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My living room is a modest area with a simple couch, TV, and one end table with a wooden chess set on it that I bought at an arts and crafts fair two years ago. “Hmm, I’m going to checkmate you at this someday,” he teases me as we move along on the tour. A short hall running off the living room leads to the bathroom and my bedroom, which has a tall four-post bed and a matching oak wardrobe in the corner, stained a muted green on its sides.
He stands at the window for a moment, which peers out into an alley, then turns to glance at my bed, appearing lost in thoughts.
I lean against the doorframe. “What’s on your mind?” I ask. “Are you tragically underwhelmed with my bachelor pad?”
Richie comes up to the foot of the bed and puts his hand on it. His fingers sink into the soft, lime-green comforter. “The opposite. Your home feels so comforting. It’s also clean … organized …”
I laugh. “You expected me to be a slob?”
He eyes me. “One look at you in that smart tie and sexy getup does not conjure the word ‘slob’ in any sense of the word. Not that I can think of very many senses for ‘slob’, except for an endearing frat-boy manner, perhaps … which you are also clearly very much not. You have more of a skateboarder vibe during your off-hours. I bet you rode around on a skateboard during your rebellious teen years. Am I right?” He takes ahold of one of the four bedposts, as if to admire its sturdiness. “Fit for a prince, this bed. I always wondered why they don’t have a prince-or-princess-size bed,” he muses.
“You’re looking at it.” I nod at the bed. “That’s a prince size bed, right there.”
For a second, he takes me seriously, eying the bed with renewed curiosity. Then he glares at me teasingly when he realizes I’m joking. “Well, then. I guess a prince must live here. A prince who thinks rather highly of himself.”
I realize I’ve never seen him express a flicker of annoyance before, even if it was teasing. “You look so cute when you’re hot and bothered.”
“Oh, is that what I am? Hot and bothered?”
“Something about being near a bed.” I come up to his side. “At the same time as … being near me.”
Richie lets go of the bedpost, turning his eyes on me. He no longer blinks. Nor moves. Nor even breathes, apparently.
And then: “If I … was twenty years younger,” he murmurs, almost a whisper, “I would be so bold as to ask for a kiss right now … and race headlong into that fantasy of mine, to be yours, and for you to be mine. I would ask you to be mine.”
I want him to touch me so badly. I want his hands on me. I want him to touch me like I belong to him—like I belong to someone, finally, instead of belonging to everyone. “So why not do it now?”
He snorts, finding that funny, then looks away.
I take hold of his chin and turn his head back to me, gently.
His eyes snap to mine, surprised.
“Ask for a kiss,” I demand him.
14
He freezes in place. I think he’s trying to figure out my ploy—assuming everything is a ploy.
“Ask me,” I repeat.
In a tone that sounds more like he’s indulging me rather than being serious, he asks, “May I have a kiss, Isaac?”
I didn’t expect him to use my real name. Now it’s me who’s caught off-guard.
And that’s when I decide to forego any more answers or games; I just go in for the kiss.
It happens all over again. The flood through my body. The surprise of his firm lips. The gift of his taste, his energy, his overwhelming need …
And mine.
His hands softly grasp at my hips, then slide around, as if to explore the smooth, tight material of my fitted dress slacks. His fingertips are electric, and they are an extra reward that sends waves of pleasure through my body.
I love being wanted. I crave being touched.
Especially by him.
And as I grip the back of his head to strengthen our kiss, pressing our faces together deeper, I feel a nearly inhuman possessiveness take over. I want him to know how needed he is, and how badly I’ve wanted someone to crack into my figurative safe.
To see all the hidden parts of me, even the less sexy ones, and embrace them still. To pull me out of my own head and open my eyes to the world around me. To fulfill a need I didn’t know was there. And the more we kiss, the more I realize this is exactly what I wanted all along.
“Can I touch you, Isaac?” he breathes between our kisses.
He’s already touching me. I think he knows that, yet still, even in his desperate lust, he manages somehow to be courteous. How fucking sweet is this guy?
