Page 28 of The Key Holder

Dylan looked around, taking in the damage. “Damn.”

“It’s not too bad.”

“What are you talking about? There are two giant holes and pieces of wall all over the floor.”

I shrugged and carefully placed all of the wet curtain into the tub with the rod propped in the corner. “One trip to Stony Creek and a few hours of work and it’ll be fine.”

“You’re going all the way to Stony Creek?”

“Unless you want to shower with me the rest of the summer?”

“With you?”

Shit. “Uhhh…I just meant in my bathroom.”

“Oh. I mean, that makes sense.” It wasn’t my imagination; he almost sounded disappointed. “That, or you’d have to hold up my rod every time I wanted to shower,” he added.

“I’ll hold your rod any day,” I said, knowing full well that my joke was a purposeful step down a path paved with red flags.

He looked up at me, and I saw a flicker of something in his eyes. Was it hope? Something more? I wasn’t sure, but I knew at that moment that I would be there for him. This summer and beyond.

“You might have to help me up the stairs,” he said.

“I can do that.”

I wanted him as part of my life again.

Whatever it took.

7

Dylan

I’ll hold your rod any day.

I replayed Ford’s words over and over in my head as I laid on my bed. After the shower disaster, I had managed to get shorts and a shirt on without assistance, and then Ford had brought me a snack and bag of ice for my ankle.

I bet his cock is a snack.

My accident-prone ass was completely lucid by now, but I was still horned up from our lakeside day in the sun. I couldn’t get his bulging banana hammock out of my mind. Which was why—even with Cheez-It crumbs all over my chest—I was playing with myself.

It turned out even though it was straining to bust out of the cage, I could move the whole thing back and forth enough that it felt almost as good as jerking off.

Fuck.

I was desperate for it.

Surely he wouldn’t be a poor choice of a partner. He obviously cared about me. The man had carried me through the wilderness twice in one week. I closed my eyes and thought of how his body felt against mine. Morgan and I couldn’t have predicted that the first man I’d fallen in love with would be the one I’d be spending my sexless summer with.

Over the next hour, and with no guilt that I had found a way to cheat the cage, I brought myself to the edge multiple times. It was only the thought of Ford—of the possibility that he could be the one to help me cross the finish line, so to speak—that kept me from cumming.

“I’m back!”

My hand came out of my shorts faster than I spent my paychecks. “Did you get everything you needed?”

“That and more!” he yelled back.

What does that mean?