocking for another sixty seconds.

Sean glanced into his room’s connecting bathroom and eyed the pictures he’d already developed. Clipped to a cord draped across the bathtub, they hung safely out of the way as they dried. Sean’s darkroom wasn’t glamorous—door and windows covered and duct taped—but it served its purpose and that’s all Sean cared about. He’d brought hundreds of images to life in this space and planned on bringing quite a few more.

Another minute passed. Sean moved his photo to the rinse tray. Five minutes, then clip and repeat.

His eyes roamed idly over Max’s face as he waited. His heart thumped to a steady, troubled beat. Their scene on Tuesday had been phenomenal. Like the session before, Max had shot Sean past the stars into a whole other inexplicable dimension. And then, after Sean splintered into a million different pieces, Max gathered him up and put him back together. So intensely beautiful, the only way to describe it. But what resonated the most was the strength of their intimacy. Because while all that other stuff may have seemed just as intense, it wasn’t. Not even a little. Not even close.

It was sexual, yes. Provocative, absolutely—how Max drove Sean into absolute mindlessness. But it was also just part of Max’s job. As was his bringing Sean back down to earth, carefully and considerately reassembling him. Something he undoubtedly did with all his clients, behaving as a professional Dom should.

But the way Max had kissed Sean all those times to calm him? That had been something entirely different. Sean had felt it with each tender press of Max’s lips. Max had chosen that method when countless others would have worked. He’d consciously picked to soothe Sean with his mouth.

With his kiss.

Sean exhaled at the memory and closed his eyes. God, Max’s lips: one-eighty proof bliss. Instant intoxication to the brain. So hungry, yet controlled as they moved over Sean’s. So seductively authoritative, yet kind. Sean could literally muse for hours on all the ways they made him feel. In his junk, but most especially in his chest.

Intimacy was only the half of it, though. Max was throwing other vibes, too. Ones that all but pulsed off his body as he held Sean in his arms during aftercare. Invisible energy kindling between them, weaving the beginnings of a bond. Or at least that’s how it’d felt to Sean. God, the way Max had gazed into his eyes. Like he was secretly easing a part of himself into some hidden channel coursing through Sean’s soul. Sean had felt it. It’d been palpable, affecting his head. Compelling him to act without thinking.

Like when he’d all but fucking insisted that Max give them a chance. At a relationship. At dating. At somehow being exclusive… Sean’s stomach turned at the thought of Max fucking other men. Because honestly, how would that whole deal even work? If he and Max ever started seeing each other. Would the exclusive part only pertain to Sean? Would Max still bang others for pay? Sean wondered how often Max had sex with his clients, then frowned, suspecting pretty fucking regularly. Hell, Max had all but said as much when Sean asked him to fuck him on his table. Ugh. Goddamn. Max with another guy. Just the thought of that made Sean queasy. Made his heart pound all anxiously. Made him break into a sweat.