Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood

            Then something occurs to me: I came. He didn’t. I think of that moment of tense desperation just before, the fear of being stuck on the verge of pleasure, and I wonder if that’s where Jack is at now. If that’s how he feels, pulled too tight, too big for his skin.

            “I want to have sex,” I tell him for the millionth time, and it’s true. I do. I want to see Jack come, for a whole host of reasons that have little to do with him. I’m utterly, purely selfish.

            “Against tonight’s rules,” he mutters into my shoulder.

            “So you’re just going to stop?” I shift my thigh, and it’s still there. His erect cock.

            “I’m fine with—”

            “Honesty,” I cut in. We’re both starting to wield the word like a weapon. “What do you want now? Putting aside your ‘rules.’ ” I roll my eyes at the last word, which seems to amuse him. My stomach blooms with heat—a physical reaction to his dimple.

            “I don’t have to—”

            “Honesty.”

            “Okay.” He exhales and stares down at my body. Considers the possibilities. “I want to come on your stomach.”

            “Oh.” I expected . . . I don’t know what. Not this. “Is it a . . . kink you have?”

            He shakes his head. “Not usually, no. But . . .” He looks past my eyes, uncharacteristically bashful.

            “Honesty?” I request.

            “I never thought of myself as the possessive type. But . . . you were someone else’s for a long time. It drove me a bit crazy in my lizard brain.”

            I nod, thinking of my own vague jealousy. “I think you should, then.”

            He swallows. “Yeah?”

            “Yeah.” I bite back a smile. “Make sure your clothes stay on. Rules and all.”

            He gives me a dirty look. For a second I’m giggling on the high of teasing him, then there’s his belt clinking undone, the catch of a zipper, brushes of fabric as he takes himself out, and the smile dies on my lips.

            I am looking, and he isn’t. He doesn’t watch for my reaction. Just takes himself in hand, pumping up and down. His cock is hard, long and thick in a way I didn’t think possible. I glance at the way he’s stroking himself, then away to the couch, then at him again, and ask, “Doesn’t it . . . get in the way?”

            It’s a mortifying question, and I want to air-fry myself out of this plane of existence the second it’s out of my mouth, but Jack’s not listening. His eyes move rapidly all over my body, like I haven’t been almost naked in front of him for the past ten minutes. “You really are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” he murmurs.

            “You said you don’t care. That you barely notice. That there are lots of beautiful women.”

            “I don’t know.” He’s usually so confident, but right now he sounds as disoriented as I feel. “With you, I notice.” He nips wet kisses down my jaw. “You think you can come again?”

            Impossible to tell. I haven’t come with another person before, and an improvement rate of 200 percent seems steep, but maybe? I’d rather be present for this, though. Study him. Know what Jack looks like when he’s not fully in control. “I think I don’t want to.”

            He nods, and what happens next is not really for me. He steps between my thighs and angles the underside of his cock so that it hits my clit. It has us both gasping, but it’s about what he wants. As is the way he slots the head against my opening, and the long moment he leaves it there, grunting, a turning point in the multiverse, where two futures exist: one in which he pushes in and fucks me, the other in which he follows those inflexible rules of his.

            Unfortunately, Jack Smith-Turner is a stickler.

            It occurs to me that I could be doing this for him. I could be more than just a warm body and slender arms looped around his neck. “Should I—”

            “Not tonight.” His movements are picking up, knuckles brushing rhythmically against my slit. “I just want to look at you. Know you’re here.” He uses my slick to make himself wet, hard, fast pulls, and after just a handful of seconds I see the tension in his arms, the muted tremors in his fingers, how close he already is. “Shit, Elsie.” His voice is urgent. A little desperate. His forehead presses against mine. “There were days, these last few months, when you were all I could think about. Even if I didn’t really want to.” Then a choked “Fuck” that feels like a rush of breath against my lips, and I know he’s there.