“No,” Riot breathed. “Christ, no. I don’t want you to run. I want you to stay. I want—” He cut himself off, his jaw clenching.
Another wave of heat crashed over Cass, so intense it felt like being submerged in hot water. His skin was still too tight, too hot, and without thinking he slipped his arms out of his robes, letting the fabric pool around his waist. The air against his bare chest felt like relief, even as Riot’s grip in his hair tightened to the point of real pain. Tears pricked at the corners of his eyes from the sharp pull, but he didn’t try to move away. The pain was doing something strange to him, mixing with the heat and embarrassment and the want until he couldn’t tell where one ended and the others began.
Riot noticed immediately, his expression shifting. His hand released Cass’s hair like he’d been burned. “Shit, I’m sorry—”
Cass frowned, missing the intensity even though it hurt. “You don’t have to stop. It was... it was nice. Even if it hurt a little.”
Riot just stared at him, his hands ghosting over Cass’s bare chest, carefully avoiding the bandaged points.
Shame washed over him. “I’m sorry,” Cass whispered. “I’m sorry for putting you in such a strange position. Maybe I misinterpreted everything and you don’t actually want—”
“Last chance, Cass. Stop saying you’re sorry, or else.”
Before Cass could ask whator elsemeant, Riot was pulling his robes the rest of the way off, letting them fall to the floor.
The sudden exposure made Cass’s whole body flush. At least before, he had been in his underwear, but this? He was naked. Fully naked. It felt so improper, so deficient…only BrotherMatthias had seen him this unclothed, and he could feel cool air hitting the wet skin, could feel how obvious his arousal must be. Another gush of slick pulsed out of him, his body responding to being stripped with more of that mortifying wetness.
“I’m sorry,” he gasped, the words tumbling out before he could stop them. “It’s definitely getting on you and I feel—”
Riot leaned forward and bit his shoulder. Hard.
The cry that tore from Cass’s throat surprised him, half pain, half groan. Riot’s teeth sank into the muscle where his shoulder curved toward his arm, and the sharp sting sent lightning crackling through his whole body. Tears streamed down his face, but he wasn’t trying to pull away.
Riot licked the bite mark, his breath hot against the angry flesh. “There. No more apologies.”
But Cass barely heard him. His heart was racing and his head was full of questions and fears and the remembered pressure of cutting metal against his skin and he wanted all of it to stop. He needed it to stop to make the aching go away.
He needed to stop thinking.
“Riot,” he said suddenly, breathless. “If I have a five-second head start, can you still catch me?”
Riot pulled back to stare at Cass. “What?”
Cass scrambled off his lap and ran.
He ran into the hallway, bare feet slapping against cool wood. Behind him, he heard Riot curse and furniture. The hallway stretched in both directions. Left? Right? Everything looked the same in his heat-addled state. His wounds stung at the sudden movement, bandages pulling against raw skin, but the pain was distant, unimportant. All that mattered was the thunder of his pulse and the sound of heavy footsteps beginning to follow.
He chose left.
It was thrilling. And terrifying. But the terror felt good somehow. It was burning away all his hesitation, all hisoverthinking, leaving nothing but instinct: run, hide, escape, get caught.
Get caught.
A door ahead, slightly ajar. He lunged for it—
Riot’s hand caught his shoulder.
The impact sent them both crashing through the doorway. Cass hit the floor of a small bathroom hard, the breath punched out of his lungs, and then Riot’s weight was on top of him, hot and solid and everywhere, pinning him to cold tile.
For a moment all he could do was gasp for air and feel. The chill of the floor against his overheated back. The press of Riot’s body along every inch of his front. The way his heart was trying to beat out of his chest.
“Caught you,” Riot growled against his ear.
The sound of his voice, rough and feral and satisfied, made something clench tight in Cass’s belly. He’d run, and Riot had chased, and now he was exactly where some deep, instinctual part of him wanted to be. Completely at the mercy of someone who’d proven he would chase him down without hesitation.
“That wasn’t five seconds,” Cass whispered, breathless and shaky.
“You’re right. It was three.” Riot’s mouth was hot against his ear. “You fucking ran from me. Naked and soaking wet and smelling like—fuck—” His hips ground down hard, and Cass felt the thick length of him. “Can’t even…can barely fucking think when you smell like this—”
