Days passed, turning into weeks, then months. Keary did not appear. He didn't respond to any of her texts, nor answer any of her calls. She realised that despite all the time they'd spent together, she had no idea where he stayed, and when she went to the few bars at which she knew that he played, she was told that he had quit some time ago. Nobody knew where he was, and nobody knew how to find him, because he didn't want to be found.
She had no way of knowing, but that night, he had woken abruptly into darkness, gripped by panic. Never before had he experienced such a powerful climax, but neither had he ever submitted that far: tied and collared and leashed and blinded and teased and flogged and penetrated and then pushed beyond his control past the brink of mind-melting orgasm. In all their sessions before, he had always found or created ways that would enable him to gain the upper hand if he didn't like the way things were going, but that last night, he had nothing.
He had been completely at her mercy, and he didn't like that at all.
It was undeniable that the dynamic of their relationship had shifted. The no-kissing rule had been established as a guard against becoming too emotionally invested, but now it had been broken on both sides. But even as he felt himself being drawn almost forcefully to her, the truth was that his earlier answer to her question on trust had come not from assured reality, but from precarious hope.
He looked down at her and gulped. Her sleeping face, framed by luscious brunette curls, triggered a maelstrom of conflicting emotions: affection and pity, fear and desire, longing and repulsion. He could feel them rising up to suffocate him.
He needed to get out.
With some difficulty, he rose, and realised she had cleaned him. He hesitated, then scooped her up. Her now-familiar smell and the feeling of her in his arms brought to mind the morning he had told her about his family. Right at that moment, the memory overwhelmed his sense of vulnerability to this woman. Laying her down quickly on the bed, he threw on his clothes and left the hotel via a backroom emergency route so he wouldn't be seen.
When he finally got back to his house, he sat in silence on the bare floor with his back against the door for a long, long time.
...
The trees had begun shedding to brace for chillier days when her doorbell rang late one night. It had been months, and she had sent him a text about a week prior:
K, there's something I need to tell you. Can we please talk?
She had just been about to fall asleep, but when she shuffled groggily to the door, what she saw through the peephole jolted her wide awake. She flung the door open.
"K…!"
In later days when she thought back on the events of the night, she would come to the conclusion that she had lost control from the moment she turned the handle. Before she realised what was happening, he had barged his way in and swept her up, backing her firmly up against the wall, his mouth covering hers. Even though her mind recoiled in shock, her body knew him, and responded, her legs curling around his waist to cling close, her robe loosening.
Perhaps it was because of his long absence, but he seemed to have grown taller, stronger. She clung to his shoulders and took in the smell of him, mixed with the scent of the cold night air, and a tinge of… blood? But her thoughts were quickly diverted when he started pressing closer. She pushed against his chest, breaking away to speak.
"K, I have to tell y–"
He caught her wrists and pinned them above her head, cutting off her words with his mouth. Had he always been such a good kisser? But no, she needed to tell him! She twisted her head away.
"Keary, I'm ge–"
She couldn't finish the sentence, because two long fingers plunged deep into her. Her mind went blank as they went to work inside her, skilfully stroking her g-spot as he bit down on her neck such that she could only gasp helplessly. She arched, her insides tightening around him even as the rest of her trembled.
Part of her was keenly aware that she should not be doing this, not with this boy, not tonight. She thought of invoking their safeword, but everything else in her was titillated by the exact same fact.
And, even after all this time, he remembered what she liked… She felt like she was melting under his touch, and had no strength to protest when he carried her into the room and threw her roughly onto the bed, then yanked her robe to her wrists before twisting it and tying them above her head. The fact that he was still fully clothed while she was now completely exposed under him made her shiver, sending heat surging between her legs. Instinctively, she moved her hips, willing him to touch her. He smiled, reading her wordless request, and acceded.
"I'm sorry I was gone so long," he murmured against her skin. "I needed some time to sort myself out. But I'm back now. Let me make it up to you."