7. Max #2
I stepped off the gravel path onto the soft grass, which was way too long and needed a good mow. Apparently Draven had already cleared out all of the old furniture that had once been inside. In the afternoon light I could see through the windows into the living room, which was completely empty.
But as I approached the two open doors that led to the master bedroom, I saw that he at least had one piece of furniture. He’d put in a bed.
And then as I got closer, I saw the outline of… him .
My heart lodged in my throat as I turned and the full view of the bed came into focus, sunlight shining in on Draven through the open doors.
He was naked from the waist down, sprawled back across the mattress.
And he was wearing nothing other than a dark, tight T-shirt, which was currently hitched up a little past his stomach, exposing the ridges of his lower abs.
An impressive tattoo stretched upward from the top of his thigh and snaked its way up his hip, landing just below the V-shape on his lower torso. Inches and inches of black and red ink on his skin.
His cock was out. Prominently on display. And hard.
His fist was wrapped around it, and he was jerking off with the backyard doors open wide.
The faint sound of whatever video he was watching came from the small speaker on his phone. My spine tingled when I heard my own voice.
“That’s how we do it in Tennessee, baby.”
He was getting off to one of my videos. A flare of pride ripped through me so quickly I didn’t have time to be shocked by it.
You’re jerking off to videos of me?
Now who’s really the one in control?
He still hadn’t spotted me and I knew if I moved slow, I could still make a break for it.
But as I took a step backward my shoe hit a branch on the grass and it snapped.
Draven’s head turned my way, but he didn’t even seem startled.
Fuck .
He seemed glad.
Like a predator who’d just struck gold out in the wild, spotting prey, walking right into his den.
“Max,” he said.
He wasn’t taking his fist away from his cock. Wasn’t even making an effort to move or grab his clothes or preserve any sense of modesty.
His cock was thick and so goddamn pornographically big and I was still looking at it—still unable to tear my gaze away as he started to stroke again, slowly, from the root, as if this were something we were doing together.
Something flared beneath my skin. Suddenly the sunlight felt way too bright and hot.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Touching my cock. Looking at you. Putting my thumb through the precum at the tip, because now I finally have you here.”
Adrenaline coursed through my veins as my eyes remained laser-focused on him.
I was getting drawn in by his eyes, being pulled further in, like he had the power to unravel me with just a look.
Being caught, and catching him , sparked something in me.
My stomach went taut, and everything was brought into heightened focus. The sound of the cicadas. The faint floral smell in the air. The green of his eyes, visible even from here.
It was making my dick twitch.
For some reason all of it was swirling together, settling in my mind, my brain confusing it for another turn-on instead of a red flag.
I wasn’t into men before, but there was no longer any doubt that I was so attracted to Draven it was fucking dangerous.
The same thought from earlier returned to my mind again, too: I’d always liked watching videos online where people did things in public places. Places where they shouldn’t.
When those people got caught? Even better.
Call it voyeurism or exhibitionism or whatever it might be, but I definitely didn’t mind looking at guys’ cocks if they were in those kinds of videos.
And I didn’t want to run. I was just…
Standing here.
Planted.
I swallowed past a suddenly dry throat. “You shouldn’t be here,” I managed to say.
He hummed, and as he gripped his cock a little tighter, he spread his legs even wider on the bed.
“Hate to say it, Baby Blue, but this is my house.”
I puffed out a breath. “Fuck you.”
“What’s the problem?”
“You show up one night, have the nerve to nearly choke me out, then you snap up Mr. Marsden’s old house like it’s a pack of bubblegum.
I don’t know how you treated Lily, either, or why she’s so quick to defend you, but I have a sneaking suspicion you took advantage of her—or made her scared, somehow?—”
“Nothing of the sort.”
I sucked in a lungful of air. “You still don’t make any sense to me.”
“Is that why you like looking at my cock?” he asked, ignoring every rambling word I’d said. “You liked it when I scared you, that night?”
“Wasn’t scared of you,” I lied.
“Hated you. From moment one.”
“Well if you hate me, you should be the one to go back to Montana instead of me. I’m sure you’d get along just peachy with everyone there who hates me, too.”
It was a lie anyway.
I’d never hated him.
I just hadn’t trusted him, even for a minute.
My breaths quickened. I felt the hair on my arms stand on end as goosebumps covered my skin.
Instead of turning around and high-tailing it like I should have, something possessed me to take a step further.
I crossed the brick patio until I stood on the threshold of the doorway, watching him from a whole lot closer now, the bed just a couple of steps away from me.
I walked over to the nightstand and pressed the button to lock his phone, shutting off the sound of my own goddamn video. And then I moved back to the doorway, ready to leave.
But not leaving .
I wanted to intimidate him. I was sick of him trying to leverage whatever fucked-up power or confidence he thought he had against me. I was the one standing here above him, while he was naked and vulnerable and splayed out on the bed, cock in hand.
Not that he seemed like he was very vulnerable, right now.
The air in the room smelled like him, and I pulled in a deep breath of his scent.
His eyes smoldered as he looked up at me. They were so much more intense and commanding from this close distance.
“There’s nothing wrong with you, you know,” Draven said. “It’s okay to like things like that.”
“Like what?”
“Having a restraint at your neck.”
I realized I was clenching my jaw and forced myself to relax it. “I never said I liked it.”
He hummed. “My mistake.”
I sucked in a breath, glancing over at the shroud of trees beside me, focusing on anything other than my hardening cock or the green of Draven’s eyes.
“I like the way you smell,” I told him.
Fuck.
Put those words back in.
Don’t tell him you enjoy it.
“I like to hear that,” he said.
“I don’t know what my problem was on that first night,” I said. “You caught me off guard, then you pissed me off. When your arm was on my neck I just finally realized I had no other options…”
“Options?”
I swallowed. “I had nothing left in my control. Same thing when you pinned my wrists to the ground.”
The corner of his mouth twitched into a smile. “No options other than to spit in my face, Baby Blue.”
I let out a long breath. “Why do you call me that?”
“Ever looked in a mirror?”
I shifted on my feet. “I know my fucking eyes are blue.”
He stroked his cock a couple of times, and when I couldn’t help but glance down at it, he paused.
“I can stop,” he offered.
“You’re not going to.”
“Only because you love watching me,” he said. “And you don’t want me to stop, so I’m going to stroke my cock until I come, and it’s your choice whether or not you clean me off with your tongue afterward.”
On instinct I turned away, my heart pounding as I started to walk out of the bedroom.
But a new flash of anger made me freeze, turning around again to face him.
“Quit acting like you know me. I’ve never wanted to watch a guy jerk off. I only did it for you on the call because I was desperate.”
“And you’re not desperate right now?”
God, I hated him.
Or maybe I just hated that he was right.
He wasn’t going to quit calling me out.
“I can just go.”
“You’re not going to leave,” he uttered in a low tone, stroking himself in a steady rhythm as he pulled in a breath, holding my gaze. “Just watch.”
I couldn’t stop looking at his cock. The veins, the thickness, the fucking tip , glistening in the light. Something twisted deep inside my stomach, something hot and feral and completely full of desire.
That was another thing I always liked in videos—when the person who got caught actually ended up liking it, way more than they’d ever bargained for. It was plainly obvious that Draven loved being caught, and that I loved catching him.
“You can’t tell me what to do,” I volleyed back.
“Keep watching.”
I didn’t want to be within a hundred fucking miles of this man but I still wasn’t leaving.
I was fascinated.
In the same way that I would enjoy watching a python from behind glass, Draven wasn’t someone I trusted, but I still wanted to… witness him.
“There’s something wrong with you,” I muttered. Saying it to him. Saying it to myself.
“Come here. Put your hand on my neck,” he said.
The fuck?
My cock throbbed.
I glared at him. “Thought you only liked doing that to unsuspecting homeowners.”
In the worst part of my mind, I still wanted to retaliate. Put him in the position he’d had me in days ago. When he had so much pressure on my neck, and a complete ability to choose if I kept breathing or not.
Tiny dust motes floated in the air between us as I reached the side of the bed next to him, staying far away from his cock.
I took another step toward his face, the floorboard shifting under my weight.
Draven’s eyes opened again.
“You want my hand on you?” I asked.
He hummed. “Need it.”
Well, I have the control, now.
“You’re not going to fucking get it,” I told him.
Something flashed through his eyes when he realized I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction, and I swore a smile was tugging at the corner of his mouth. I’d thought denying him would piss him off, but somehow it only seemed to spur him on further.
“Hate me that much, Baby Blue?” he said in a broken whisper. He was stroking himself faster now. “You barely know me.”