Page 27 of Crawl for Me

“Yes, you do.” My voice stays low and steady. “If we’re going to do this—whatever this is—I need to know. What do you want?”

His chest stutters. “I… I just want to please you.” The words tumble out in a rush. “That’s it. That’s all I want. I don’t care if it’s once, or a hundred times, or if it never goes anywhere beyond this—I… I want to make you feel good.”

Oh.

Well. That’s… interesting.

The silence that follows isn’t empty—it thrums. I sip my wine, slow, letting the taste sit on my tongue while I watch him squirm.

Of course. Of course that’s what he wants. It’s written all over him every time he fumbles, every time he blurts out a half-stammered sentence, every time he looks at me like he’s starving. But hearing it out loud, stripped bare like that—no excuses, no polish…

It’s not sweet. It’s not romantic. It’s need. Pure, unfiltered need.

And Christ, it lands. Low in my stomach, hot in my blood, curling around my ribs, flooding between my thighs.

My thumb drags idly along the stem of my glass, eyes fixed on his flushed face, the uneven breaths puffing out of him in shallow draws.

His voice cracks softer, spilling in pieces. “You wouldn’t even have to do anything in return. I mean, I’d want you to, God, I’d want you to, but if all you ever did was just… let me—” His words fracture, his face flushing deep. “It’s enough. That’s enough for me.”

Oh, well that’s really fucking interesting.

Breathe, Sable.

He’d take nothing from me—nothing but the permission to give. No demands, no balance sheet, no scorekeeping. Just that raw, reckless eagerness to put his hands on me, to unravel me, and call it enough.

My pulse spikes, heat dragging low, thick and heavy until I have to squeeze my thighs together to keep still.

The stem of my glass wobbles between my fingers, slick with sweat. I tip it higher, letting the wine burn my throat, because if I don’t—if I let myself linger on his words any longer in this moment—I’m going to drag him down right here and ride him until that desperate little mouth forgets how to form apologies.

And—fuck, the way he’s looking at me—like I’m holy, like I’m lethal, like I’m both—it makes my skin prickle with the need to test him. To see how far that hunger really goes.

“Say something,” he blurts suddenly, voice breaking. “Please.”

I cough, and shake my head once, trying to clear the static sparking in my chest. He’s still staring. Wide-eyed. Jittering with nerves but refusing to look away.

“That’s all you want?” My voice is steady, though my breath isn’t. “Nothing in return?”

He nods again. “Yes.”

I should stop there. I should. But the wicked part of me—the part that can’t resist prodding the edges of this thing until it splits—leans in closer, glass dangling loose between my fingers.

“So if I told you to drop to your knees right now,” I murmur, “you’d do it. You’d call that enough?”

A violent, pink flush floods his neck. “Y-yes.”

My stomach flips, and suddenly I can’t breathe right. Fuck. I’m breathless from nothing more than the sheer weight of his desperation.

I force myself back against the couch, glass rattling faintly as I set it down before my grip betrays me. “Then we need rules,” I say, steady enough that it almost sounds like I’m not two seconds from combusting. “Precautions.”

“Anything. Just—anything. Whatever you want,” he stutters out before he tips the rest of his wine back in one heavy swallow.

I lean across the table, snag the bottle, refill both glasses, and take another swallow from mine to keep the edge off. “The office is off-limits,” I say, meeting his eyes over the rim. “No touching. No brushing my hair out of my face in the break room. No staring at me like you’re starving in front of Marla. You so much as breathe wrong in the bullpen, and I’ll shut this down.”

He nods fast. “Yes. Of course. I can do that.”

“Good.” I tip my glass, wetting my lips before the next strike. “Rule two. If you want something, you say it. Out loud. No games, no swallowing it down until you choke. No guesswork.”

“Okay.” He nods. “I can do that. I will.”