I turned in his arms, and he went back to the buttons, finishing the rest of them, all the way up to the top.
I caught his hands.
“Elliot.”
His eyes were dark, studded with gold and green, the pupils wide. He pushed his hips forward so that his stiffening erection pushed against me, my own twitching in response.
“I’m serious,” I told him.
“So am I,” he replied, stepping closer to that our bodies were pressed against each other.
I let go of his hands, putting mine around him to settle on the small of his back. I leaned away, my back against the counter, looking down at him.
“We need to talk,” I said. I didn’t particularlywantto talk. I wanted the same thing he clearly wanted. But I wasn’t going to let us go down the same pathway we’d already been on. I needed to know what he wanted us to be. Where he wanted this to go.
I felt more than heard him sigh, although he didn’t move to step away from me. “What do we need to talk about?” he asked softly, his hands resting against my chest.
“What are we?” I asked him. “How is this going to work? Us?”
“You want rules?” he asked me, and I almost said no, because I had hated his old rules so much. But relationships need rules. Boundaries. Commitments.
“I mean, we should at least set some parameters,” I said, not liking how apologetic I sounded.
“Okay.” He looked up at me, something I couldn’t quite identify in those multi-toned eyes. “Rule One,” he said softly, sosoft I could barely hear him. “You can kiss me as much as you want, anytime you want.”
I took him at his word, bending to kiss him deeply, my hands cupping his face and my tongue tasting him, slowly and deliberately, before pulling back. “Ditto,” I agreed, before kissing him again.
When I pulled back, a half-smile was on his lips.
“Rule Two,” he continued, as though I hadn’t just kissed him until both of us were breathless. “I care about you.” His voice broke a little, but he kept going. “And I want you to care about me, too.”
“I do,” I whispered. I cupped his face and kissed him again, softly, until he pulled away, just far enough that he could speak.
“I want us to do the romantic shit, like go on dates.” My lips twitched.
“Okay,” I agreed against his mouth. “Romantic shit.” I felt him smile again.
“Rule Three,” he went on, his lips still brushing mine. “There is absolutely anus. And…” He hesitated for a moment, then continued. “I’d like it to beonlyan us.” He pulled back far enough that his eyes could study mine. “I don’t want to share you with anyone else.”
“I don’t want to be shared,” I assured him.
He offered me a quirked, lopsided smile. “I also want the sex, though.”
I laughed, pulling him back to me. “Good.”
“Was that enough talking?” he asked me, his hands starting to push my open shirt over my shoulders.
Part of me wanted it to be, because I wanted to get to the part that Elliot also clearly wanted to get to. The part where he took my clothes off, I took his clothes of, and I got to find out what it was like to kiss him at the same time that he was fucking me.
And part of me wanted it to be crystal clear what we both wanted out of this. Yes, he’d just said he wanted romance, and emotional attachment, and exclusivity, but that was pretty basic in the grand scheme of relationship parameters. Were we just trying this out? Were weserious? Were we thinking about this as having the potential for forever?
To be fair to Elliot, I wasn’t sure what my answers were to those questions, either. I felt like he would be in thetrying it outcamp, given how we started off, but I wanted to opt forseriouswith an eye, at least, towards whether or not we could be forever.
But that seemed like a lot for our first… whatever this was. Night togethertogether? It wasn’t our first date—that hadn’t gone terribly well—and it wouldn’t be the first time we’d had sex by a long shot. Would he expect me to leave after? Was I supposed to sleep in the guest room?
“Seth.” His hands were holding my face.
I blinked at him.
