Chapter Three
Dylan
Ican’t stop thinking about Hunter, and it’s keeping me awake.
I shift restlessly in bed, throwing off the covers and staring up at the dark ceiling.
My skin under my t-shirt and underwear feels stretched and hot, as if it’s too tight on my frame.
The bed that was perfectly comfortable last night now feels too hard one minute and too soft the next.
Of course, what’s really making sleep impossible is closing my eyes and Hunter’s image filling my head.
This morning’s meeting replays in my mind on a loop.
Outside, the wind kicks up, whipping around the house and rattling the windows.
Trees creak and groan outside, their bare branches clicking together like skeletal fingers.
Normally, the noises from the woods and the isolation from living outside of town with no nearby neighbors don’t bother me, but tonight I’m on edge, restless, and strangely alert.
Seeing Hunter again, hearing the low rumble of his voice... A shiver ripples through me.
“Shit,” I whisper, closing my eyes and pressing the heels of my hands against them.
Hunter looked so good it hurt—like time had chiseled him sharper instead of softening him.
I let today’s interaction play out again in my head, going over his every word, his every expression.
Not that he gave me much in that regard.
Throughout most of the meeting, his features had remained inscrutable, almost blank, his tone even and professional.
Nothing about the interaction would have given away that we even knew each other before, let alone that we’d been friends and, later, so much more.
Somehow, his indifference is worse than the anger I’d been afraid of facing.
Not that I would have blamed him if he had been angry. I would have taken it because I deserved it. But I guess I really didn’t need to worry. He’d spoken to me like a stranger, which makes sense. After ten years, that’s all we were to each other.
Except maybe he hadn’t been entirely nonplussed at seeing me again. There’d been a crack in that indifferent veneer, a fissure in his professionalism offering a glimpse at the man I remember.
“It kind of sucks when someone disappears and you’re left wondering if they’re alive or dead.”
His words sent a wave of shame rolling through me, but in its wake, there’d been a sense of relief. Maybe I’d mattered to him, at least a little, and he hadn’t completely forgotten me over the last decade.
I have no right to feel this way.
I know that. I’m the one who left. First, I lied to him, told him I didn’t love him, then disappeared completely from his life the same night.
I hadn’t wanted to do any of those things, but I’d been backed into a corner, and I am, at my core, driven by self-interest, self-preservation. In the end, I hated hurting him, but I couldn’t bear the idea that one day he would hate me for everything he’d lost by getting involved with me.
Looking back, maybe it was always going to end like that—messy, unfinished, and full of things we never said.
Even seeking Hunter out today had been my own inherent selfishness at work.
He’d known it, too. I’m sure it’s why he asked why I’d come to him, the man I abandoned, instead of literally any other private investigator.
Admittedly, I didn’t know any other private investigators, but, as he pointed out, I didn’t know him either, not anymore.
I hadn’t lied when I said I’d reached out because I thought he was the best option for finding someone to listen to me, to believe me when I said something had happened to Matthew, that he hadn’t just taken off.
After the police brushed me off, I needed to find someone who would take me seriously.
God, he looked good today. Just as I remembered, and yet somehow even better.
Back when we’d been together, he’d been on the brink of manhood, his skin smooth and golden and perfect.
Now, there were faint lines across his forehead and at the corners of his eyes.
He hadn’t been able to grow more than patchy stubble back then—now, the scruff carved definition into his jawline.
His hands were still big, and I remember what they felt like, calloused and warm, when they moved over my skin.
I’m only vaguely aware of my hand slipping inside my underwear, my fingers curling around my hard, straining cock—probably the real reason I’m so restless tonight.
A soft gasp escapes me as I stroke myself slowly, but it’s not memories of us from the past playing in my head.
It’s now. It’s Hunter in his office again.
I’m bent over his desk, the grain cool beneath my palms. The desk lamp glows low beside us, throwing golden light across the cluttered surface and casting flickering shadows along the wall. I hear the door click shut, feel the air shift as he steps in behind me.
He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t need to. I feel the heat of him at my back, the weight of his stare tracing down my spine. My pants are gone—I don’t even remember them being pulled down—and the chill of the room raises goosebumps across my skin.
A moment of silence. Then a breath. A wet sound—
I flinch when spit hits my hole, hot and sudden. I bite my lip, a whimper catching in my throat. Another breath. Another slick sound. Then his finger is there, sliding inside with a deliberate push.
“Hunter,” I whisper, breathless.
He presses closer. A second finger joins the first, stretching me open in slow, practiced motions. I’m burning up, trembling. His other hand rests heavy on the small of my back, pinning me down. His belt buckle brushes my thigh.
Then I feel the blunt pressure of his cock. He pushes forward—
I gasp, eyes squeezing shut. He fills me with one slow, devastating thrust, setting a rhythm that’s hard and deep, each snap of his hips sending jolts up my spine. The desk creaks beneath me. His fingers curl in my hair, holding me down while he fucks me with quiet, focused intensity.
My orgasm builds fast, hot and desperate, curling tight in my gut. I try to hold it off, to make this last, but I’m already too far gone. My grip tightens. My legs tremble.
When I finally come, it’s with a sharp cry, my body locking tight and coming undone in waves.
“Fuck,” I hiss, my hand sticky, chest heaving. I collapse back against the mattress, the real world settling around me again in quiet shadows and the sound of wind outside the windows.
I get out of bed and shower, and when I check the time, it’s nearly five.
I give up on sleep. Instead, I drive into town and get an early start on the day.
I have orders to make, anyway. There isn’t a doubt in my mind that the lack of sleep will catch up with me, and exhaustion will hit me like a brick wall.
I might as well finish what I can now, in case I need to duck out early.
I’m sitting at my desk in the closet-like back room, a steaming cup of coffee next to my laptop, while I fill out an order form for deli meat, when I hear a thud overhead.
At first, it barely registers. Between the tiredness leaving my brain murky and my attention fixed on what I’m doing, the noise is distant and muffled and easily explained away. Then another thud, followed by a louder bang and what sounded like footsteps.
What the hell? I freeze, straining to hear more. Another bang and more footsteps. Someone is in the apartment upstairs. Matthew.
I stand and hurry from the café, walking around the side of the building to the back, where rickety wooden stairs lead to the apartment.
The sky is starting to brighten, deep indigo blue stretching out and eating the star-studded black. I didn’t bother grabbing my coat, and the sharp wind whips through my wool sweater, stinging my skin as if I’m wearing nothing at all.
At the top of the stairs, the door is ajar by a few inches, and the apartment is dark inside. I press my hand to the door and push it open wider, but I can’t make out anything in the shadowy darkness.
“Matthew?” I call, stepping inside and flicking the light switch on the wall next to the door. Dull light illuminates the small space, and I start to call Matthew’s name again, but the word dies on my tongue, my eyes widening at the chaos before me.
The place has been trashed. Books pulled off the shelves are strewn over the floor. The couch is tipped forward, fabric torn open and foam padding yanked out. All the cupboard doors in the small kitchenette in the back corner are open, and dishes are in piles of broken ceramic on the floor.
“What the fuck,” I whisper, apprehension leaving me cold.
The thud of heavy footsteps from the shadows charges toward me.
Before I can even turn to see who it is, someone slams hard into me, knocking the air from my lungs and sending me stumbling backward.
For a second, I teeter on the edge of the top step, for just a moment before I lose my balance, then I tip backward, and the floor disappears from under me.