Chapter 22
CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO
CADE
The weeks blur into a bliss I never allowed myself to dream of, let alone believe I could deserve.
I wake most mornings with the ghost of Noah’s touch still lingering on my skin, even when he hasn’t spent the night.
It’s a quiet, satisfying kind of growth—how easily my body has begun to expect him.
How the space beside me in bed feels wrong when it’s empty.
I lie there sometimes, staring at the ceiling in my bedroom, and let the truth settle over me: I am in a serious relationship now and I want to be with him every waking (and sleeping) second of the day (and night).
And somehow, impossibly, he wants me back in the exact same way.
I’d be scared if I weren’t so excited.
This morning, I arrive at our office before him. He didn’t sleep over last night because he had tests to grade, and we’ve both proven in the last week that we cannot get work done when we are together anywhere but the office.
Everything turns to quick blowjobs or me coming in my pants.
So off and on all week, Noah’s stayed at his place so we can get work done and keep our careers on track.
I drop my keys on the desk as I push the stopper down, keeping the office door propped open.
The room smells faintly of old books and the vanilla-caramel diffuser Noah insists on running “for ambiance.” I set two coffees on the desk—mine black with two sugars, his with enough cream to make it pale—and try not to smile too obviously at the domesticity of it.
Twenty minutes later, Noah steps in wearing a charcoal button-down that stretches perfectly across his shoulders, sleeves rolled to his elbows.
His watch slides over the ink on his wrist, a gift waiting for me to trace with my tongue.
His hair is still damp from his shower—the one he texted me that would be filled with jerking off while thinking of me, curling slightly at the nape of his neck.
He spots the coffee I brought him and his entire face lights up in that devastating way that makes my stomach flip, every single time.
“You’re spoiling me, Professor,” he murmurs, voice low, like a secret, even though we’re alone.
And we’ve decided against being a secret.
I know that the ball is mostly in my court, and despite the fact that it took me some years to get here, I am here.
Understanding of myself, and ready for the future.
With him.
I lean back in my chair, trying for casual even as heat crawls up my neck at just the sight of Noah. “Figured you earned it since you’ll be keeping me up until two a.m. tonight.” His eyes cut to mine, finding the little daring dance waiting for him. “Discussing Rushdie, of course.”
Noah rounds the desk, sets his bag down, and brushes his fingers against mine as he takes the cup.
The contact is brief but of course deliberate.
Electricity arcs between us. His thumb strokes once along the side of my hand before he pulls away, but his eyes stay locked on mine, full of promises we can’t fulfill here.
“I can’t wait,” he says softly. “Especially for the part where you realize my take is better than yours, and your glasses get all foggy.” He fans himself with a student essay. “You know what that does to me.”
I swallow hard, still kind of accepting that he and I are doing this. Accepting that I am attracted to the person before the gender was easier to accept than merely being chosen by Noah, I think.
I clear my throat. “We have a department meeting at ten. Try not to look at me like that during it.”
“Like what?” His smile turns wicked as he drops into his chair across from mine, stretching his long legs out so his foot brushes mine under the desk.
“Like you’re remembering what I sound like when I come,” I admit boldly, face burning.
Noah’s laugh is warm. “Guilty.”
The morning passes in comfortable productivity broken by those small moments.
When I hand him a stack of essays, our fingers linger.
When he leans over my shoulder to point out a citation error on our joint symposium notes, his breath ghosts across my ear and I have to grip the edge of the desk to stay focused.
Every interaction is unintentionally charged, like we’re both still learning how to exist in this new reality where touching privately is allowed.
When Dr. Morton unexpectedly stops by our office, talking to Noah about some email he’d sent a few weeks back, for whatever reason, he brings stress.
He brings tension. Because when Eli Morton leaves, he takes all the flirtation and fun with him, leaving a slightly quiet, more focused version of Noah in our office.
But it's okay, because to be together and work together, we have to be able to turn off the playfulness a little. That’s what he’s doing. Focus on work. I take his cue going forward, and trust that he knows how to steer us.
By the time Friday afternoon arrives, I’m buzzing with anticipation.
Noah has a long run planned, and I’m joining him, to hell with my half-marathon training plan.
Running with Noah is its own kind of foreplay—watching the way his powerful body moves, the sheen of sweat on his skin, the way he glances back at me with encouragement when I start to lag.
I’m fast when I’m alone, but with him, my focus isn’t great.
Sweaty Noah makes me think of sexy, naked Noah.
We meet at the trailhead near the edge of campus, the late afternoon sun making the magnolia trees look golden. He’s in running shorts and a tight compression shirt that should be illegal.
“Ready?” he asks, after verifying that everyone else flaked.
I nod, and we set off at an easy pace. The trail winds through the science buildings and campus garden, and conversation flows effortlessly between us.
We talk about our classes, a ridiculous email from Dr. Pratt about the symposium being moved up a week, the new faculty job posting, and the latest on-campus student gossip.
When conversation breaks, we run in companionable silence, and I’m glad everyone else flaked.
When we finally circle back to campus, Noah suggests that we go back to his place, since we’ve spent a few nights at mine recently. We’re both flushed and breathing hard when he asks, and my mind goes to Noah’s bed, messy sheets, clothes everywhere, and him, naked, strewn amidst it all.
“Your place sounds great.”
Noah’s eyes darken as he keys us inside. “Shower?” he suggests, voice lined with alternative, dirty desires. Mine, too, so I don’t even pretend to hesitate. “Yes. Together.”
The moment the bathroom door closes, his mouth is on mine.
Our kisses are deep, hungry, tasting of sweat and want.
We strip each other between kisses, hands mapping familiar territory with new urgency, new need.
Noah’s body is a masterpiece I’m still learning—broad shoulders, defined chest tapering to narrow hips, the trail of dark hair leading down.
I trace it with my fingers and love that when I do, he shudders.
Under the spray of hot water, he presses me against the cool tile and drops to his knees. The sight of him like this—water streaming down his back, looking up at me with wide, amber eyes—nearly undoes me.
“Let me take care of you,” he murmurs against my thigh, kissing, nipping, making my eyes sting with the tenderness of his affection.
I nod and thread my fingers through his wet hair as he takes me into his mouth, slow and worshipful.
My head tips against the shower wall, a broken sound escaping from somewhere deep in my chest.
“Oh, Noah.” The hot water, his hot mouth, looking down amidst the spray to see his thick, aching cock. “Fuck. That feels so–you’re so good.”
He works me slowly, humming around my length with hollowed cheeks, one hand steadying my hip while the other explores. Noah reaches around, dipping fingers into my ass, the same way he played with me that one night.
God I still come to that on the nights he isn’t with me. I think of how he told me the ways in which he’d prepare my body for his, and made me come.
Noah’s fingers graze my ass as he sucks me deep, and my vision goes fuzzy, and my balls pull tight, and I come embarrassingly fast, gasping his name, nearly choking on it.
We’re in the shower, but Noah still swallows me as I come, abandoning my ass at some point to stroke himself once, then twice.
After I’m spent and trembling under the hot stray, Noah rises and kisses me, letting me taste myself on his tongue.
I reach for him, wrapping my hand around his bobbing pink cock, teasing him with a stroking rhythm that makes his breath catch.
“Like this?” I whisper, stroking him the way he showed me last week.
“Fuck, yes. Just like that.” His forehead rests against mine, eyes half-closed in pleasure.
I watch every flicker across his face, memorizing what makes him moan, what makes his hips jerk.
When he comes a few seconds after me, it’s with my name on his lips, and something fierce and protective blooms in my chest.
The way he’s taking it so slow with me, being so careful for us. I’m glad we’re in the shower and he can’t see the stinging in my eyes.
We clean each other gently, passing the washcloth back and forth beneath the spray, adding soap at some point.
This is what I never knew I needed—sex that feels like connection, not performance.
Noah’s patience with my inexperience has been a revelation.
He never rushes me. Never makes me feel like I’m behind or lacking.
Later that evening, we end up back at my place, on my couch grading papers side by side.
My place is smaller than his, cozier, with shelves of books climbing every wall.
Noah sits with his legs draped over my lap, red pen flying across student essays while I try to focus on my own stack.
Every so often he reads a particularly ridiculous sentence aloud and we dissolve into laughter.