Holden
When Bryce showedup after work, he was too tired to do anything besides collapse into Holden’s arms and go to sleep. Holden didn’t mind. He took Bryce to bed, stripped off his clothes, and held him until his breathing turned steady and slow. Holden fell asleep soon after and woke the next morning with their positions reversed with Bryce’s face buried in the back of his neck and Bryce’s fingers drawing lazy swirls across his chest.
“I like waking up with you,” Holden said, half the words lost on a yawn. He rolled onto his back and Bryce tucked in against his ribs, cheek pillowed on Holden’s chest.
“I like it too.”
Holden stroked his fingers through Bryce’s hair, pressing a kiss against the top of his head. They lay together in a comfortable silence, the sound of cars outside the window and annoying birds chirping on the roof the only sounds besides their level and even breaths. They’d talked about being boyfriends, which to Holden had always felt like such a trivial word for the kind of commitment he wanted to give someone. Boyfriends felt like it was a high school thing, a label kids used when they didn’t know better or didn’t care.
The way he felt for Bryce, even so soon after meeting, was far more monumental than “boyfriend” allowed, but Holden wasn’t sure how to express that. Even in the space they’d built together where words weren’t always necessary, Holden didn’t know how to express the level of adoration he felt for Bryce, the level of want.
Need.
“For as quiet as you are,” Bryce murmured, breath hot against Holden’s nipple. “You sure think loud.”
Holden made an amused sound and inhaled so deeply it raised Bryce’s body.
“What are you thinking about?” Bryce asked next, clearly ready to use his words until Holden grew weary of it and took them away.
Holden arched a brow, and Bryce shoved off of him, pushing into a seated position with the sheets pooled in his lap and his knee digging into Holden’s side.
“What are you thinking about?” Holden countered.
“I’m thinking about how long I can make it before the anticipation of you pumping me full of fake cum kills me.” Bryce grinned, cheeks pink in the late morning light. “But I’m also thinking about how if that never happens, it would be perfectly okay.”
Holden thought of the bag of supplies in his nightstand. “It’ll happen,” he promised.
Bryce’s lashes fluttered a little. “I’m really lucky to have found you, I think.”
Something constricted in Holden’s chest, and he danced his fingertips across Bryce’s hip, easing the sheet down until Bryce’s thigh was visible. Holden had always been so eager to bed the other man he’d never paid attention to Bryce’s tattoos. At least not beyond the stardust on his knuckles. Bryce’s bodywas a dedication to his brother, a portfolio of Merrick’s tattoos scattered across his skin.
“Now tell me what you’re thinking about,” Bryce said.
“I’m thinking about how I’d secretly worried talking all night at work would make you tired of it by the time you came home to me.”
The air crackled, and Bryce worried his lower lip between his teeth. Holden had used a lot of honest words in that sentence, but maybe not in the ideal order. He was very close to showing his hand.
“Worried?” Of course Bryce picked up on that. “You were worried I’d come back here after work and have nothing to say to you?”
Holden opened his mouth to argue, but Bryce showed no signs of stopping.
“Andcome home to you?”He flung one leg over Holden’s body and straddled him, fingers steepled on Holden’s chest. He ground his hips down against him, both of them shivering from the friction. “I think you like me, Holden Walker.”
Holden grabbed his hips, stilled him.
“I do,” he rasped, searching Bryce’s face for any trepidation or distaste at his very understated two-word confession.
What he got instead was a bright smile and a soft laugh.
“I like you too. And don’t worry, I’ll always have something to say to you.”
“Unfortunate,” Holden teased, and Bryce’s smile somehow grew wider. Bryce opened his mouth, but something flashed across his face and he snapped his mouth closed, licking his lips like he wanted to seal them closed.
“What?” Holden prompted.
“Nothing.”
“Not like you to keep something back.”
