Until the World Stops - L.A. Witt Page 0,74

kick him while he was already down. He wasn’t forcing me, and from his hesitation, he was clearly concerned with whether I really was into this.

I’d fooled around with plenty of guys I wasn’t into, and they either hadn’t known or hadn’t cared. Everyone got off and it was all good. So I just needed to channel that tonight. Go into this like I would a Tinder hookup who didn’t excite me on a night when I didn’t feel like getting laid. Close my eyes, think about someone else, get us both off. Not ideal, but I’d get an orgasm out of it and things wouldn’t be awkward with Casey. He’d get what he needed after that phone call had rocked his world. If this really wasn’t going to work for me, I could wait to throw that at him until things weren’t so fraught.

His shirt came off. Then he started on my belt. I unbuckled his. In no time, we were naked and sinking together on his bed, his hands and mouth frantic and needy while I used mine to make sure he knew—that we both knew—that I was into this tonight.

But there was only so much I could fake it, especially when his hips settled between my thighs and his cock rubbed against me. He was fully hard and ready for action. Me? Not so much.

And he knew it, too—he lifted his hips a little and reached between us, moaning into a kiss as he started stroking me, probably to help me along. We’d both done it a time or two for each other, especially if we were fooling around in the middle of the night and our bodies were still waking up.

Mine wasn’t going to wake up this time. I’d thought I could talk myself into going through with this, but those insidious worries about whether I could say no had wedged themselves into my brain, and this time they wouldn’t move, and my body wasn’t having it.

Fuck. What was I doing? This wasn’t just some guy who hadn’t been entirely honest on his profile and didn’t turn me on like I’d hoped. Closing my eyes and thinking about someone who turned me on didn’t work because goddammit, my mind kept going to the only man I’d been able to think about lately—the one who was naked in bed with me.

I wanted him. I wanted to throw myself into this completely—not just physically, but all the way.

But this was just sex for him. Tonight, it was a way to cope with the news about his mom. Every other time we fucked, it was a way to get through the pandemic and feel like things were normal until he could go back to swiping right on men he wasn’t shackled to for the foreseeable future.

Casey wanted me and the orgasms I could give him, but he didn’t want me. And I…

Casey’s hand slowed. Then stopped.

He pulled back and met my eyes. “You sure you’re okay? You’ve… I mean, since we came upstairs, you’ve seemed a little…”

“What? I…” But the jig was up. He saw right through me and his goddamned hand was right on the evidence of how into this I wasn’t, and I couldn’t keep pretending everything was fine. “I’m sorry.” My shoulders sagged under the weight of that admission. Sinking back onto the pillow, I whispered, “I can’t do this.”

“What? Why not?” He didn’t sound put out or pissed off. Worried, actually, which didn’t help my resolve at all. Lifting himself off me, he asked, “What’s wrong?”

I couldn’t look at him. “I’m sorry. I know you need this right now, and—”

“Fuck what I need,” he said softly, settling beside me with a few inches between us. “I don’t want this if you don’t. What’s up?”

Up. Nice choice of words.

But I didn’t point that out. Shaking my head, I whispered, “I just don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Oh.”

“Not just now. I mean…at all.”

Casey stiffened. “What? But it was your idea. In the beginning, I mean.”

“I know.” But that was before—I cleared my throat. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea to keep doing it.”

He held my gaze. God, he still looked so raw from earlier, like he was ready to break all over again. What was I supposed to do?

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I just… I don’t feel like I have a choice.”

He blinked, and his eyes got huge. “You what?”

I dropped my gaze because I couldn’t handle holding his anymore. “You’ve got all the