Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 80689 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80689 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
“Do you like that? Having my cum in you right now?”
I’m blushing.
“You do. You like knowing it’s jammed up inside you, don’t you, you fucking perv?”
I enjoy the playfulness in his tone.
“It’s weird,” I tell him, “but I do have this feeling right now.”
“What’s it feel like?”
“Satisfied?” Because I don’t get why it feels so good.
“That’s what I want to hear. So your first time bottoming was a good one?”
“Yeah, like, if I’d had any idea that’s what it felt like, I’m pretty confident I would have experimented with it sooner.”
“Happy to have introduced you to your prostate.”
Just his mention of it makes my ass twitch slightly.
He kisses my cheek. It’s a gentle move, very unlike what we just shared.
“Did you get to speak with your sister today?” he asks, and when I cringe, he adds, “Sorry. I know that’s totally unrelated. I just couldn’t think of a way to get from fucking you to wanting to know how things were going.”
I laugh, but then I feel that sting of uncertainty. “She’s doing well. She really likes the doctors, but she says the treatment has made her tired. Not a big surprise, but she could barely keep her eyes open when we were talking.”
“You sound sad. It must be hard to be here when you want to be there to help her.”
My chest tightens. “When our mother passed, it made me realize how fragile life is, how you have to be there with the ones you love as much as you can. Because it can be gone at any moment.”
“I get that.” His gaze shifts to the sheets, and he has this far-off look in his eyes. Given what he’s shared about his past, I don’t doubt he knows this kind of pain too.
“I’m sure you do, with your mother, father, and Kieran.”
His gaze meets mine again. He’s eyeing me uneasily, and I’m not sure why.
“I notice you never mention your mom.” Though I read about how she died, it hasn’t come up.
“Have you read about that online already?”
I nod. “Sorry if I shouldn’t have.”
He gets that far-off look in his eyes again. “It’s all right. Those kinds of reports and obituaries never do enough. We were only nine when it happened. I’m guessing you saw that it was pills. She wasn’t well for a lot of that time. Kept her distance from us. She’d been admitted to the hospital a few times, and Father had a therapist and psychiatrist come to the house to help, but obviously, that wasn’t enough to get her out of the pain she was in.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you,” he whispers. “I should have probably asked you sooner, but I was worried it might be too sensitive a subject. Your parents…”
“Dad was a firefighter. He spent a lot of time working, but whenever he was home, he gave us his everything. But right before Charity was born, he went into an apartment building to rescue people trapped there, and it collapsed on top of him.” I didn’t think my chest could get any tighter, but it’s like a rod is being driven into my heart.
“I’m so sorry, Jonas. He sounds like a hero.”
I nod. “He was. And a great father. Even with as much as he worked, he was always making time for me and Mom. He’d take us camping and taught me how to fish. Read me bedtime stories. I wish he’d been home more, but I’m also glad I had any time with him. It’s sad that Charity never got to meet him and feel that kind of love.”
“I think maybe she did,” he says. “Just not from him.”
Fuck, that gets me. I don’t want to start crying, so I blurt out, “That’s life, right?”
“Maybe it is life, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less,” he says, and my eyes are drawn back to his.
He hooks his arm around me, offering a hug as tender as his touch. Like a blanket that protects me enough to let some of that tension in my chest ease up, and I tremble as tears rush down my face.
“Sorry, I’m not—” My voice cracks before I can go on.
“Jonas, you don’t have to apologize.”
His hand slides up to my nape, and he strokes gently before offering a kiss against the side of my head.
When he pulls away, I find myself unspooling. “Dad’s death was hard, but it brought my family closer together. Mom moved in with Aunt Amy to have Charity, and they both raised us. Two of the most loving people on the goddamn planet. Just felt like, as horrible as losing Dad was, at least we still had each other. Then as Charity got older, she got sick. And that was like hell. And then Mom was diagnosed with breast cancer at the same time Charity was undergoing treatments, and that was just so overwhelming. I have a hard time even connecting to memories around that. Kind of like right after Dad died. I don’t feel emotion around it. Like this hollowness in my chest.”