Chapter 33Cody
33
Cody
It’d taken more willpower than I’d ever used before to leave Liem at the Locc so I could set about my plans, but I’d done it.
I was doing it.
I, Cody Louis(e) Desmond, was taking Liem Lott on a date.
And I was going to be fucking prepared. I dropped by a store on the way to the rental and perused a few aisles, even though the tiny, shitty voice in my head told me I could be getting ahead of myself, and then I purchased them.
That voice was wrong. It had to be. I didn’t know a lot, but I knew that Liem Lott was mine, and it was time to show him that. Everything that had happened in that classroom had been a good start, and the bag of fresh groceries dangling from my hand, the box tucked under my arm, and the notebook were next.
I walked the short set of steps to the front door of the bungalow I’d booked for the night, thankful I was able to check in early, but annoyance flared as I climbed.
Those five steps reminded me that I had other business to tend to as well.
Once I unloaded the groceries, I did a quick check of the house, which was almost a massive error in judgment.
It was too perfect.
Cozy and private, with two bedrooms and one bathroom, all spacious enough to move around but not sterile. The backyard was entirely private, and there was even a hot tub. My mind immediately went places when I saw it, and I had to bite back a groan as I imagined Liem, steam billowing around him and the night sky above.
Jesus.
Maybe I should’ve planned a public date. Though, it wasn’t like that would’ve lessened the risk of me trying to tear his clothes off, based on our track record.
You could call Liem right now, suggested the devil on my shoulder that suspiciously also had Liem’s voice. I could implode my plans and just act on my desperation for him.
But I didn’t.
My shoulders slumped, and I sighed as the adrenaline of the idea left me, and I moved on with my set agenda, which contained one small hitch.
I could not call his dad with a boner. Especially as I already had bad boner karma after what happened at Miss Barb’s house.
Burnt frames and smoky glass….
I’d barely thought of the things from Miss Barb’s house since storing them in Dad’s garage. It was just something else I needed to come clean to Liem about, and I planned to do that today. Before this went further.
My hot tub fantasies would have to wait.
I busied myself in the kitchen, gathering the ingredients I needed, the work eventually sinking my arousal enough that I was able to make the first of three phone calls.
He answered after the third ring. “You’ve got Monny.”
I froze, stainless-steel mixing bowl in hand. “That’s not how you answer the phone, is it?”
A beat of silence. Oh, shit.
That was maybe not how you were supposed to talk to your… Liem’s father.
But then Monny Lott’s booming laugh crashed through my phone, and those doubts disappeared.
“What can I do for ya, kid?”
I put the bowl down on the counter, then took the phone off speaker and brought it to my ear to tell him my business, and after a little more back and forth and an update on how his two-week vacation from Ari’s was going—they’d opted for a staycation after Mardi Gras—I had the recipe instructions I needed from him committed to the inside of my notebook.
“Talk to ya later, Cody. Hope to see you and my youngest soon.”
“Same here, Monny. Thanks for everything, and please leave the rosebushes alone,” I replied, hoping he heard the sincerity behind the teasing.
My next phone call was longer, and by the time it was done, I had cookies in the oven, a bowl of biscuit dough ready to be shaped, and a feeling of extreme satisfaction.
Debbie Hand, the chairwoman of the BTB committee, was now on my side in the fight against inaccessible public stairs.
One phone call left, and I suddenly got nervous as fuck as I stared at Liem’s contact info. So nervous that sweat broke out on my neck, which reminded me that I should shower before he arrived, but not before taking a photo of the paint marks.
For posterity.
I’d gotten a kick out of walking around the drugstore while wearing them earlier.
Liem’s contact photo, the selfie he’d sent from the sand dunes, beckoned me, and I clicked his number.
“Hi.” That sweet voice filled my ear after one ring, so much excitement in just the one word. “Is it time?”
Fuck , his everything. The raw, unbridled enthusiasm. The way I knew he didn’t even consider masking his feelings did things to me, and for the second time today, I found myself sniffing back a barrage of emotions.
This was the man who painted me exactly as I was.
I cleared my throat before saying the thing that had been on my mind, in my heart, since I saw him through the window of the Locc.
“I’m ready, Liem.”
Thirty minutes later, fresh from a shower with a sheen of my stolen coconut lotion coating me and with a stomach filled with renewed nerves, I determined that nothing could have prepared me for the sight outside the bungalow’s front window.
Liem had texted and insisted I send him the address instead of picking him up.
I hadn’t questioned it.
Flinging open the door, I hurried down the steps just as Liem dismounted the two-wheeled, motorized vehicle, removed his dark-purple helmet, and shook out his hair.
My fists clenched as I came to a halt a few feet from him.
Just when I thought I had the upper hand. Just when I thought I’d prepared for every possibility, Liem fucking Lott rides in on a fucking Vespa, looking like the incarnation of a wet dream within a nightmare .
He tucked the helmet under his arm and ambled toward me, his cheeks rosy and hair windswept.
He looked deliriously happy.
“What do you think?” he asked as he reached me.
“I think—” I paused, eyeing the monstrosity before looking back at him and narrowing my eyes. “—that you drive me fucking crazy.”
His lips twitched, and just a bit of uncertainty crossed his features.
It was enough to clear my head. I wanted the joy back. And not knowing how else to get it, I swooped down and kissed him without warning. He responded instantly, moving against me in a way that was both intense and languid, but I broke our connection after only a few moments to search his eyes. Behind the scenes, I performed rapid calculations, funneling through my instincts to both panic at the sight of Liem on such a machine and to respect his ability to take care of himself. I landed on some kind of medium.
“You’re being safe?”
He nodded and laid his tattooed hand on my chest, right over my heart. “I promise.”
“And you’ll show me how to ride it? And you’ll get special riding clothes for it? Jeans and jackets?”
His hand formed a loose claw as he etched the promise on top of my heart. “I will.”
It was enough. I took his helmet and let it dangle from my fingers, then grabbed his hand and led him up the stairs. Setting his helmet by the entryway as Liem kicked off his shoes, I took a moment to actually look him over.
“It’s lovely,” he said when he finished his once-over. “And it smells wonderful. Have you been baking?”
But I wasn’t done. I was still looking, and this bungalow was nothing compared to him. Nothing could be.
With his dark pants, a soft shirt that fell over his shoulder—horrible for riding any kind of motorized scooter—my hair elastic around his wrist, and a little braid woven into his loose hair, he was a vision. There were also his tattoos, fully on display, his piercings, his aura of pure sunlight.
“Yeah, I have,” I sighed. “And I don’t think I can do this, Liem.” My gaze was glued to his exposed shoulder.
“What?” he asked.
“The plan,” I said simply, accepting my redirected fate with arms wide open. Or rather, with an arm behind Liem’s back and under his knees as I scooped him up and carried him straight to the bedroom, basking in his soft gasp.
I kicked the door shut and sat on the edge of the bed, cradling him in my lap, then ghosted my lips over his bare shoulder.
But I couldn’t drown fully in him yet. Not until we discussed at least the basics.
“Liem,” I said, leaning toward him and taking his lips in a lingering kiss. “I want to be with you. Near you.” I paused, and after one more kiss, I met his gaze and whispered, “Inside you.”
He let out a desperate noise and squirmed on my lap, but I laid a hand on his thigh and pressed, steadying him as I went on. “But more importantly, I want to do everything with you. Everything, Liem. See every sunrise, some sunsets.” I kissed his face, any bit of skin I could reach. “Help at Ari’s, get to know your family more. Introduce you to my dad.” I ran my nose up his throat. “I want to consume you.” Burrowing into his neck, I breathed in his scent. “I have things I want to tell you. Things to show you, to make my intentions clear.”
Liem writhed on my lap, lithe and flexible despite the pressure I applied to his thigh. “You have always been clear to me, Cody.” He angled toward me, his dark eyes full of sincerity. “Always.”
I stood up then, easily taking the angel in my arms with me, and turned to deposit him on the edge of the bed. He fell back on his elbows, and I stepped between his legs, resting my open palms on top of his thighs, loving the way his muscles clenched under me. “I’ll work every day to deserve you. I want nothing else more than I want that.”
Those were most of the basics, the sum of the desires written in my notebook, which was now locked inside my fireproof box, alongside so much more.
“Cody…,” he said almost hesitantly, frowning at me, but I reached toward his face and stroked my finger down his cheek and across his lips, not ready for his argument against my proclamation.
“I have questions that can’t wait right now, Liem, if we’re going to do this.”
“Do what?” he asked, almost in challenge.
“If I’m going to fuck you.”
His eyes closed, and he tried to buck underneath me as he rasped, “Tell me, ask me,” his tongue snaking out to taste my fingertips that still lingered on his face. “Please,” he begged.
I retracted my hand after one more stroke and straightened, my control hanging by the thinnest of threads.
“How far are you ready for this to go tonight?”
Liem regarded me for a moment and then pushed off the bed to stand in front of me, flush against me. “Far,” he said decisively, that spark of mischief lighting his eyes as he added, “And hopefully quite deep.”
I choked on either a laugh or a wanton moan—who could say which it would’ve been?—but then groaned as he shimmied past me to move to the other side of the room.
He smiled over his bare shoulder at me, and I suddenly felt like prey.
“I’ve had… dalliances before,” he started, waving his hand in the air. “And my last physical was only a few weeks ago. I’m clear.”
“Dalliances, hmm?” I said, stalking toward him. “Would you prefer I use a condom?”
Whether he’d noticed the indiscreet pile of supplies on the bedside table, I wasn’t sure. But it was only early afternoon, and sunlight streamed in through the sheer curtains of the bedroom. There was no hiding them, or anything.
And I had no desire to do so.
He smiled again, wicked and wonderful. “No. I know you wouldn’t risk me.”
Never .
“And,” he said, prowling toward me, his delicate shoulder dropping and his shirt along with it, exposing even more of him. “I want to feel you. I need to know.”
My jaw flexed as I bit back a desperate sound that gathered in my throat yet again as ideas flipped through my mind as if they were all written on cards in a horny, overstimulated rolodex.
“Can I have you, Liem?” I ground out, relief flooding me as I reached out and had him back in my grasp. “All of you?”
“Yes.” He plastered his body to me, his feet between mine as he tipped his head back and smiled softly at me. “I am so glad you finally asked.”
“I’m sorry it took me so long, LL.” I slid my hand down his back, and I squeezed his ass, then ran my finger along his crease through his clothes. “Has anyone had all of you before?” My voice had dropped so low that it seemed to rumble.
Liem rose on his toes as his eyes fluttered shut. “Not like you’re going to, Dezi, but—” He paused, licking his lips. “I’m ready for you.”
My finger retreated, and I pulled back. “Explain that.”
His shoulders swayed lightly back in forth in that enchanting, mesmerizing way of his, and I couldn’t help but duck down and lick a stripe across the bare, soft skin there.
Liem gasped, but at his next words, I internally collapsed.
“Some of those dalliances were with myself.”
“ Ti Bet ,” I succumbed, dead as my forehead fell to his shoulder. “Are you telling me you’ve had toys in your ass?” I asked against his skin, then raised my head and locked eyes with him. “Getting ready for me?”
“Yes,” he said unabashedly and pressed close to my front again—so close that his nipple rings grazed me.
“And you want me inside you? Bare?” I asked, one last Hail Mary confirmation.
“Yes,” he repeated.
“Thank fuck.”
Grabbing him by the hips, I lifted him just as he wrapped his legs around my waist. Liem kissed me with so much passion, so much intensity, that I had to wonder for a moment what exactly I’d just unleashed.
Whatever it was, it was never going back into captivity.
Our tongues tangled, and our bodies melted together, so in sync that it felt like we’d been doing this for years. Like we already knew each other’s pressure points, the places that brought each other the most pleasure. Liem ran his nails down the back of my neck, and I shuddered, goose bumps prickling all over. He chased them, kissing down my neck and tugging my shirt down so he could plant kisses on my collarbone.
Just as our kissing and grinding ratcheted up and I felt myself drifting into nothing but sensation, Liem slowed, changing the flex of his hips to a roll and moving his kisses back to my lips.
“Stay with me, Cody,” he said against them. “And take my clothes off. You can date me later.”