Chapter 42
Tristen
Sunshine bathes the room in a toasty golden glow and the scent of something rich wafts through the air. It’s strong enough that my nose wrinkles from its strength but my stomach growls as if it knows what it’s up.
I have to blink a few times to get shit to focus—to get my contacts to slide back into place—but when they do … I stiffen.
It tweaks my ribs, and I bite down hard on my lip to silence the whimper.
A foot is hanging off the side of the bed, the leg stretched out and fucking beneath my head.
My lungs trip up.
Behind the overwhelming scent of smoke that still lingers on my skin and something cooking downstairs, is something even stranger.
Emmett.
He let me … lay on him?
Last night is so fuzzy that I can’t remember much beyond hearing dispatch call out that Noah was in the building and the radio crinkling with all the callbacks that couldn’t find him.
The crew had entered on the cooler side of the blaze, and I knew—just fucking knew—he’d be somewhere inside the hottest parts of the fire. I didn’t think, I just ran in.
Everything after that is a blur.
So how I got here … fuck, it makes my head hurt just thinking about it.
Taking a moment, I work a swallow down my raw throat. My ribs ache. Chest tense like I smoked a pack of cigarettes in one sitting. My face and arms feel like I was in the sun all night instead of sleeping.
None of these are uncommon for me, especially after the last few days.
Hell, the last few years.
Not even the stiffness in my shorts surprises me.
It throbs when I acknowledge it, the length trapped beneath my bent thigh.
I really need to do something about that.
It’s been days—weeks?—since I’ve practiced some self-care and it’s showing.
My balls draw up as if in agreement.
Fuck.
Pulling back a semi-deep and cleansing breath, I ignore my protesting ribs and go to roll my head back to see if Em is awake.
I bump into something and freeze.
Is he … hard?
The thought—the possibility that he’d be hard with my head on his lap—has my dick leaking precum in my shorts.
Does he even realize I’m here?
My mind wanders, my heart thundering in my chest, and I lick my dried lips.
Is he long and thick? Just as pale as the rest of him?
I don’t know that he’d ever let me see him, but with him—it—this close … my mouth waters, my dick throbbing at the possibility.
Would he let me see him … tease my fingertips over him … feather my lips across his length…
Taste him.
Would I let myself do it?
The fantasy of him has me digging my thigh into the mattress and adding a delicious pressure to the head of my leaking dick.
The involuntary whimper that escapes me makes him jerk.
Shit, shit, shit.
A heavy wave of guilt washes over me and I slowly rise, dragging the blanket the rest of the way over my lap as I straighten.
Precum smears across the inside of my shorts, and it suddenly feels dirty.
“Sorry,” I mumble, my voice cracked and thick.
Emmett lets loose a deep as shit sigh, like maybe he’s exasperated, and pulls his knee up. “Stop. Please, just stop.”
I snort. “Pretty sure I said the same thing to you at one point.”
“Yeah, well, you told me to fucking stop. So, I did.”
My gaze snaps to his, the fire in his words lighting up something low in my stomach and pulling up the corner of my lips.
His brows are pinched, his lips pressed thinly, but his eyes …
God, his eyes.
I bite down on the inside of my cheek and fist the blanket to keep myself from reaching out. From smoothing that brow of his and kissing his lips until they’re full and red and—
Never in my life have I been so damn … enthralled by someone. So desperate to reach inside his head and know what he hides beneath the armor.
I want to see him.
Without the mask. The weight.
All of him.
To know what he looks like falling apart beneath the covers of night.
Just as much as I want to know what he’d look like free and wild on the bike he’s trying so hard to learn how to ride.
I clear my throat.
“I’ll stop saying sorry if you help me understand.”
His brow furrows deeper, his lips puckering around his soundless answer.
What?
A smirk pulls at the corner of my lips and his sight flicks to it and back.
“You.”