21 - Haven
HAVEN
By the time we got back to the house, the energy had shifted again. From controlled, to chaotic.
Music was on within minutes. Someone dragged out a folding table, and almost instantly beer pong cups appeared; as if summoned by some sorcerer’s trick.
And the girls — because there were more of them now — filtered in like they belonged there. Which tonight, I suppose, they sort of did.
“Hey Spreadsheet!” Zack called, tossing me a ping-pong ball. “You playing or what?”
I caught it easily, and pushed off from the wall. I’d been hovering near the edge of the action, drink in hand, just watching. Observing. Taking mental notes.
“I don’t lose at games like this,” I warned.
“Oh, I like that!” one of the girls laughed. “Confidence.”
“It’s not confidence,” I said, lining up a shot.
I lifted the ball between two fingers, took aim, and let it go. Cheers went up, as I sank it clean.
“It’s simple math.”
“Math?”
“Differentiation and Integration,” I replied. “The calculation of arcs and curves.”
“Curves,” laughed Caleb, downing the cup I just sank. “Our girl knows about curves.”
“That…” I acknowledged with a shrug, “plus I went away to college.”
The ball came back to me and I sank another one, without hesitating. Straight in, too. No edge of the cup nonsense.
“Okay,” laughed Caleb. “We’ve created a monster.”
I allowed myself a small smile. Just enough, but not too much. When the game ended in victory I played another, mostly because I felt obliged to defend my title. Then I faded back, to watch the others have fun. Puck bunnies and all.
I hadn’t anticipated joining the party, really. It just sort of happened around me. I downed another beer, and stayed just enough to be seen. Long enough to belong. At least for tonight, when the whole house was happy.
Eventually though, the noise started to press in. The closeness, the music, the claustrophobia — it was all just a little too much. I slipped out quietly, in the direction of the staircase. As expected, no one even noticed.
The second floor was darker. By the time I reached it, nature was seriously calling. The attic’s toilet seat would be freezing cold, as usual, so I made the decision to dip down the hallway and use this bathroom instead.
Then — a sound. It was soft. Low. Not music. Not laughter.
Something else.
I slowed down. The door to Dorian’s room was cracked open, just enough for light to spill into the hallway. And there was that sound again. A breath — sharp, drawn quickly. It was followed by a low, broken moan that definitely didn’t belong to him.
I should’ve kept walking. I didn’t.
Instead I stopped just outside the door, my heart picking up speed as I stared at the thin slice of light. Curiosity drove me. Or stupidity. Or maybe both.
Either way, I leaned in just slightly… and peeked through the gap.
Oh.
Dorian had one of the girls pressed tightly against the wall, her legs wrapped around his waist. Her head was thrown back in ecstasy, as he surged into her with zero hesitation and even less restraint.
Oh, wow.
There was nothing soft, or careful about it. It was raw. Physical. Driven entirely by heat and want, and something that didn’t require permission for its existence.
I watched the muscles of his broad back, as they flexed tightly with the strength needed to hold her up. His hand tangled in her hair, pulling her head just enough to expose her throat as his mouth followed the line of it. The girl gasped, clinging to him like she couldn’t get enough.
The sounds. The breathlessness. All the exposed skin, flushed pink with desire as they writhed against each other — connected in the most intimate way.
My God…
It was all so unspeakably hot.
This wasn’t what I had. Not with Sebastian. Not with—
My thoughts tripped over themselves, because that wasn’t true either. Not entirely.
Ares flashed through my mind. The heat. The way he’d kissed me, like he couldn’t help himself.
I thought about Grayson, in the shower. The way his muscles glistened as the water crashed over them. The way the steam rose off his perfectly-sculpted body, as he stood in my bedroom doorway.
I didn’t realize I’d stopped breathing until I had to pull a sharp inhale, to steady myself. When I did, the girl’s head snapped up. She looked at me through a tangle of sex-tousled hair, her eyes still half-lidded with pure, unbridled lust.
I froze, unable to look away. But she never stopped fucking him. Never stopped raking her nails down Dorian’s back, as she hooked her ankles and screwed her legs even tighter around his waist.
Her eyes snapped to mine — sharp now, aware. Then… she smiled. It was a wicked smile. A ‘fuck you’ smile, accompanied by a single, easy motion.
The bitch flipped me off.
For a moment I shook my head in disbelief. Then I smirked, lifted one arm, and gave her the finger right back.
She laughed evilly, then buried her face into Dorian’s neck. Her moans grew louder, her hips bucking harder, as she silently sent me a message: “this one’s mine.”
The marks on his back were almost blood red now. Maybe they even were. My feet abruptly began working again, so I headed back to the staircase and climbed to my own floor. The bathroom was open. The cold seat didn’t even register. I was too busy replaying the scene in my mind.
The whole thing had been so raw, so visceral.
I’d never watched two people have sex before, not counting myself in the mirror.
The raw, unfiltered need I’d seen in that girl’s eyes had awakened something inside me.
Something I’d put away — at least temporarily — so I could work on what needed to be done.
I shut the door to my room, drowning out what remained of the music and revelry from downstairs. I put on my sleep clothes, grabbed my laptop, and huddled beneath the blankets.
Five minutes later, I still hadn’t done a thing.
Fuck.
Ares flashed through my mind first. The heat. The lack of control.
Then Grayson — steam, water, muscle, tension.
And Sebastian… warmth. Safety.
Something was building, I could feel it now. Not just in the house. Not just on the ice.
In me.
I didn’t know just how long it was going to hold, before something finally gave.
And I wasn’t sure I wanted to be in control when it did.