Chapter Nine #2
He kissed me again, not tentative at all this time.
It was a pressure, a statement, a thing that belonged exactly where it landed.
He kissed hard, but with an intent that was almost clinical in its precision.
He mapped my mouth, traced my teeth with his tongue, and when he pulled back, I heard the sound I made—half gasp, half whimper—and recognized it as my own.
He undid the top button on my shirt, then the second, and the third, each one slow enough to register as a threat. He peeled it off my shoulders, then ran his hands down my arms, all the way to my wrists, as if he was checking for hidden flaws.
I reached for his shirt. He let me. I unbuttoned it—more clumsily than I wanted to, which he seemed to enjoy—and slid it off. Kenneth was bigger than I’d realized.
The chest hair was salt-and-pepper, same as his beard, and his skin was warm under my hands. The biceps, the shoulders, the build that meant when he pulled me to him the whole shape of my body changed to fit.
He unzipped my pants and pushed them down, then paused. “Last chance,” he said, voice barely above the hum of the city.
I kicked the pants off and said, “You’re going to have to do better than that.”
He smirked and tackled the rest of the problem with ruthless efficiency: shoes, socks, underwear, all gone in one pass.
I was standing in front of him, bare except for my glasses, and for a second the urge to cover up flared, habitual and sharp.
But Kenneth just looked at me—really looked—and there was no derision in it, none of the judgment I’d spent half my life braced for. Just want.
He stripped the rest of the way, and the first time I saw his cock I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from reacting like a teenager. It was big, yes, but more than that, it was obvious he knew exactly what to do with it.
He pushed me back onto the bed, not hard, just insistent, and I landed on the sheets, shivering a little from the rush of cold air and the fact that every single nerve ending in my body was at a ten.
He came down over the top of me and kissed me again, deeper this time, one hand fisted in my hair, the other braced against the mattress. His beard scratched at my skin, and the sensation was new, raw, immediately addictive.
He kissed down my jaw, my throat, the hollow at the base of my neck, then farther, tongue flicking over my collarbone, teeth dragging a line down to my chest.
He stopped at my left nipple and latched on, sucking hard enough to send a jolt straight through my stomach. I gasped. He switched to the other, and this time he grazed it with his teeth before soothing it with his tongue, then sucked until I arched off the bed.
“Sensitive?” he asked, mouth on my skin.
“Shut up,” I said, which made him do it again, slower, just to hear what else I’d say.
His hands moved lower, running down my sides, kneading at my hips. I was aware, in the abstract, of being soft—not gym-soft, but not the kind of body that looked good in anything but clothing.
Kenneth didn’t seem to care. He just explored, mapping every inch of me with his palms and his mouth, like he was memorizing the territory for later.
He dropped lower, tongue tracing the line from my navel to my cock. He paused to look at it, and then at me, a smile at the edge of his mouth that was somewhere between approval and hunger.
He wrapped a hand around the shaft, thumb stroking the underside, then took the head into his mouth and sucked, slow and deep, until I had to clutch the sheets to keep from losing it right then.
He looked up at me, eyes locked on mine, and took me in further. I felt it in my spine. I felt it everywhere. The way he moved was careful, controlled, but when I bucked my hips he just pressed his other hand to my thigh, holding me down with a weight that was impossible to argue with.
I made noises. I couldn’t stop them. Every time I tried to regain a scrap of composure, he did something to take it away. He played me like an instrument, adjusting the tempo, changing the pressure, never letting me get comfortable enough to anticipate the next move.
He worked me to the edge, then pulled off, hand still wrapped around the base, thumb smearing precum over the tip.
“Fuck,” I said, voice high and strained.
He said, “Not yet,” and then reached for the nightstand.
He pulled out a small bottle of lube and slicked his fingers. He lined up between my legs, then bent and kissed the inside of my knee, then my thigh, then the crease where my thigh met my hip.
He ran one finger down the length of my crack, tracing the line, then circled my hole, gentle, teasing, not pushing in yet.
He said, “Relax.”
I tried.
He pressed in, slow, patient.
I gasped. It hurt, but only a little, and only at first.
He worked his finger in and out, gentle, coaxing, until the discomfort was replaced by something else. He added a second finger, stretching me, making sure I could take it. He waited until I was panting, then withdrew.
He got a condom, tore it open with his teeth.
He looked at me. “Ready?”
I was beyond ready.
He lubed up, lined himself up, and pressed in, the head of his cock splitting me open. He didn’t rush. He gave me time, let me feel every millimeter.
When he was all the way in, he paused, letting me adjust. He said, “You’re perfect.”
I almost cried.
He started moving, slow at first, then faster, harder. Every thrust hit something inside me I had never known was there.
I reached for him, grabbed his shoulders, needed the anchor. He fucked me, and I let him, and I wanted it, more than anything.
He picked up the pace, pushing me closer and closer, his hand on my cock, jerking me in time with his thrusts. He said, “Come for me.”
I did. Harder than I ever had, the world whiting out for a second, then two, then longer.
He kept going, kept fucking me, until I felt him shudder, then freeze, then let out a long, broken moan. He collapsed onto me, our sweat mixing, our bodies shaking together.
For a while, neither of us spoke.
Then he said, “You okay?”
I laughed, giddy. “Yes. Fuck, yes.”
He kissed me, softer now, and we just lay there, tangled in the sheets, the city outside humming its endless song.
I had never felt so wanted. I had never felt so good. I had just started to drift into the kind of brainless afterglow that makes you forget every bill you haven’t paid when I felt his mouth at my neck again.
I was still shaky. I could barely get my breath to come back online. My skin was so hot that the cool of his lips should have felt like a relief, but instead it was just another voltage spike, like someone had found a new layer of nerves to wiretap.
He kissed my jaw, my collarbone, the hollow above my sternum. Each press was careful, almost ceremonial, as if he was mapping the territory for future excavation.
When he got to my nipple, he hesitated. Not for long, just enough that I tensed, bracing for a new kind of trouble. He licked, once, slow and flat. Then again, harder. He drew it in with his lips, sucked, then pulled back with a low, deliberate pressure that made me arch off the mattress.
I tried to clamp down, but my fingers dug into the sheets so hard I lost feeling in the tips.
He made a sound, deep in his throat, that I felt through my chest before I heard it. He did it again, then bit down, gentle but firm, the edge of his teeth just sharp enough to flip a hidden switch somewhere in my wiring.
I jerked, a full-body spasm. “Jesus—”
He looked up, grinned, then sucked the other one, this time flicking the tip with his tongue, soft and maddening.
He alternated, back and forth, until my whole upper body was tingling and I could feel the pulse in both nipples, in sync with my heartbeat.
He drew lazy circles with his tongue, spiraling outward, planting kisses along the path, then spiraling back in.
My cock, which had been done for the night, disagreed. I felt it stiffen, fast, and hard enough to be embarrassing.
He noticed. He always noticed.
He traced a line down my stomach, following the lightest path, as if he was writing a thesis on tactile response. When his mouth got to my belly button, he nuzzled in, inhaling, then laughed. The vibration made everything worse.
He hooked his fingers under my hips, dug in, then dragged me down the mattress half an inch. He lined up, stared at my cock, then looked at me. His eyes were dark, hungry.
He didn’t go straight for it.
He licked the inside of my thigh, right where it joined the groin, a single slow stripe, then did the same on the other side. He kissed the base of my cock, then my balls, one at a time, holding each in his mouth for a second, rolling with his tongue.
I was panting.
“Fuck, Ken—”
He shushed me, a gentle, final warning, and then took me, all of me, in one slow swallow. He went down so far, so smoothly, I thought for a second he might have a second throat hidden somewhere in his architecture.
His hand wrapped around the base, tight, keeping me from pushing too deep, but the control was total. He bobbed, slow, each upstroke a glide, each down a suction that threatened to unravel me right then.
He pulled off, popped his lips, and looked up. He said, “Don’t come yet.”
It was not a question, not even a suggestion.
He went back down, faster this time, hollowing his cheeks and twisting his hand in sync. I felt the heat build, low and inexorable.
I tried to warn him, “Ken, I’m—”
He squeezed at the root, clamped down, and waited for the urge to pass. He watched me, unblinking, until I stopped shaking. Then he backed off, let my cock rest against my stomach, the head slick and throbbing.
He grinned. “Good?”
I nodded, mute.
He kissed his way back up, licked the sweat off my sternum, bit the tendon at the base of my neck.
He held himself over me, bracing one forearm on either side of my head. He was a wall of muscle, but there was nothing heavy about the way he held me down.
He kissed my mouth, softer than before, then whispered, “You like that?”