Chapter 32 Pierce
PIERCE
I lay Thatcher down on his bed, following him onto the mattress without breaking our kiss.
A month of longing pours into every touch, every slide of tongue against tongue.
His hands work frantically at my shirt buttons while I tug his T-shirt over his head, both of us desperate to feel his skin against mine.
“Off,” he demands, pushing my shirt from my shoulders. “Need to feel you.”
I comply, tossing the shirt somewhere behind me before pressing my body against his. The contact makes us both groan. God, I fucking missed him so much.
“Pierce,” he breathes as my mouth finds his neck, tasting the skin I’ve been craving for weeks. “Please…”
“I’ve got you.” I work my way down his chest, relearning every curve and dip, every spot that makes him gasp. My fingers find the waistband of his jeans, and I look up, meeting his eyes. “Can I?”
“Yes. God, yes. Anything.”
I undress him slowly, reverently, pressing kisses to each inch of newly revealed skin. When he’s finally bare beneath me, I take a moment to look at him. Flushed and wanting, his cock hard and leaking, the glint of his piercing catching the light.
“So beautiful,” I murmur, and watch the blush spread down his chest.
“You’re wearing too many clothes,” he complains, reaching for my belt.
We shed the rest of my clothing together, hands fumbling in their urgency. When I finally settle between Thatcher’s thighs, both of us naked and aching, the feeling of completeness nearly overwhelms me.
“I missed this,” I breathe against his neck as I open him slowly, reverently. When I push inside him, I know I’m in the place I want to live in for the rest of my life. I’m home.
“Pierce,” he gasps, his fingers digging into my shoulders. “Please…”
I set a rhythm that builds steadily, watching his face transform with pleasure. The way his eyes are half-closed, the way his lips part on broken moans… I want to memorize every detail, burn it into my memory so I never forget how beautiful he looks when he’s falling apart beneath me.
“Don’t come,” I tell him, my voice rough with the effort of holding back my own release. “Not yet.”
“What?” His eyes fly open, desperation written across his features. “Pierce, I can’t— It’s been a month—”
“I know, baby. But I need to feel you inside me after. Can you do that for me?”
He shudders. “Fuck. You’re going to kill me.”
“You can do it.” I lean down to capture his mouth, swallowing his whimpers as I increase my pace. “Be good for me.”
Thatcher’s hands fist in the sheets, his jaw clenched with the effort of holding back. I can feel him trembling beneath me, his cock hard and leaking between our bodies, the metal of his piercing pressing against my stomach with every thrust.
“Pierce, please,” he begs. “I’m so close—”
“Hold on.” I chase my own pleasure now, driving into him with increasing urgency. “Just a little longer.”
When I finally come, it’s with his name on my lips and stars exploding behind my eyes. My release pulses through me in waves, and I barely have time to catch my breath before Thatcher is flipping us over.
“My turn,” he growls, and the sound goes straight to my still-sensitive cock.
He prepares me quickly but thoroughly, his fingers knowing exactly how to work me open after our time together. When he finally pushes inside, the feeling of his piercing hitting all those perfect spots makes me cry out.
“Okay?” he asks, pausing to let me adjust.
“More than okay.”
He doesn’t hold back. After a month of deprivation and the torture of not coming while I fucked him, Thatcher takes me with desperate intensity. Each thrust drives his piercing against my prostate, the metal adding sensation that has me hardening again despite having just come.
“Thatcher,” I gasp, my hands gripping his hips. “I’m going to—again—”
“Yes,” he pants, his rhythm growing erratic. “Come with me. Want to feel you.”
His hand wraps around my cock, stroking in time with his thrusts, and I’m gone.
My second orgasm crashes through me just as Thatcher buries himself deep and comes with a broken shout.
The feeling of him pulsing inside me, filling me up, is everything I’ve been craving for a month. Hell, I’ve needed this my entire life.
We collapse in a tangle of sweaty limbs and racing hearts, both of us too spent to move. Thatcher’s head rests on my chest, his fingers tracing lazy patterns on my skin.
“That was…phenomenal,” he says.
“And yet I think we’re only scratching the surface of us.”
We lie in comfortable silence for a while, just breathing together. My hand finds his hair, stroking through the curls I’ve missed touching.
“Can I ask you something?” I say eventually.
“Anything.”
“Why do people call you Meatball?”
Thatcher laughs, the sound vibrating against my chest. “You really want to know?”
“I’ve been wondering since the day your résumé fell into my hands.”
“It started with a dare,” he admits, shifting to look up at me. “I was maybe fourteen, and my cousins bet me I couldn’t eat an entire plate of Aunt Carla’s meatballs in one sitting. We’re talking like twenty meatballs, Pierce. Huge ones.”
“Let me guess—you did it.”
“I did it. And then I threw up in Noah’s shoes.” He grins at the memory. “But the nickname stuck. My cousins started calling me Meatball, and it spread to everyone else. Even my mom used it sometimes, toward the end.”
“I love it,” I say, pressing a kiss to his forehead. “It’s very you.”
“Chaotic and slightly nauseating?”
“Determined and memorable.”
Thatcher smiles, settling back against my chest. After a moment, his voice grows more serious. “Are you really going to quit VSE? Maybe we could just…steal moments like this in secret. I don’t want you to give up your career for me.”
“Quitting VSE isn’t just about us being together,” I explain, my hand still moving through his hair. “It’s about me finally doing something I love. I can’t believe I’m forty-six and starting over, but I want this. I want to build something that’s mine, something meaningful.”
“And that’s architecture?”
“Yes.”
“Pierce…”
“More importantly,” I continue, tilting his chin so I can see his eyes, “I want to be there alongside you when you get your publishing deal. When your art is in every bookstore in the country. I want to watch you become the artist you were always meant to be.”
Thatcher’s expression shifts, something vulnerable crossing his features. “Actually, the publisher I met at CANVAS pulled out.”
My heart sinks. “What? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because it’s not all bad news.” His smile returns, tentative but hopeful.
“The acquisitions manager felt terrible about it, so she connected me with an agent. Her name is Rebecca, and she’s incredible.
She knows the industry inside out and has connections everywhere. I get really good vibes from her.”
“That’s amazing.”
“I know it’s not a guaranteed deal or anything, but…” He takes a breath. “I know in my gut that something good is going to happen. For the first time, I actually believe something good is coming.”
The transformation in him takes my breath away. This is the same man who used to dismiss his art as “just doodles,” who couldn’t accept a compliment without deflecting. Now he’s talking about his future with confidence and certainty.
“I’m so proud of you,” I say, meaning every word.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I pull him closer, pressing a kiss to his hair. “Can I ask you for something?”
“Anything.”
“Will you draw us? Together? Something I can hang in my apartment.”
Thatcher’s face lights up. “Really? You want my art on your walls?”
“I want you everywhere in my life. Starting with my walls.”
He’s already scrambling out of bed, reaching for his sketchbook on the nightstand. “Let me just grab my pencils and—”
The apartment door bursts open.
“Surprise!” Multiple voices chorus as footsteps thunder down the hallway.
“What the—” Thatcher barely has time to yank the sheet over both of us before his bedroom door swings wide.
Noah leads the charge, followed by Lex and Adam, then Alli with the same dog from earlier, then Emery and River, and finally—
“Lior?” I stare at my former fiancé and future not boss standing in my boyfriend’s bedroom doorway, grinning like this is completely normal.
“Welcome to the family, Pierce,” Noah announces.
I pull the sheet higher, very aware that I’m naked in a room full of people. Lior warned me about this “tradition” when it happened to him and Noah, but experiencing it firsthand is something else entirely.
“I would like to declare I called it first,” Lex exclaims, crossing his arms smugly.
He pulls out his phone and starts scrolling.
“Day two of Thatcher working at VSE. And I quote: ‘My boss is unfairly hot when he frowns. It’s distracting.’ Week four: ‘He almost smiled at me today. ALMOST. I’m making progress.
’ Week two: ‘He laughed at something I said. It was more of a snort, but it counts. I’m breaking through his walls. ’”
“Okay, that’s enough,” Thatcher lunges toward Lex, but I grab him by the waist and pull him back against me before he takes the bedsheets with him.
“Week three,” Lex continues gleefully. “‘He brought ME coffee today. Remembered exactly how I take it. I think the grumpy ice king is melting and I’m going to take full credit.’”
“I will murder you in your sleep,” Thatcher threatens.
“Week three and three-quarters,” Lex adds with a wicked grin. “‘He touched my back when we were leaving a meeting. Just for a second. I’ve been thinking about it for three hours.’”
“Please,” Adam scoffs. “I knew something was up when Thatcher sketched Pierce’s—and I quote—‘sexy hands’ during family dinner.’”
“Sexy hands?” I raise an eyebrow at Thatcher, who buries his face in my shoulder.
“I hate everyone in this room,” he mumbles against my skin.
“You’re both wrong,” Noah says with the confidence of someone holding a winning hand. “I knew something happened between them at my wedding.”
Thatcher’s head snaps up. “What?”