Page 42 of The Devils in the Details

“Easy,” Ari said. His voice was rough. Lower than I’d ever heard it, like he was holding himself together with the discipline of someone who had decided that thoroughness was more important than speed.

His finger pushed inside. Slow. Careful. The stretch registered—not pain, pressure, the fullness of being opened by someone who was paying attention to every reaction.

“Good?” he asked.

“Good,” I managed. “More. Please. Now would be—yes, that, exactly that, fuck.”

A second finger joined the first. The stretch deepened. Ari’s free hand held my hip, keeping me still when my body tried to move, and the control of it was something my nervous system filed under “highly relevant data” without consulting my better judgment.

He worked me open with the patience of a man who had all the time in the world and was determined to use it. His fingers crooked, found the spot that made my vision go white, and the sound that came out of me was not human.

“Ready?” he asked, and his voice had dropped, becoming rough, barely controlled.

“Ready,” I said. “Yes. Now. Please. If you don’t—Ari, I swear to god—”

He rolled the condom on. Slicked himself. Positioned himself between my legs, and the blunt pressure of his cock against my ass was its own kind of arithmetic—the equation of something large and insistent meeting something that was currently recalculating its entire understanding of capacity.

He pushed. Slow. So slow it was almost cruel. My hips tried to move, tried to rush it, and Ari’s hand clamped down on my waist, holding me still with the absolute authority of a man who had decided that this was happening at his pace or not at all.

“Wait,” he said.

I waited. Breathing hard. The stretch was intense—not pain, exactly, but the fullness of being taken by something that did not fit easily and was fitting anyway.

Then he was in. Fully. His hips pressed against my ass, and the feeling of him—thick, hot, stretching me open in a way that registered everywhere at once—made my back arch off the mattress.

“Move,” I said. “Please move. Ari, please—”

He moved.

One stroke, deep and slow, and my cock jerked against my stomach, leaking. Ari’s hand wrapped around it, stroking in time with his thrusts, and the coordination of it was something my nervous system had not been designed to process.

His pace built. Not gentle. Not rough. Precise—the kind of precision that came from a man who treated my body like something he had studied and was now applying that study with the focused attention of someone who wanted to get it right.

His hands were everywhere. One on my hip, holding me exactly where he wanted me. One on my cock, stroking with a rhythm that matched his thrusts. His mouth found my neck, my shoulder, the sensitive spot below my ear that made my entire body go tight when he bit it.

“Look at me,” he said, and I did, and his eyes were black and warm and entirely focused on my face, watching every reaction like he was collecting data he intended to keep.

I came embarrassingly fast.

My cock pulsed in his hand, stripes of white hitting my stomach, my chest, and the orgasm rolled through me with the violence of something that had been building since approximately the moment I walked into a study and saw a six-foot-three dock worker with a scar and a lighter and the coldest eyes I’d ever seen.

Ari watched it happen. His thrusts didn’t stop—slower now, deeper, the kind of deep that pressed against every sensitive place inside me and kept pressing—and the look on his face was satisfaction, pure and warm and entirely undisguised.

Like he’d won something.

He had.

His rhythm faltered. His hand left my cock, braced against the mattress beside my head, and his forehead dropped to my shoulder. His breathing went ragged.

One final thrust, deep, holding, and I felt him come—the pulse of him inside me, the way his body went tight against mine, the low sound he made against my skin that was not a word, but might have been my name if names had been the point.

Ari did not pull out. He did not move. His weight settled over me, heavy and warm, one hand still pressed flat to the mattress beside my head, the other on my hip like he was not planning to let go.

He did not let go.

I lay there. Breathing. Cataloguing. The stretch of him still inside me, the warm mess on my stomach, the heaviness of a body that had just been thoroughly rearranged.

Ari’s face was in the curve of my neck. His breathing slowed. His arm across my ribs, his hand on my hip, and the weight of him was something my body had already decided was correct, which was its own kind of problem.