Page 95 of Crave

We didn’t look at each other.

Didn’t speak.

Because acknowledging it would make it real.

And neither of us was ready for that.

I came first, spilling into his hand as he stroked me through it, slowing when I trembled and drawing out every pulse until I shuddered against him. Then I focused on him. The heat, the sound he made when he tried to hold back. His groans. The sharp hiss through his teeth when he was close. And the thought that this might be the last time with him hit so hard I couldn’t breathe around it.

So I let go. Pressed kisses along his back, around to his front. Found his mouth. He took it instantly, spreading one hand over the back of my head to kiss me deeper. To entwine our tongues in a tangle of frantic want.

Then I sank to my knees and took him into my mouth.

His moan was wrecked, helpless. And he threaded his fingers through my hair as he pushed his hips forward, not rough, but desperate for more. Water streamed down my face as I looked up at him, hollowed out by the sight of me.

“Fuck,” he breathed. “You look so pretty like that. So fucking good.”

I did my best. Took him deep, worked my tongue, groaned around him when he caught the back of my throat. Even with his hand on me, he didn’t force it. He let me take him there.

And I did.

He came hard, spilling down my throat, and I swallowed, keeping a part of him with me.

Then he angled his head. “Get up here.”

So I stood and he kissed me, rough and urgent, the water pounding around us. Washing everything away, except the part of me that didn’t want this to end.

When we emerged, I dressed while he towelled off, then I checked the back of my wardrobe to find that old pair of joggers I’d bought once that were too big and never sent them back. The only top I had that would even get around him was an old gym shirt, oversized on me but fitted him like a glove. He stepped into them, then glanced at the stuff on the desk.

“Can I trust you to get rid?”

He meant the baggies. The phones. The evidence.

But it hit somewhere deeper. Rawer.

“Yeah.” I held his gaze, so he’d know he could. “You can trust me.”

He smiled. Nodded. Then moved over to the window next to him.

“Seriously, you can go the front way.” I angled my head to get in his line of sight. “No one’s in.”

“What if your neighbours see me?”

“They’ll think I scored quick.”

Razor snorted, then stroked his thumb along my jaw, soft and sweet in a way that nearly undid me. Especially when he said, “I’ll stick to the way I know.”

He meant the window.

But I heard everything underneath it.

He then dipped to climb through, winced, and pressed a hand to his side.

“Wait…” The word ripped out of me before I even knew I’d said it, and I caught the hem of his T-shirt, lifting it under the pretence of checking the dressing. As if this was about bandages, not the terror clawing at my ribs. Not the fear of letting him go. Or the dread that this window, this moment, this breath, might be the last time I’d ever see him alive.

“You’ll need to change that in a few hours,” I said, voice steadier than I felt.

“I will.”