November 29, 2020—Seattle, Washington—The Next Day #9
He kissed him again, it was hungrier now, deeper and more consuming, his hands pressing into Adrian’s sides, feeling the heat of him through his clothes.
He rocked against him, his own bare skin dragging over the rough fabric of Adrian’s jeans, feeling where he was already hard beneath the constraint, already aching for more.
Logan’s kisses drifted lower, sliding over Adrian’s chest, his ribs, his stomach. He lingered over the bruises that marred his lover’s skin, kissing them softly, whispering against them, “You’re perfect.”
Because for Logan, he was.
Bruises and all. Scars and all. The past and all.
Adrian was everything.
He had always been.
Logan quickly removed Adrian’s jeans and boxers in a fluid movement, pausing briefly to take off his shoes and socks before biting Adrian’s toe playfully, earning a giggle from him.
He let the fabric fall away and tossed it aside, exposing the warm, golden skin beneath.
He took his time kissing his way back up, his lips tracing a path over Adrian’s thighs, his stomach, the sharp lines of his ribs, savoring every inch, taking every touch so he would never starve for it again.
“Be right back, don’t move,” Logan murmured against Adrian’s lips, stealing another kiss, before pulling away.
Adrian let out a breathy chuckle, his accent curling around his words. “Like there’s anywhere else I’d rather be.”
Logan smirked and slipped off the bed, hurrying toward the walk-in closet where their suitcases sat, untouched since they had arrived.
His hands moved quickly, unzipping his bag, pulling out the little plastic bag they had bought at the pharmacy in the airport, a quiet promise made in the space between then and now.
He retrieved the small bottle of lube and the box of condoms, the weight of them in his hands a reminder of all the nights he had dreamed of this, of Adrian beneath him again, skin against skin, nothing between them but heat and love and the desperate need to make up for lost time.
When Logan returned, he didn’t hesitate—he crawled back onto the bed, back over Adrian’s body, pressing him into the mattress with his weight, their mouths crashing together in a kiss that tasted of urgency, of devotion, of years spent waiting.
Their hips found each other instinctively, a rhythm neither had forgotten.
Logan rolled against him, grinding down, and the friction sent a sharp, aching pleasure shooting through him.
The sound Adrian made, those breathless moans, only spurred him on, made his movements more frantic, more desperate, as their cocks slid together, trapped between their bodies, slick with heat and sweat and Adrian’s saliva that still coated Logan’s cock.
“Fuck,” Logan gasped against Adrian’s lips, moving harder, his entire body trembling from restraint, from wanting more, from needing everything.
Adrian’s hands found Logan’s hips, gripping them tight, his fingers pressing bruises into his skin as he stilled him, stopping the movement with a quiet groan.
“If you don’t stop, I’m going to come,” Adrian panted, his voice wrecked, his lips curved into a breathless smile. “It’s been a long time for me.”
“How long?” Logan asked, too fast, too sharp. The words escaped before he had a chance to reel them back, before he could soften the demand buried in them.
He hadn’t given much thought to Adrian being with another man, hadn’t let himself dwell on it, on the inevitable, on the reality of time moving forward even when his own heart had been frozen in place.
But now, with Adrian beneath him, with their breaths mingling and their bodies pressed together, it felt like something they had to talk about.
The questions burned in his throat like salt rubbed into an open wound, forcing his heart to wail with that threnodic song Adrian had soothed not so long ago.
Who?
How many?
Where?
When?
Were they good?
Did they touch you the way I did?
Did they make love to you, or was it just fucking?
Did you think of me while someone else had their hands on you, the way I thought of you?
Did you softly sigh and whimper as you did with me?
Can you remember the precise position in which it was made?
Could you trace for me that very path they had caressed you, so I might glide my hand along the exact contours and endeavor to erase those lingering memories?
Will you recount, in precise detail, what it felt like, for I believe I need this to unravel myself?
How did their eyes linger on you when they touched your skin?
Adrian looked away, tilting his head slightly, and the shift in his body was enough to change the air between them, thickening it. Logan felt it in his chest, in the sudden tightness of his ribs, in the way his fingers twitched against Adrian’s skin.
“I’m sorry, forget it,” Logan blurted, reaching out, his fingers brushing against Adrian’s jaw, tilting his face back toward him. The pulsing pain in his voice betrayed him. “It’s none of my business.”
Adrian exhaled softly, a breath that barely reached the space between them.
“No, it is.” His voice was quiet but steady.
Still, he didn’t meet Logan’s eyes. Not yet.
“Something like….” Adrian took a deep breath, “Two years,” he concluded, his chest moving sharply under Logan’s hands, as though the words themselves were contingent and, in being spoken, conjured a reality in which they became real.
Logan flinched. His whole body tensed, a sharp pull of muscle and breath, because two years ago—
That was them.
Which meant that whoever Adrian had been with had come right after Logan left.
A rebound, maybe?
A flash of nausea gripped him. Had it been between Australia and the wedding?
Had Adrian—my Adrian—been with someone else in their room, in their bed, where Logan had once held him, as if he were the only thing that mattered? That horrible bed. That ugly, scratchy comforter. That stupid, cheap little cabin that had meant everything because it had been theirs.
And now, the thought of someone else there, in his place, made him feel like a fool.
But screw it.
That bed was no place for Adrian to fuck anyone else.
Muscles bunched along Logan’s jaw, feeling the sharp edge of jealousy slice through him, even though he knew—God, he knew—he had no right. He had been the one to run. He had been the one to leave Adrian bleeding in a hotel room while he boarded a plane back to a life he didn’t want.
He had gotten married.
And yet, the idea of Adrian bringing someone else into his bed so soon after, the idea of someone else taking what had once been Logan’s to hold, made his stomach twist with something ugly and possessive.
The idea of Adrian going to a random bar and picking someone up, bringing that man to their room and…
But then—
Adrian’s eyes fluttered open, their hue a storm-dark amber, limned with unshed sorrow. They glistened—no, they ached—with something more than grief: a fevered yearning, in which gentleness and devastation were intertwined.
And beneath that dark, forsaken swirl, innocence lay.
“Since that night?” Logan’s voice barely made it past his lips, thick with disbelief, with something dangerously close to hope. His throat tightened, his heart pounding erratically in his chest. “You mean… no one since me?”
Adrian swallowed, his gaze never wavering, his hands curling against Logan’s skin like an anchor.
“No one,” he whispered.
And Logan felt something inside him break—something deep, something he hadn’t even known he was holding onto. “But… why?”
Adrian nodded, just slightly, as if confirming it was a good question; it was a movement so small it might have been missed if Logan weren’t watching him with the kind of wide-eyed shock that stole the breath from his lungs.
“I thought about it myself…” Adrian began.
“There were the weeks I waited for you there… in Australia,” his voice was low, quiet, raw.
“Then your wedding happened, and the months that followed… I wasn’t really into dating.
I couldn’t even bear the thought of someone else touching me.
It made me sick just thinking about it. Like my body didn’t know how to belong to anyone else.
Like my skin had memorized only your touch, and anything else—anyone else—felt wrong, felt vile. ”
His voice trembled on that last word, as if even saying it left a bitter taste in his mouth. Logan swallowed, unable to speak, unable to move, unable to do anything but listen as Adrian continued.
“During university, I tried.” He exhaled a soft, almost hollow laugh. “Dean pushed me into it. He signed me up for so many dating apps and practically forced me to go on dates. He even dragged me to a gay bar once.”
That should have been funny. The image of Dean in a gay bar—Dean of all people—was something Logan would have loved to tease him about. But right now, it was nothing more than background noise to the only thing that mattered.
“And?” Logan asked, his voice almost a whisper as he gently caressed Adrian’s face with his palm.
“And… nothing.” Adrian’s gaze met his. “I wasn’t ready.”
Logan felt his heart squeeze in his chest.
“I was too broken to start something new. And you know me… I don’t really do the whole one-night stands, it’s not for me…
I need an emotional connection to be with someone, I need to feel something for them, or sex is just…
hollow for me. But I couldn’t form it; I couldn’t…
even look at a guy after you. And the few guys I did go on dates with, well… they just weren’t it.”
Logan blinked, his throat constricted, his hand tightening over Adrian’s face while he clenched the sheet with his other fist, trying to hold himself together as he felt himself being unmade from the inside out.
Adrian’s voice softened, his words laced with something achingly bittersweet, something that tasted like longing and old wounds still healing.