Chapter 9 #2
Darius wiggles his toes and I press a little harder, massaging further up his foot.
“He got a scholarship offer to a university in Australia and I didn’t want to go.”
“But you loved him?”
“I did. But we were young, and I knew that following him across the world was not what I wanted to do. Sometimes love isn’t enough, you know?”
I nod even though I don’t.
“I’ll be honest, I thought you’d drink because I was certain you were in love with Caiden.”
Was I? If he had asked me a week ago, I may well have said maybe, but I’m not so sure what I felt was love.
It was safety and control. Comfort and familiarity.
Caiden and I played a role in each other’s lives, one that pitted me as the villain he needed, and there were feelings there, but it wasn’t love.
“No. That wasn’t…we weren’t.” I huff a breath, annoyed at the words catching in my throat.
“It would be easy to say it was complicated, but the truth is that Caiden and I weren’t good to each other.
Maybe it could have been something if we had been different.
I don’t know, and it doesn’t matter anymore. ”
“Okay. That’s fair.” Darius raises his glass. “Your turn.”
I take a moment to think. I haven’t played this game since I was twenty and partying too hard in a small town in Devon. Playing by Darius’s version of the rules, where you can pick something you have done, I eventually settle on, “Never have I ever got a tattoo.”
We both drink, Darius downing the last of his.
“Can I see yours?” he asks, depositing his empty glass on the floor.
My hand hovers over the hem of my t-shirt, my body tensing and a knot of anxiety forming in my chest. I know he’ll have questions that I’m not ready to explain. Past hookups have been given a version of a story about it being a silly joke. Darius deserves only the truth from me.
I lift my tee slowly, watching Darius’s face – his eyes homing in on my naked skin and the words tattooed on the left of my chest.
I chose me.
“I love it,” he says. “One day, I hope you’ll tell me what it means to you.”
He must sense my anxiety, that or he really does see me, because he doesn’t push for more.
Clearing my throat, I ask him to show me his. He throws his head back with a groan.
“I showed you mine. It’s only fair.”
“Fine. I have two, but I will give you one. You have to promise not to laugh.”
I make a show of crossing my fingers, tucking them behind my back.
“Promise.”
Darius huffs. “I’m serious. I got it when I was nineteen and it seemed like a great idea at the time.”
He stands up, swaying a little before he steadies himself, turns around and lifts the hem of his t-shirt.
Bloody. Fucking. Hell
Three things greet me that I do not expect.
The first being a strip of pink lace sticking out above the waistband of his low slung shorts. The second, dimples. He has two little dimples in his lower back that I want to either stick my thumbs in or lick my cum out of. Or both.
I swallow thickly, averting my eyes upwards to the third thing, biting back a chuckle.
“Do you like it?”
It being a tattoo of a penguin on his lower back, slightly above his dimples.
“Why is it holding a heart like that?”
The penguin, tattooed in thin black lines, has a heart resting on the end of its flipper, as though it’s offering it up to someone.
Darius pulls down his tee and flops back onto the sofa.
He groans. “It was meant to look like it’s giving its heart to its mate, but it ended up looking like it’s doing some kind of balancing act. It’s silly.” He covers his face with the back of his arm and I lean over and move it, looking him dead in the eye.
“It’s cute.”
He huffs again, his forehead wrinkling. “The other one is less cute.”
“Can I see?”
He smiles. “Nope. You’ll have to earn that privilege.”
“And how do I do that?”
Darius hums under his breath. “Let me get back to you on that.” He frowns, looking at my empty hand. “We need a refill before I take my next turn.” There’s a bottle of vodka on the coffee table, and he leans over to grab it, overestimating the movement and face planting onto the floor.
Darius lands on the fluffy white rug with an oomph and I cannot hold back the amused sound that bursts out of me. He rolls onto his back, a sound that is half snort, half laugh leaving his lips.
Bloody hell, it’s quite possible I am in love.
His blond hair is spread out like a halo, his t-shirt riding up to reveal a slim, fair stomach, the edge of another tattoo peeking out from beneath the hem.
“You’re a mess,” I say, reaching a hand out. “And a liability.” I’m thankful the table was far enough away that he didn’t hit it on the way down.
Darius slips his palm into mine, still chuckling, and I pull him up with a little more force than necessary, which causes him to land on top of me, body pressed to mine, legs straddling my lap. His lithe frame fits perfectly on top of me, and on instinct, I grip his hips.
His eyes flit from mine and up to the scar on my eyebrow. “How did you get this?” He runs a finger over the mark and I cannot fucking breathe. He’s so close. So warm. So utterly perfect.
It’s not only my heart that notices. My cock thickens in my boxers and there is nothing I can do about it. Not with the way he’s leaning on me, touching me, breathing the same fucking air as me.
“D.” My voice is a raspy whisper. “You can’t… I can’t…”
His eyes dip to where our chests are pressed together, and he drops his hand, understanding dawning in his expression.
Wordlessly, he slides off my lap and sits next to me. The atmosphere in the room has changed, a tension thick enough to cut with a knife.
“Sorry,” I mumble, not sure what else to say.
“No, I am.” Darius looks at me. “I like you, Ollie. Really fucking like you, but I…” He shakes his head and I wrap an arm around his shoulder and pull him closer. His head lands on my chest right over my heart, which is beating so hard for him it hurts.
“It’s okay. I wouldn’t be any good for you, anyway, D. It’s better this way.” Looking down, I meet his sparkling blues. “I won’t lie and say I’m not epically attracted to you, but this – ” I kiss his forehead. “This is enough.”
“You’re wrong about not being good for me,” he says, but I place a finger over his lips and he drops the subject. We both know it’s true. Darius deserves the world, and I don’t know that I can give it to him.
He doesn’t lift his head from my chest, and we stay like that in a silence as warm as sunshine until he breaks it with a question.
“You said you were distracted yesterday because you have to do something you don’t want to. Will you tell me what it is?”