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When I get home, I take Oliver’s food inside and dutifully tuck it away in the refrigerator. Then, remembering my wasted day yesterday, I buckle down and get those projects done I wasn’t able to manage so soon after Ewan flew off. Building the standing planters takes a couple of hours, but it holds my attention well enough for the time to be blissful. I’m not prone to worrying about things I can’t control, and I’d really prefer it if this didn’t become a habit. Since I can’t seem to control it rightnow, I do my best to find solid distractions.

Planters done, I move on to the second of the home projects my mother not so subtly advised me to do and begin pulling the various weeds that have sprouted up along my deck. To be honest, I hadn’t known they were weeds until Mom told me, and I hadn’t been planning on pulling them even after she did. But, as my father can attest to, Mom has a hell of a knack for getting her way. Which is why I am now the owner of two standing boxes ready for herbs to be planted and am well on my way to a weeded yard. Another couple of hours later, back aching and shirt sticking to me with sweat, I consider telling my mom that the next time she has an opinion about my yard, she can do something about it herself.

But because I’m an only child and a bit of a mama’s boy, I do take a picture of the planters to send her, positioning them under the windows on the deck. She’d told me I could just buy a DIY kit and put them together, which is ridiculous when I’ve got perfectly good wood and a drill handy. As I’m sending her the photo, I also note the lack of a return text from Ewan. Instead of calling him again, I go upstairs to wash off the grime of the day. If I’m lucky, some of this melancholy will filter down the drain as well.

It’s the headlights that wake me up. My bedroom is at the back of the house, window facing the sea and not the drive, but the light is strong enough to filter around the house and brighten what was pitch-black before. I hadn’t been sleeping well, orit wouldn’t have woken me up. As it is, I’ve been tossing and turning all night, obsessively checking the flight information Ewan sent me. He’d texted me before takeoff that he was on the plane and texted me again when it landed, almost as though he knew how stressful this short trip away has been for me. The slam of a car door has me sitting up and throwing back the covers, tugging on a hoodie and leaving the dark bedroom.

He’d told me he didn’t want to wake me, which is all well and good, but I couldn’t have fallen asleep if I’d wanted to. Trusting he was on that plane coming back and the worry that he wasn’t circled my nervous system all night, making it hard to breathe, let alone sleep.

The house is dark when I get down the stairs, small slivers of light sneaking through the windows from the moon but not nearly enough to provide visibility. I can hear Ewan struggling to get his key in the door. Unlocking it from my side, I pull it open to save him the trouble, and there he is. Hands full and a suitcase waiting at his feet, the motion lights next to the doorframe bright on his pale face and deepening the shadows of the yard.

“You’re awake,” Ewan says, dropping the duffel bag with a thump and pulling me into a hug.

He smells like stale airport air and whatever that fancy cologne is he favors. The skin on his neck where I press my face is warm, his arms strong as they lock around my middle and tighten.I knew he’d come back, I think, and wait for all my doubts to slink away before I lift my head and kiss him. He makes a muffled sound and returns it only for a second before tilting hishead away.

“I haven’t brushed my teeth in, like, twelve hours,” he explains. “I have airport mouth.”

Smiling, I reach for his bags and kick my leg back to open the door wider. He yawns, stretching his arms over his head as he enters. The light from the front glows as I close and lock the door, pushing Ewan’s bags to the side to be dealt with in the morning. He’s waiting for me in the dark and melts against me when I slide an arm around his waist. There are a lot of things I need to talk to him about, but the urgency has lessened.

“How was your trip?” I ask him as we walk upstairs.

“Eh. It was fine. Busy.” His words end on another yawn, this one muffled in my shoulder as he turns his face against me. My heart patters with delight. Oh boy, did I fucking miss him.

“Bed?” I offer.

“Shower?” he counters, before adding, “Together?”

We stand under the water far longer than is needed for him to get clean, talking in quiet voices about his gallery show and stroking gentle hands over slick skin. Sleep becomes a less pressing demand when those fingers slip down into my crease, teasing and light. I do a little touching of my own, and we eventually find ourselves in the bedroom, sheets cool from my absence and the hum of the ocean in the distance. Ewan makes slow, silent love to me, his pace sedate enough for me to hold back an orgasm and eventually flip us around to return the favor. He laughs softly when his back hits the bed, spreading his legs as I reach for the discarded lube, chin lifted as he waits for my mouth to return to his. We fall asleep sated and snuggledup, Ewan spooned behind me with his cheek pressed to my shoulder and a leg pushed between mine.

We wake up the same way, and I have the added bonus of being made love to. Ewan is an athletic sleeper, prone to kicking and rolling and mumbling in his sleep. Already, in the very short time we’ve been sharing a bed, my subconscious has learned to ignore every shift in the mattress. This morning, I don’t wake up until I feel fingers between my legs, cool and wet and searching. I’m tired enough that not even that is enough to fully tug me into wakefulness. Instead, I float in that calm space between dreams and reality, back warm from Ewan and body relaxed from our lovemaking the night before.

The press of that finger inside pushes me that final distance. Already relaxed—already stretched—it’s easy to stay still and silent, pulse hammering but otherwise maintaining the façade of sleep. Ewan is silent, his own arousal apparent only in the rapidity of his breaths against my shoulder and the hard line of his dick against my leg. Eyes closed, desire thrums through my body as Ewan touches me everywhere but my own aching cock. I’ve gone from asleep to ready to come in less than a minute, the transition uncomfortable enough to be painful. It’s the fact that Ewan’s doing this for himself that gets me, the fact that asleep, I’m nothing more than a warm body for him to use. I have no say in what we do or how we do it, and the eroticism is dialing my arousal up to eleven.

When the blunt head of his dick teases my rim, I turn my face into the pillow the same way I had to before. I can’t make noise or move, so there’s no way for my pleasure to escape otherthan through hard breaths panted into the pillow. Just like he did last night, Ewan keeps his movements painfully slow, pushing in and pulling out centimeter by aching centimeter. When the press of his hips against my ass pushes me forward, my dick rubs against the mattress, and I nearly groan. Everything is too sensitive, too pleasurable. I keep my eyes closed and hands still on the mattress in front of me, but I know without looking that I’m leaking. I’ll be the first to come this time around.

And so it is, when Ewan’s fingers coast around my chest and brush my nipple, that I do. Ewan’s thrusts become a touch more urgent as though watching me come untouched is bringing him closer to the edge. I keep the charade up for myself but also for him, safe in the knowledge that my little fantasy is just as hot for Ewan as it is for me. He gasps through his own release minutes later, burying himself deep and staying there, teeth scraping and lips kissing across any skin he can reach. I grab his hand and bring it up to my mouth, planting a few kisses of my own.

“Missed you,” he whispers.

“Please stay,” I reply, not having meant to say those words here or now. I freeze, squeezing his fingers too hard, and open my mouth to take it back, to offer me going as an option.

“I am,” Ewan replies before I can speak the words. “I am.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

EWAN

Shiloh doesn’t have enough sheet sets for the amount of sullying up we are doing. A rotation of two might work for a regular washing schedule, but not so well when there are two horny men getting them filthy every night. Sometimes multiple times. Closing the door on the washer, I get it running and make a mental note to buy some more for him. For us.

Heading downstairs, I meet Shiloh in the kitchen, where he is partaking in his favorite hobby of feeding me. From the smell, it seems like omelets are on the menu today. Walking up behind him, I prop my chin on his shoulder and confirm this.

“Yum,” I comment, reaching between his elbow and flank to steal a pinch of cheese.

“Coffee is there for you.” He nods to the side toward a fullmug sitting next to his half-empty one. I shiver with delight at the domesticity of it. Who knew the little things like that could be so sexy?

“So, I’ve got some news,” I tell him, kissing his neck and backing up to hop onto the island. I’m thinking if I sit here, I’ll have a better chance of food morsels finding their way into my mouth. “While I was in LA, I met with a few potential renters who are interested in leasing my loft. Daniel would close off the upper section since it’s a studio space but leave the apartment itself as is. Well, sans all my shit, obviously.”

Shiloh angles to the side, leaning a hip against the counter so he can see both me and the eggs.