Chapter 5: The Unexpected Audience
There was only sound, only texture, only Natalie's soft, heavy weight on his chest and the second heartbeat of a pulse under her skin, pressed so close against his mouth. Blindfolded, he floated in the black velvet. He was adrift in the musk of her and the fading bitterness of himself on her skin, an aroma made somehow shamefully sweet in the closeness. He lapped at her, mind hollow, body buzzing. His jaw was tired but it was a worshipful ache, and the sounds she made, throaty little hums of deep approval, resonated through his entire skull.It was simple. Pleasure her. Prove it.
“Good, Tim. God, that’s good.”
His world condensed to the slick-slick-slick rhythm of his tongue, the firm pressure of her hips under his clumsy, pinned-down hands. He never had to think. The wild, frightened wonder of her being on top of him this way, using him this way, had become a low, proprietary burn—his purpose—and he could drown happily in it forever.
Then the creak of the floorboard near the door. Another presence. He felt more than heard it. The tiny change in the air.
Everything in him jolted. That panic-surge on the bus, cool air replaced with living, watchful silence. It resurrected all those frantic butterflies from his gut. He hesitated.
“Eyes on me. I didn’t tell you to stop,” she murmured, not shifting. Her fingers tightened in his hair. Encouragement and reprimand. He tried to fall back into it, but he was choking in the blackness, in the listened-to feeling saturating the room.
He heard her voice again. Not speaking to him. A whisper across the bed, full of conspiratorial heat.
“See?”
Another voice, Chloe’s, low and familiar, but threaded now with something else. “Jesus, Nat. He’s... really good.”
“I know.” A private smile. He could hear it in Natalie’s words.
Trapped under her, he wondered which face he should be wearing. A question embarrassed him, wholly wrong for this place he’d finally found. Then her hand, tangled in his, guided his cramped fingers away from her hip and laid them flat on the mattress. The loss of any small point of contact made his breathing hitch. Another ritual.Another guess. Then—a new, subtle coolness settled near his right hand. Slight pressure, fingertips. Chloe’s hand rested not on him, but beside him.A threshold. His muscles pulled taut as wire.
“He likes being watched,” Natalie whispered to Chloe, but loud enough for him to strain to hear. “He shivers all over. But it’s not just that, is it, Tim? It’s knowing you have an audience.”