31. Chapter 31
Mal
H enrik is quiet as he undresses me. His movements are slow but steady. Intentional.
Each time an article of clothing is stripped away, his fingers and his mouth follow in its wake, caressing me. Branding me.
Worshiping me.
He teases me through the fabric of my briefs before they join the pile on the floor, and then his mouth descends, soothing over my flushed skin, his lips soft and sweet.
“Are you planning on torturing me tonight?” I ask lightly, humming when Henrik’s tongue skips, featherlight, up the underside of my erection.
I can barely make out his features in the dark room, but it looks like he smiles.
“Can I ask you a question?” he says before popping his mouth over the tip of my dick and suckling gently, his tongue working the sensitive underside of my glans.
I drop my hands above my head, sinking into the sheets. “Mhm.”
“Why the coconut shampoo?”
I bark a laugh as Henrik ghosts his tongue back down my erection. He draws one of my balls into his mouth, and I try to focus on the question.
“Uh, I guess I just thought it fit the whole Malibu thing. Why? You don’t like it?”
He practically growls, the vibration wonderful against my sac. “I love it.”
I grin, lifting my head to get a glimpse of Henrik as he works. “You’re wearing too many clothes,” I point out.
Henrik hums, wrapping his hand around my shaft as he tongues my perineum. “You want me to stop?”
“No? Yes. No.”
Henrik chuckles, stroking me slowly. “You’ll stay here, right? With me?”
I frown. “Of course. I thought we already covered that.”
“No, I mean… Will you live here with me?” He lifts his head into my line of sight.
“Yeah,” I say gently. “I already told you I wasn’t going anywhere.”
“I know, but… I want to make sure you understand that it has nothing to do with our arrangement before. That I want you here as my partner.”
“Oh, Henrik.” I give his arm a little tug, and Henrik climbs up over my body.
His suit pants and nice button-down are entirely too formal for the occasion, and I make a mental note to tell the man he should wear his sweats around the apartment more often.
They did such lovely things for both of us.
“Yes. I will live here with you as your partner. I’d like nothing more. Except maybe your mouth on mine.”
Henrik nods before swooping down, his lips clashing against me wonderfully.
I work on the buttons of his shirt as Henrik nips and licks and sucks at my mouth.
Once he’s finally free from his top, I flick open the button of his pants.
Henrik leans up enough for me to tug the material down his hips, and then I use my feet to drag them the rest of the way as Henrik chuckles.
“You’re very flexible,” he says against my lips.
“Mm, I am. Know what else I can do?”
Henrik cocks his head, as if asking what , and I grab my ankles, pulling them up beside my head so that I’m practically folded in half.
“See for yourself,” I say.
Henrik’s eyebrows lift, and then he reaches forward, his palms flattening over the backs of my legs and dragging upwards.
He groans once he reaches my ankles, and then he reverses course, hands coming to a stop on my ass.
His thumb trails inwards, skimming along my crease.
And then Henrik slides down the bed, replacing his thumb with his tongue.
I bite my own as Henrik laves over my exposed asshole, offered up as I am, and the moment he adds his talented fingers to the mix, I groan.
“Will you fuck me?” I ask, dropping my head back as Henrik does something I don’t have a name for. Some sort of rubbing, twisting flick of his tongue.
“You want me to fuck you?”
“No, I was talking to the other man in this room,” I retort.
This time, Henrik most definitely does growl, and I grin as he grabs my legs and tugs them down. He wraps them around his body and holds tight. “There’s only you and me,” he says roughly.
I nod fervently, even though he can’t see it, and Henrik doesn’t let go as he rolls us both to the side, reaching into the nightstand.
I know Henrik said he’d accept me working in porn if that was what I wanted to do, but it would have been hell on him. And I get it; I do. I understand the source of his jealousy because I feel the same. I don’t want anyone other than me to touch him ever again. He’s mine. And I’m his.
He would have done his best, of that I have no doubt. He would have found a way to live with it, but I would never want to put Henrik in that position. I would have chosen him over porn, regardless of my own desire to be done with that part of my life. I would have chosen him.
Maybe some people wouldn’t agree with that. Dixon and Niko still have sex with other people. I can’t imagine if Alex were to enter a relationship that he’d give up porn.
But for me, it’s the right decision for so many reasons.
I’m happy with my choice. Because it’s mine.
Henrik rolls us back into position, and I grab the condom from his hand. I open it as Henrik starts loosening me, first with one oiled finger, then with two. He takes his time, his hand tuning me like a maestro. Each touch expert. Each caress by design.
Once he’s at three fingers and my muscles have given up the fight, resistance lending way to pleasure, I swat his arm, and Henrik pulls back.
“C’mere,” I instruct.
Henrik knee-walks closer, and I slide the condom down his length, notching him against my entrance. My legs are still wrapped around his hips, my heels at the top of his ass, and I pull him forward, urging him on without words.
Henrik takes my cue, pressing inside my body with a barely muffled groan.
He’s thick and oh so hard, and that sensation of fullness lights me up.
But more than that, it’s this man I’m with.
How one hand travels up my abdomen, landing splayed on my chest like a tether.
How the other holds tight to my thigh, not allowing a millimeter of distance between us.
How, even in the dark, I can see the look of absolute wonder on his face.
That’s what makes this different. What makes Henrik different.
How do you put into words something as abstract as love? How do you define that swirling, chaotic mess of emotions? It’s like the canvas above Henrik’s fireplace. Beautiful. Terrifying. Unordered. And perfect.
There’s no sense in trying to understand it. It’s better simply appreciated for what it is.
“Kiss me,” I mutter, too caught in sentiment to come up with more eloquent words.
Henrik obliges instantly, leaning forward and slanting our mouths together. His body rolls over mine, inside mine, the glide smooth and slow and shallow. The two of us riding a wave. No hurry, no artifice.
Just simple. Raw. Real.
It’s exactly what I need.
“Mal,” Henrik breathes out, the one word loaded.
“I know,” I say softly.
He nods, kissing me again. And just when I start to relax, to slip into the current of Henrik’s lovemaking—because what else could you possibly call this?
—he slips one hand down between the tight press of our bodies, bypassing my dick.
I’m curious for all of two seconds before I feel the unmistakable pressure of additional thickness stretching my rim.
I gasp out, arching slightly as Henrik’s finger slips in alongside his dick. “Henrik.”
“Too much?” he asks.
I shake my head rapidly, and then there’s more. “ Ohgod .”
“Good?” he checks.
“Good.” I nod, the pressure of two added fingers a blooming ache that spreads throughout my body, cascading and sharp in the best way. Overwhelming. Too much and yet, with Henrik, never enough.
And suddenly, that slow lovemaking is like a tidal wave, rushing me out to sea, unstoppable.
“Gonna come, Hen,” I groan.
He makes an unintelligible sound, fucking me a little harder, his free hand cradling the side of my head. I reach down, wrap my hand around my dick, and it’s all over.
“Fuck,” I gasp out, my body squeezing tight against Henrik’s cock and his fingers as I spill between our bodies.
He slips his digits free as my insides milk him and plants his hand on the bed beside my waist. A punched-out groan leaves his chest as he grinds his way home, swelling inside me and finding his own bliss.
I don’t unwrap my legs even once he stills.
I simply pull Henrik to me, reveling in the way he rubs his short stubble against my neck and breathes me in, as if my scent is air.
“I love you, too,” I say once I’ve caught my breath.
Henrik freezes against me.
“I do. I’m not just saying that because your dick is still buried in my ass.”
He laughs once, an almost choked sound. “Mal.”
“I love you, okay? I knew it before, and it’s why I never gave up hope, even though I was stubbornly refusing your calls.”
Henrik breathes out, almost a sigh, and then he leans back. I let him go so he can safely secure the condom as he slips from my body, although I immediately mourn the loss. Henrik isn’t gone long. He blankets my body once more, the pair of us sticky and naked but not minding one bit.
“I love you so much,” he says at last, his voice hoarse. “And I’m so sorry .”
“Hen, stop. Please. We’ve gone round this plenty tonight. We can talk more in the morning. But, for now, I just want you to hold me like you promised, deal?”
“Deal,” he says gently. “Can I ask something else?”
“You and your questions tonight,” I tease, arranging my body into a more comfortable position under Henrik’s bulk.
“The PTSD… Does it have to do with your mother?” he asks, the very question wary.
I let out a deep breath, and Henrik toys with the strands of my hair, stroking and twisting. “Yeah, in a way.”
“Will you tell me more about that tomorrow? I’d like to understand.”
I nod. “Yeah, I will.”
I have a feeling it won’t be as hard the second time around, having talked to Delilah so recently about it.
“And…”
“What is it?” I ask.
“Will you tell me about what that means? To have PTSD. What that means for you and how I can…”
“How you can help?” I fill in, understanding where Henrik is going and why he sounds so unsure, afraid he’s overstepping.
“Yes. I want to help,” he says simply. So sincerely.
“Yeah, Hen. We’ll figure it out together, okay?”
He exhales, nodding against my shoulder.
“Now, will you let me go for a moment so I can let in the kittens?” I ask.
Henrik huffs a laugh, loosening his grip.
When I open the bedroom door, the pair of young felines are right there, staring up at me. I laugh as they sprint by, jumping onto Henrik’s prone frame as if it’s routine.
“Tell me the truth,” I say, sliding back over the sheet and moving the little black kitten off Henrik’s chest so I can be closer to my man. “Was it really only Little Gray you were sleeping with?”
Henrik sighs. “No. I commandeered the both of them, and we all slept in your bed because we missed you.”
My chest clenches.
“And they need names,” Henrik goes on. “Because if you think for one second these kittens are going to live anywhere else, you’d be sorely mistaken.”
“They’re here for the long haul, huh?” I say, my insides swooping and settling into a new order.
“Yes. I’ve gotten quite attached.”
I grin against Henrik’s shoulder, planting a kiss there before I say, “So have I.”
So have I.