“She asks a lot of questions and seems very, very serious, like Granny Lu, but without the smile.” He pulled the hood of his jacket up, tucking his face into the fabric. “But she says very little about herself.”
Riot looked at him, and as Cass looked back from inside the hood, his expression open and curious and entirely without guile, a knowledge settled in Riot’s bones. He had almost said it aloud once. But in the quiet of the root cellar, with the sounds of spring muffled by stone walls and crackling fire, the thought was loud, pressing against his teeth and demanding to be spoken aloud.
I’m in love with him. Hopelessly, recklessly, stupidly in love with him.
Chapter thirty-one
Sovereign
Cass
Cass’seyesflewopenin the dark, his head aching as he heard the distant rattling of a door. His body was curled tight, knees to his chest, arms wrapped around his middle, and for a disoriented second he didn’t know where he was. There were stone walls and wood beams and the smell of dead fire and cold earth and—
Riot. Riot’s arm across his waist, Riot’s breath warm and even against the back of his neck. Asleep.
A cramp seized low in his belly and Cass bit the inside of his cheek so hard he tasted copper. His body was doing the thing again, the warm-wet-aching heat he’d spent all day pretending wasn’t happening. Except it was done pretending. Now it wasdemanding.
The wetness between his legs had soaked through the borrowed pants. Not the faint dampness he’d been able to ignore in the car. This was real. This was his body producing it like it had somewhere important to send it and was running out of patience with the delay.
No. Please. I was done. I just want it to be done.
He pressed his face into the sleeping bag and tried to breathe. His skin was burning from the inside out, a coal sitting in his pelvis, glowing. Every inhale pulled in Riot’s scent and the scent made the burning worse which made the wetness worse which made the cramp—
He curled tighter and bit the sleeve of his jacket.
You can handle this. Fix it yourself. Don’t be a burden.
He felt his face grow unbearably hot as he worked his hand into his pants, realizing that he had never done this himself before. But he could figure it out, right? His fingers found himself hard, which shouldn’t have surprised him anymore but did. He wrapped his hand around himself the way Riot had done it and tried to remember the grip, the pressure, the speed.
It felt... okay. Not wrong. But notrighteither. His hand was too uncertain, the rhythm off, and he kept second-guessing. Tighter? Faster? He stroked himself and produced nothing but mounting frustration. Whatever Riot’s hands knew that made everything build and crest and shatter, his own hands didn’t speak the language. After several minutes, he was sweating harder and no closer to relief. A cramp seized him so hard it ached into his knees and couldn’t stop the small whimper that escaped him.
The inside thing. The thing that makes the cramps stop.
His face burned ever hotter at the idea of trying it, but the crampsdidstop when Riot’s fingers were inside him and he had an orgasm.
He shifted and moved his hand behind him, fingers sliding through the slick to find his opening. His finger slid in easily enough, and the sensation was not bad. But it wasn’t great either. It was just his own finger in a place that apparently required more expertise than he had. He curled it the way he thought Riot did, felt a spike of something good, but then it faded. The angle was wrong. His wrist ached from the position, his arm pinned between his body and the ground. He tried deeper, searching, as another cramp hit..
It wasn’t enough. He couldn’t reach. His own body was right there and he couldn’t get it right.
He withdrew his hand, shaking, and pressed his forehead against the sleeping bag. His eyes stung. The frustration was a weight on his chest, his body needing and needing and needing, and him unable to provide.
You’re always needing. Always.
“You can ask me for help.” Riot’s voice was quiet and steady like he had been awake for a while. The cellar filled with gold light.
Cass turned his head. Riot’s eyes were open, molten gold with his pupils impossibly wide. He was lying on his side, watching Cass with flushed-pink cheeks.
“You heard me?”
“I heard you trying.” Riot’s hand found his wrist. “You don’t have to try alone.”
“I wanted to fix it. I didn’t want to wake you up because my body won’t—”
“Princess.” Riot leaned over and kissed him, long and slow and tasting of their terrible dinner, but Cass didn’t mind because it was Riot. “Let me help you.”
Cass nodded.
Riot’s hand slid into his pants. Two fingers found the opening and pressed inside with the sureness that made Cass’s own attempt feel pathetic, finding the right place immediately, curling, and Cass’s spine arched so hard his shoulders left the ground.
