Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
bennet
The gym was already dimming toward evening when we got there.
Rubber and metal and the faint sharpness of disinfectant hung in the air.
We’d walked over together from the Bel House, close enough that our shoulders brushed once or twice, accidental but not really.
I kept my hands in my pockets so I wouldn’t do something stupid, like reach for him without thinking.
The locker room was busy. Voices bounced off the tile.
Lockers slammed. I changed fast, eyes down, movements efficient.
I knew Jason was a few feet away. I knew exactly where he was without looking.
I could feel it, the way you can feel a heat source even with your back turned.
I wanted to glance over my shoulder, just once, catch the moment his shirt came off, see the familiar lines of him exposed in a place that wasn’t private.
I didn’t. I told myself it was better this way.
There would be other chances. I let that thought sit without examining it too closely.
Out on the floor, Jason slipped into instructor mode without any announcement.
He showed me how to adjust the seat on the machine, nudged my foot into the right position with the side of his shoe.
When I picked up the weights, he corrected my grip, fingers light around my wrist. The touch was brief, professional if anyone had been watching, but it stayed with me long after he stepped back.
“Like that,” he said, calm, encouraging.
I nodded and started my set, counting under my breath.
My focus kept slipping. I could feel him watching me, his attention steady, not judging.
Every so often, he’d murmur something soft, a low “good” or “yeah, right there,” and it went straight through me.
My muscles burned. My breath went shallow. I liked knowing he was seeing me try.
When we switched, I stepped aside with a towel and pretended to be invested in wiping my hands.
Jason took my place, and I let myself look.
There was no one close enough to notice.
He moved with an ease that felt earned, not showy.
His shoulders shifted under his skin as he worked, back muscles tightening and releasing in a rhythm that made my mouth go dry.
I followed the line of his arms without guilt, without shame.
Why would I feel ashamed? I told myself I was allowed this.
I told myself to take it in while I could.
The thought passed through me like a shadow and was gone before I could decide whether it meant anything.
We finished with ab crunches on the mats, side by side.
The exertion left us both flushed, sweat slick on my spine, my shirt clinging in a way that made me too aware of my own body.
Jason laughed when I lost count and started over, breathless and bright.
The sound did something to my chest. I wanted to stay right there, on the floor, breathing the same air as him, suspended in that loose, spent feeling.
Back in the locker room, the crowd had thinned.
The noise dropped to a distant hum. I peeled my clothes off and stood in my underwear, skin cooling fast. This time, I didn’t look away.
Jason was a few lockers down, unhurried, pulling his shirt over his head.
His body was familiar to me now, but seeing it here still felt like a small shock.
He caught me watching, and his mouth curved, pleased, almost cocky.
He rolled his shoulders once, like he knew exactly what he was doing to me.
We headed for the showers together, tile cold under our feet. The space was empty, steam hanging faintly in the air from earlier. I reached for a stall and felt Jason’s hand close around mine before I could step inside. The contact sent a sharp, immediate pull through my gut.
He leaned in, close enough that I could smell soap and sweat and him.
When he kissed me, it was brief, just a press of mouths, but my whole body reacted like it had been waiting for permission.
He shifted, clearly intending to follow me into the stall, confident and sure in a way that made my pulse jump and ache at the same time.
“No,” I said, too quickly, then softer. “Not here.” I swallowed, aware of how thin my voice sounded. “Um. You’ll walk me home, okay?”
He grinned, easy and unbothered, and nodded.
He did walk me to the Thinkers’ House some twenty minutes later, although I had spent most of that time in the shower, naked and aware of him on the other side of the wall, whistling and singing.
When he heard my shower going off, he splashed me with water over the wall, simply reminding me that he was there and aware of me, too.
Some part of me had to admit the point of pride when I entered the house with Jason next to me.
Rowan was in the living room, a pillow in his lap and a notebook on top of it, scribbling notes for the next campaign.
“Do my eyes deceive me, or is that Dud the Cave Troll?” he asked as I shut the door. “I could smell you from a mile away.”
“Dud clean. Shiny knight make Dud shower,” Jason said in the troll’s deep, excited voice.
“Why on earth would the shiny knight care either way?” Rowan said in a sweetly naive tone, batting his eyelashes at us both.
“Dud no speak of these things. These things stay in Dud’s three walls.”
“Three walls?” Rowan asked.
Dud shrugged slowly. “Is cave.” And with that, Jason zipped his mouth, but it was too late, for the shiny knight had already pulled his fist all the way back.
To be fair, my fist hurt more than Jason’s shoulder after I’d punched him. “Crap. That’s all muscle,” I murmured to myself.
“Mosquito bite Dud,” he said, shrugging, while Rowan cackled on the sofa. “Dud carry shiny knight.”
“What? No. No!” Jason moved his arms behind me in a heartbeat, one landing on my upper back and the other sweeping my feet off the floor until I was literally in his arms.
He carried me to the bottom of the stairs while Rowan howled. “The stories. They write themselves.”
I wiggled to get free, but Jason only held me tighter and carried me all the way up the stairs and to the door of my room. Then, as he dropped me gently back on the floor, he grinned and pinned me against it. “I would have carried you in, but…the symbolism is too much.”
“I wish I could punch you again,” I said, shaking the lingering pain out of my hand.
The door closed behind us with a soft, final click, and the sound seemed to flip something feral and electric inside my chest.
Jason didn’t give me time to think.
His hands were on me immediately, firm and sure, one braced beside my head, the other settling at my waist as he backed me into the door. My shoulder blades hit the wood, breath knocking out of me in a startled laugh that barely made it past my lips before his mouth found mine.
The kiss wasn’t careful.
It was hungry and sudden, like we’d both been holding our breath since the gym and could finally let go.
His mouth opened against mine without hesitation, heat and pressure and intent, and I made a sound I didn’t recognize as my own.
My hands came up on instinct, grabbing at his shoulders, fingers digging into muscle through bare skin.
He kissed like he meant it. Like he wasn’t second-guessing a single thing.
I melted into it, heart racing, the world narrowing to the press of his body and the way his mouth moved against mine.
He tasted like mint and sweat and something warm and familiar that made my knees weak.
I tipped my head back without meaning to, giving him more, and he followed immediately, deepening the kiss with a low sound that vibrated straight through my chest.
My brain tried to catch up. It failed.
Everything felt too big and too fast and exactly right. His hip pressed between my legs, not subtle, not restrained, and I gasped into his mouth. He swallowed the sound like he’d been waiting for it, kissing me harder, crowding me against the door until there was nowhere else to go.
His hand slid from my waist to my lower back, palm flat, holding me there. Grounding me. Claiming space. The other stayed braced above my head, caging me in without ever making me feel trapped. It was overwhelming in the best possible way.
I kissed him back just as fiercely, weeks of wanting and wondering pouring out of me all at once. I nipped at his lower lip without thinking. He groaned softly and answered by angling his mouth, tongue brushing mine in a slow, deliberate stroke that sent heat flaring low in my belly.
“Jason,” I breathed, more a warning than a plea.
He pulled back just enough to rest his forehead against mine, both of us panting. His eyes were dark, blown wide, fixed on my mouth like he was deciding whether to devour me again.
“Tell me to stop,” he said, voice rough.
I didn’t. I couldn’t.
I kissed him again instead, slower this time, deeper, savoring the way he responded immediately, like he’d been wound too tight to resist. His hand flexed at my back, fingers spreading, and I felt it everywhere. My skin buzzed. My pulse pounded in my ears.
We kissed like that for a long moment, messy and uncoordinated and desperate, until my lips were swollen and my lungs burned. When he finally pulled away, just a fraction, I chased him without thinking, still dizzy with want.
He laughed softly against my mouth, a breath of sound that made my chest ache.
“Yeah,” he murmured, brushing his thumb along my jaw, tender and devastating after everything else. “That’s about how I feel, too.”
I pressed my forehead back against the door, eyes closed, trying to remember how to breathe. My whole body felt lit up, alive in a way that was almost frightening.