What Comes Before

[Raffe]

Raffe was ridiculously heated by the time Kallisti’s grand building came into view. He’d poked light fun at Nox’s impatience, but Nox spent the entire journey stoking the flame until it burned bright in them both. This morning he’d been hard pressed not to crawl right into Nox’s lap, warm with sleep and affection and a desire for connection that superseded all their worries at the time. But he’d been cognisant of the way the darkness crossed wires in Nox’s head, and so had packaged all those feelings and needs up in order to do the right thing.

“Close enough,” he laughed as Nox pulled him close, and promptly found the other man’s mouth with his own right there in the alleyway. Warmth shivered his skin as his hands slipped under Nox’s shirt, unapologetic for the self-same impatience he so loved to tease. He let himself sweep away, as overwhelmed as by the kiss in the hospital, when he’d first realised how much he was in over his head. A smile touched his lips for the memory, and all those memories since, and he fumbled for the code to the employee’s door, pulled Nox into the shadowed corridor and onwards into the club.

He doubted any of the girls would mind the brief spectacle as they passed through to the stairs. Not that he was thinking right then, consumed with the rush of his heart, the beating of blood, of touch and taste and need.

Until a voice pierced, unwelcome.

“Fucking hell boys, take a moment for air?”

Oriena sat at one of the tables, feet propped up upon it. An expensive bottle of vodka rested alongside, its accompanying crystal glass in hand, ice clinking as she slowly swirled the liquid. Loose hair rested around her shoulders like shadows. She looked bored, but for the sharp smile that presently twitched her lips, like a shark scenting blood.