Incandescent

And so fucking beautiful.

Winding my hands in his hair, I hauled his face closer, pouring all my longing and frustration into another kiss and smelling the spicy, musky scent on his skin. I was overcome with a sentiment that pulled at my very core. I knew in that instant that if the situation had played out differently, in another time and place, I would’ve gone for it, taken my chances, and asked to date him.

I didn’t know why I was feeling so emotional in the middle of all this. But kissing Marcus was so intense and heady, so incredible, that I didn’t know what to do with all the sensations and feelings pelting my senses. They ended up spilling over and out of me in different ways. Marcus noticed right away that something had changed. He drew back to look at me, his thumb swiping at a stray tear that’d escaped my eye.

“I…I’m sorry, Marc. I don’t know what’s come—”

“Shh,” he cooed, kissing my lips, then each of my cheeks. “Turn over onto your other side.”

I didn’t question it, just flipped to face the television, the long-forgotten action movie still in progress.

Marcus tugged at the cream-colored throw from the back of the couch and draped it over us. “Let me hold you.”

Sighing contentedly, I relaxed against his chest, reveling in the strength and warmth of his arms. After a few long moments of feeling his shallow breaths against my neck, the steady patter of his heartbeat, I shut my eyes and fell into the twilight of sleep.

“Want me to leave?” he whispered against my ear, however many minutes later, and my eyes flew open.

“Only if you want,” I said over my shoulder. “But I’d rather have the opportunity to hold you too.”

“Fuck. I’d like that,” he said into the crook of my neck, and we shuffled around, now facing the other direction, his back to my chest.

“Feels so good,” he said around a yawn, and I couldn’t have agreed more.

After I set the timer on my cell, I rearranged the throw and wound my forearm against his stomach. Soon enough, his breaths evened out, and we both drifted into dreamland.

I jerked awake at the trilling sound on my phone, immediately noting the time. “Hey, sleepyhead. Grant will be home soon.” I steadied my tone, concealing my frustration that we didn’t have all night.

“Shit.” He sat up, thankfully understanding the sensitivity of the situation.

Once he had his belongings in hand, I walked him to the door, where he thanked me and kissed my forehead. It made me want to pull him back inside and finish what we’d started.

As I watched him walk to his car, I rubbed my fingers over my swollen lips, already reliving being kissed like that—so desperate and needy, like he was trying to climb inside me and live there for a while. And I was certainly no better.

Damn, it had been a good night.

16

Marcus

“I let Mrs. Smythe know she can pick up her chairs on Monday,” Marian said before she left for the day. Thankfully, I had a good office assistant who kept track of all the invoices and answered the phone to field questions and set appointments. She was only part-time, but that worked well because even though I enjoyed interacting with the customers, it gave me time to get stuff done.

The chairs were a set of six that needed to be caned, which was a weaving method using rattan palm I’d learned from my grandfather early on. It was tedious work, but the customer only cared that they were ready by Thanksgiving dinner to seat her family. I’d stained them a deeper teakwood as well to match the new table she’d ordered.

“Great. I should finish them up tomorrow morning.”

It was Friday afternoon, and it had been a busy week. Not that I didn’t think about what happened between Delaney and me every spare moment. I was nervous at first that he’d start acting differently around me, especially since he’d made it clear he was not ready for anything. But he couldn’t pass up human contact any more than I could. And even if I was interested in further exploration, I knew this was not the right moment in time for him, and that was okay. As long as my arms around him brought him as much comfort as his did me. It didn’t even matter that I was so fucking hard nearly the entire time we were in proximity and then needed to jerk off as soon as I got home.

But based on our evening text conversations, so far, we seemed okay.

Of course, the first text from him had been a terrible dad joke that made me grin like a damned fool. He was a goofball—a gorgeous one. Damn, the way his lips and body felt against mine…that was hard to shake.