I walk over slowly, straddling him before he can move.
His hands stay planted on the mat, eyes locked on mine like he doesn’t trust himself to touch me. Water sloshes around us, soaking into our clothes, glistening on our skin.
I lean in, close enough to kiss but just out of reach. “Stillanything?” I murmur, my lips at the shell of his ear.
He stills, barely breathing.
Then, wordless, I peel off my soaked shirt and toss it aside. My thin white bra clings to my skin, nearly transparent now. His eyes darken, jaw tense, hands still not moving—but I can feel the restraint vibrating through him.
I don’t say another word. I don’t have to.
I look toward the gym doors and flick my wrist.
Water answers like it knows me.
A thin ribbon slithers off the mat, gliding up through the air, coiling through the metal handles. It freezes. Not slowly—instantly, with a sharp crack that echoes through the empty room. Frost blooms outward in delicate veins across the doorframe, sealing it shut in a sheet of jagged, glistening ice.
Noa stiffens beneath me. “Celeste,” he whispers. It’s not a question. It’s not even a warning. It’s something closer to awe… or fear.
I don’t answer. I can’t.
Shit.
I wasn’t even trying. I wasn’t thinking. I shouldn’t be able to do that. Not without training.Not like that.
A sharp pulse hammers behind my eyes, warning me I’ve overdrawn, but I push past it.
We’ll talk?—
Later.
Not now.
I turn back to him, slowly. His eyes are still wide, locked on the door, then flick to me like he doesn’t quite knowwhoI am.
I shift my focus back to the task at hand—back to him. Distracting him in the best way possible.
I lean down, letting my lips brush his just once before claiming his mouth with a reckless hunger. I kiss him as I move slowly above him. Our soaked clothes cling and slide, friction blooming into fire between us until he finally groans against my throat, the sound rough and low—part warning, part promise.
The door is finally forgotten, along with everything else, as he kisses me back.
The heat of our skin contrasts sharply with the cool dampness of the mat beneath us. I sit him up just enough to grab the hem of his shirt, damp and clinging, sliding it over every muscle as I slip it over his head.
I start to trail slow, calculated kisses down his chest, stopping only when I reach the waistband of his pants. I feel him pulsing hard and hot beneath the fabric, like a fire barely contained.
With deliberate hands, I slip his pants down, freeing him, as I look up at him through my lashes.
He groans as I put the tip of him into my mouth, teasing at first, then tasting him like something forbidden. He’s too big to take in fully so I use my tongue to circle his sensitive ridge while using my hand to glide up and down the sides of him.
His hands grip the mat, his knuckles white.
I revel in the pleasure I draw from him, sucking and licking as I move above him. He hits the back of my throat and hishands come up to my face in reflex, fingers tangling in my hair. “Fuck,” he whispers, wrecked. “That feels… so… fucking good.”
His control slips in fragments—one broken sound at a time—until it’s gone completely. His breath begins to quicken and his groans grow more wild, until he finally reaches the point where he can no longer be leashed. I taste the salt of him pooling on my tongue as he shudders beneath me, my name on his lips.
His restraint then snaps like a bowstring. His hand grips my shoulder, flipping me beneath him before I can blink. Fire and fury above me. Water and want below.
My back hits the damp mat with a splash, air rushing from my lungs as he settles over me, all heat and command.
