Nate’s hands buried in his hair again and this time he did tug, tilting Ramsey into the position he wanted. One and then another and finally, a third.
It was amazing how he’d kissed before, but it had never felt like this before, like Ramsey was being turned inside out every time Nate’s mouth slanted over his, sure and true.
Ramsey didn’t know who moved first, but it felt like the most natural progression in the world to shift his weight to lead—or follow?—Nate down the hall to his bedroom.
He’d been in here once before, last June. So much of it felt the same. Ramsey’s knees giving out and landing him on the edge of the mattress and Nate looming over him.
But everything felt new and different, too.
“Take this off,” Nate murmured against Ramsey’s mouth, tugging up the hem of his sweatshirt. “Need to see you, sweetheart.”
Ramsey let Nate tug the thick fabric up and over his head, and then they were kissing again, hot and heavy. He reached for Nate, pulling his T-shirt off, finally getting to map out all that hot skin, rippling with muscle, with his palms.
When Nate crowded him on the bed, fitting himself between Ramsey’s thighs like he was born to be there, the skin-to-skin contact made Ramsey lightheaded.
He’d wanted before. Sex was something he could always fit into easy-to-process boxes, but that was sex with strangers. Just two bodies—or sometimes more—colliding together.
But everything with Nate felt heightened, like it was too big to hold, nevermind to fit neatly into a label that Ramsey understood.
He’d be okay just making out like this, rubbing up against Nate’s gloriously muscled thigh, even coming in his pants, when six months ago, he’d have laughed at something so childish.
But the actual act mattered less. The way he looked mattered even less than that.
He wasn’t worried about making a stupid face or being too desperate or letting all his naked desire show.
He just wanted to feel it. Wanted tokeepfeeling it.
“What do you want?” Nate asked in a hushed, rough whisper. His hand was still buried in Ramsey’s curls but it had gentled. The way he was looking down at Ramsey was reverent. Almost awed. Like he couldn’t quite believe that they’d made it back here.
That made two of them.
“I just . . .” Ramsey panted in the air between them. Why had they stopped kissing? He didn’t want to stop. He never wanted to stop.
And maybe it was okay for Nate to know that. A kernel of real truth, something Ramsey had buried and buried and couldn’t any longer, because it was sprouting, growing past his control.
“Tell me,” Nate said gently. Ramsey reached over and tugged Nate’s T-shirt off.
Nate’s gaze softened, even as it heated more. “Tell me,” he insisted again.
The kernel cracked open. “Kiss me,” Ramsey begged.
“Always,” Nate said and leaned in, pressed skin to skin, and kissed him.
They collapsed onto the bed, Nate pressing him down into the mattress, and Ramsey groaned into his mouth as Nate’s thigh wedged between his legs again.
They were both in sweatpants, but just the pressure was glorious. Lighting him up from the inside out.
Another Ramsey, anoldRamsey, would be already thinking of how to flip the power in the situation. How to shift focus, because Nate was all over him, every single bit of his attention like a laser on Ramsey.
Impossible to hide.
He dug his fingertips into Nate’s broad shoulders and let himself relax into the feeling of Nate’s mouth sliding over to his neck, then lower to his collarbone. To his chest, then his abs.
By the time Nate hit the waistband of his sweatpants, Ramsey was sweating and squirming.
Nate’s eyes flicked up to his. They were so dark in the dim light of the room. “You want me to touch you?”
Ramsey swallowed hard. He knew what Nate wanted. He wasn’t going to go past the point of no return without Ramsey’s permission.
