Chapter 19 #2
He is aware of Matej watching. Has been aware since he first reached for him, and the attention doesn’t unsettle him the way it might have a month ago.
It doesn’t take. It holds. Luca can feel it resting on the line of his collarbone, the dip of his sternum, the places where he is still carrying the last of summer on his skin. He lets Matej look.
He pulls the drawer of the nightstand open. The lube — a new bottle, the old one finished last week — and the condoms beside it. He sets them within reach, and the sound of the packet against the wood is the only sound in the room.
Matej lies on his back and waits.
This is unusual. Not unwelcome. He is aware of the ceiling, the afternoon light, of Luca’s attention — settled, decided, landing on him. He has looked at Luca this way. He knows what it means.
He lets it mean something now, directed at him.
Luca sits beside him. Puts his hand on the side of Matej’s face — not gripping, just there, the palm along his jaw, the thumb resting at the hinge of it.
Matej’s skin is warm under his hand. He can feel the faint roughness of stubble, the give of the muscle underneath as Matej turns slightly into the touch.
He leans down and kisses him.
Matej kisses back. Present, there — but Luca can feel the reserve still sitting in him, the mouth that answers without fully opening, the breathing that hasn’t quite caught up to what his body is doing.
Luca doesn’t push. He stays there, just the press of his mouth, until he feels something shift — a small yielding at the centre of it, and then Matej’s mouth opens against his and the reserve cracks at the edges.
He moves down.
The throat first. He presses his mouth to the hollow of it, feels the pulse there, fast but not panicked, and Matej’s head tilts back into the pillow. The collarbone — Luca runs his mouth along the ridge of it, and Matej’s breathing changes, gets sharper on the inhale.
He reaches the ram.
The ink is slightly raised under his tongue — he can feel the texture of it, the ghost of the needle’s work years ago.
He traces the line of it, the curve of the horn, and Matej’s stomach tightens beneath him.
A small involuntary sound, barely there, caught behind teeth. Luca moves on. Not lingering. Not yet.
Matej’s hands come up.
Luca feels them before he sees them — fingers against his shoulder, the left hand already moving to guide, to manage the angle.
He takes Matej’s wrists. Gently. Not gripping — just guiding, the same quiet direction as before.
He presses them down against the mattress, one at a time, and Matej lets them go. Lets them stay.
He moves lower.
The coordinate tattoo on the other side — smaller than the ram, finer lines, the kind of work that could only have been done by someone who understood what they were putting into skin.
He traces it with his tongue, feeling the slight ridge beneath, and Matej’s breath catches.
Not the same sound as before. Something rawer, closer to the surface.
Lower still.
Matej’s hands move at his sides — the old reach, the instinct to lift them and do something. This time they stay. Luca doesn’t have to touch them at all.
He reaches the base of him and takes the weight of him in his hand.
Hard, hot against the palm, the pulse of it close to the surface.
Luca holds him the way he has held everything else tonight — attention, not hurry — and Matej’s breath breaks open above him, dragged out of somewhere he doesn’t guard.
This is the familiar road, the one his body already knows.
Luca can feel how fast it would go if he let it.
He doesn’t let it.
He lets go — slow, deliberate, the hand opening — and feels Matej register the loss of it.
The hips lift once, looking for the contact again.
Luca doesn’t give it back. He rests his palm flat on Matej’s belly, a hand that means wait, and Matej goes still beneath it.
The choice is made, and both of them feel it: not the easy way. Somewhere else.
Lower. He takes the balls gently into his mouth, one and then the other, the loose heat of them, the skin drawing tight as he works.
Matej’s thighs fall open further without being asked — the body answering ahead of the man.
Luca presses his tongue to the seam behind them, the smooth stretch of skin there, and follows it back, slow, reading how it tenses and gives under his mouth.
He reaches the rim and works it with his tongue — the same patience he used on the buckle earlier, the same reading of resistance and yield — and feels the moment Matej’s resistance shifts.
It doesn’t break. It bends. A softening along the line of his thighs, the muscles releasing their hold on each other.
And then he makes a noise that he doesn’t suppress. Doesn’t try to.
That’s the pivot.
Luca reaches for the nightstand without looking. The lube is cool against his fingers, warmer as he works it between them, the small ritual of it. He turns back, finds the place by feel, and Matej’s breath stutters.
His finger finds the prostate — not by aiming for it but by feel, the small catch when the pressure comes right, the give that tells him more than sight would.
He presses there, slow, and Matej makes a sound that isn’t a sound so much as a shape.
The mattress shifts beneath them. Luca feels Matej’s thigh come up against his shoulder, not pushing, just there, warm and trembling slightly.
He doesn’t add a second finger yet. Not until Matej’s body asks, and not in words: the hips that lift, the muscle that softens under his hand and then tightens again. Wanting.
Luca presses the second finger in alongside the first. Matej arches off the mattress — not much, an inch, maybe two — and Luca steadies himself with his free hand against Matej’s thigh and keeps the rhythm even. The way Matej has taught him to do things.
Matej is loud now. Not shouting — nothing performative about it. The sounds coming without the filter of teeth or restraint. His hands have come up — one fisted at his own mouth, the other gripping the headboard — and then the hand at his mouth drops to the mattress, palm up, fingers open.
Luca doesn’t stop. Doesn’t change the rhythm. He holds steady, his fingers working that small careful pressure, and watches Matej’s face — the jaw gone slack, the eyes open but not seeing the ceiling, not seeing anything.
He keeps his rhythm. Steady. And feels Matej’s body open around his fingers, the resistance not gone, only loosened, going somewhere it hasn’t been.