The King - S.R. Jones Page 0,90
muscles, and pale skin, with deep brown eyes and jet-black hair. Or, at least, it looked that way in the dark light of the bar where we met.
I don’t count him amongst the men I slept with because we didn’t have intercourse, but we did everything else. He treated my body like it was one of his works of art. I came four times, and he came three. I wanted to see him again, but he never called. It made me worry that one of the reasons I find sex with someone else so underwhelming is me. Not them, but me.
Maybe I can’t connect? Open myself up to it fully. Or, maybe, I’m just technically crap at it. Is there such a thing as being technically bad at sex? I like it, I always start off enthusiastically, and I try to take control of my own pleasure, but somehow, along the way, it always ends up being a disappointment.
If the same thing happens with Konstantin, I’ll probably give up on sex altogether and join a nunnery. We have such a spark, a strange, elemental connection that it makes me believe, hope, that we can work together that way.
Some attractions are a slow burn. You notice the person has a nice smile, and then you add that to the cute way they ruffle their hair, or how hot they look when they roll up their sleeves. They grow on you. Other people hit you with the force of a truck. They stop you in your tracks and change everything with one glance of inky lashed, dark blue eyes.
Sometimes, that attraction, that stop-the-clocks moment, is a one-way street. You notice them, you fall in insta-lust and they go on their merry way, blind to your existence. Occasionally, though, every now and again, something magical happens, and the person who stops you in your tracks feels the same blinding moment of attraction.
At its deepest level, I do believe, with Konstantin and myself, it went beyond our outer appearance and was based in a moment of soul-deep recognition. I recognized something in him, and he saw that same thing in me.
We’ve been dancing around it ever since.
I’m sick of dancing; I want to play. Properly.
Not sure if I’m about to do something horrifyingly stupid, I slip out of bed and open the bedroom door. I’m halfway down the hall, when one of the doors to a guest bedroom opens, spilling light into the darkness.
Andrius is standing there, a shadowy figure with ghostly eyes.
“If you’re going where I think you’re going, a word of advice.”
I swallow, but say nothing.
“Men like him, and me, we like the chase.”
I frown. “Are you saying, don’t make the first move?” I whisper.
He grins. “No. You can make the first move and still have him chasing after you. I’m married with a kid, and my wife still has me chasing her.”
“How?”
He pauses for a moment, considering. “Because I know for a fucking fact that, unlike so many who came before her, she won’t take my shit. Any shit. She loves me, fiercely. She’s a warrior underneath it all, which is only right because I am, and a warrior can’t have a mouse for a wife. She would die for me, the way I would for her, but if I fucked her over?” He grins wide, his smile so gorgeous for a moment I forget my infatuation with Konstantin. “She would cut off my balls, and then she’d leave me, and nothing would bring her back. That’s how she makes me still chase her. She’s … she’s the only person in this world who has ever had any control over me, any say in what I do. She makes me better.”
With those words, he pushes past me and heads to the bathroom.
Well, that was a useful talk. How am I supposed to control someone as wild and powerful as Konstantin? You might as well try to control the wind. I bet Andrius’ wife is some Amazonian glamazon, who can lift her own body weight, and outruns him on the regular or something. I expect she looks like a Victoria’s Secret angel and carries a gun, while being skilled in arm-to-arm combat like some female James Bond. Me, I’m just … me. Failed hacker, ex-IT consultant, and half decent barista. How can someone so ordinary bring a man like Konstantin to his knees?
I can’t.
Seducing him, though, is a different matter. Maybe, I can seduce him. While I’m stuck in this house, maybe