Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
“Damon. But don’t say it the way you did before.”
With mock innocence, Rian rounded his eyes, the eyeliner ringing them turning that hazel into stark, liquid gold. “How did I say it before? Damon.”
Like that.
Just like that, rolling and whispering and sighing as if he was wrapping that pale, soft mouth over the arches and curves and points of every letter, tonguing their corners and caressing their peaks and long straight lines.
Only this time, Damon still stood against Rian’s back, his body heat close enough to brush that slender frame caged between Damon’s arms as he held the knife and the bell pepper out away from Rian’s body.
And with that scent drifting up into Damon to absorb into him in an intoxicating rush...
This time, when Rian purred Damon, there was no denying how that shot right to his gut.
Lower.
A tightening, a pulling between his thighs, that made him feel like every muscle in his body was connected through that one point, and every time he breathed it just dragged deep and hot and tense and low, slinking through his flesh like caramel and pouring over his aching, rousing cock.
What the fuck.
The fuck is wrong with you, Louis?
He jerked back, breathing in shakily, drawing his arms back and just staring at Rian. He...fuck. Maybe Rian was pretty, wild and wispy and Bohemian and ethereal, this trailing slip of a thing who looked like the last lingering ghost of some deathly, quiet beauty...
But Damon wasn’t going there.
No mixing business with pleasure or...or...something.
He couldn’t explain it.
He just knew he kept getting himself so twisted up over Rian, and anything that made him that messy was something he didn’t need to get involved with.
So while Rian watched him with a confused tilt of his head, Damon focused his attention firmly on snapping the sink back on, and dipping the pepper under the water. “Most of the seeds just rinse out,” he muttered; talking was hard, his voice thick and grinding out of his throat. He set the knife aside on the cutting board. “And you can just scrape the pulp out with your fingers.” He did just that, dipping two fingers into the inner heart of the hollowed-out bell pepper and curving them to stroke along the wet insides, and—fuck. Deep breaths. “Go ahead and cut the stem out of the other pepper, and wash it just like this. Then cut them in half and slice them.”
He finished rinsing out the inside of the pepper, left the water on for a few seconds longer to sweep the seeds down the drain, then set the pepper on the edge of Rian’s cutting board and retreated to the other side of the sink again. Dinner. Fucking finish making dinner—why had he even offered to let Rian stay to eat, anyway?—and say what they needed to say about Chris.
And then get Rian the fuck out of his space.
Before that sharp sugar-candy scent permeated the room, and Damon wouldn’t be able to get it out of his space.
Or out of his head.
But he couldn’t seem to bring himself to speak, as that silence fell again—punctuated only by the sound of Rian hesitantly chopping the bell peppers into thin slices, followed by the sharp, crackling hiss as Damon tossed the beef strips into the heated wok and the searing metal instantly set the meat to sizzling, savory scents rising to mingle with the fresh, wet scent of cool cut vegetables. Damon slid the wok in a practiced circle, swirling the cooking meat around, tossing it...and almost tossing it too high, pent-up frustration scoring through him and making his motions too sharp; he let out a soft yelp and scooted the wok forward to catch the beef strips as they fell, rounding them up back into the pan.
He was half expecting a biting, mocking comment from the man at his side.
But Rian didn’t say a word.
Until the silence was almost eating at Damon, the way Rian kept his head bowed as if he was—was—Damon didn’t know, but he growled under his breath and settled the wok, eyeing Rian. He’d piled all the pulled and cut vegetables up into neat little distinct piles, and was just finishing with the second pepper and adding the curving, messily irregular red strips to the last heap, picking them up in both thin hands.
“Here,” Damon grunted. “Go ahead and add it all.”
Rian blinked, tilting his head at him. “Just...pour it all in?”
“That’s how it works, yeah.”
“Okay...” Rian started to gather up the handful he’d just put down, but Damon shook his head.
“Seriously. Just pick up the whole cutting board and dump it.”
Rian looked skeptical, but picked up the cutting board in both hands, balancing it like a newly hired waiter handling his first tray of delicate champagne glasses and maneuvering it over the wok with exaggerated care. Damon watched with a raised eyebrow while Rian slowly, slooowly tipped the cutting board over—then let out a little excited noise, jumping up on the balls of his feet, as the vegetables tumbled into the wok and a cloud of steam went up, bursting with a medley of mingled scents.