Chapter 306 - Dangerous *

Chapter 306: Chapter 306 - Dangerous *

Xing Yu crossed the short distance between them without hurry. His cold steel grey eyes watching him like a prey.

That was the worst part. Jian had already braced himself for being grabbed, for the answering force he’d been demanding since the dining hall. Instead, Xing Yu stopped in front of him and looked down at him with an expression that made Jian’s stomach drop straight through the floor.

"Dangerous for who?" he repeated, soft.

Jian opened his mouth to say something clever.

Xing Yu’s hand came up and cupped his jaw, thumb dragging along his cheekbone, and the clever thing died in his throat.

"You," Xing Yu said.

He kissed him.

Not like the careful kisses Xing Yu had been rationing out for months, the ones that ended too soon with a polite half-step backward.

This one landed with the full weight of a man who had spent five years holding himself back.

His mouth opened over Jian’s, unhurried and thorough, tongue sliding in like he intended to taste every corner of him, and Jian made a small startled noise against his lips before his hands found Xing Yu’s shoulders and grabbed on hard.

When Xing Yu finally pulled back, Jian was already breathing wrong.

"That," Xing Yu murmured, "is dangerous."

"That’s nothing."

"No." His thumb dragged across Jian’s lower lip, pressing, parting it, sliding in just far enough to graze his teeth. "That is the beginning."

Then he walked him backward until his shoulder blades hit the wall beside the door.

The kiss that followed was hungrier. Xing Yu kissed like he was reading him, corner to corner, taking his time in a way that made Jian’s knees go unreliable. Jian’s fingers twisted into the front of his robes and pulled, and Xing Yu let himself be pulled, one thigh sliding between Jian’s legs so casually that Jian actually gasped against his mouth.

Xing Yu swallowed the sound and did it again.

"You’ve been thinking about this," he said.

"Obviously I’ve been thinking about this—"

"For how long."

"Since the first day you came back, you absolute—"

Xing Yu kissed him quiet, and Jian stopped bothering to finish the sentence.

The robes were the problem. They always were. Gia’s fashion was beautiful and layered and utterly hostile to what Jian wanted right now. He fumbled at the sash around Xing Yu’s waist and got it loose on the third try, and Xing Yu caught both his wrists in one hand.

"Slowly."

"No."

"Slowly," he repeated, and then showed him what he meant by peeling Jian’s outer robe off one shoulder and pressing his open mouth to the skin beneath.

Jian’s head fell back against the wall.

Xing Yu worked his way along his collarbone. Then lower. Each kiss landed with a slow, deliberate heat, and between them he dragged his teeth, just barely, just enough to leave a wet line of sensation that made Jian’s hands curl uselessly at his sides.

His robe slid loose and pooled at his elbows. Then it was on the floor. Then the next layer followed, Xing Yu’s fingers patient and precise at every tie, until the cool air touched Jian’s bare chest and he had to bite his lip to keep quiet.

Xing Yu leaned back to look at him.

Jian had never been looked at like that. Not once, in his whole life. Not like he was something worth a five-year wait.

"Stop staring," he muttered, ears burning.

"No."

His palms came down flat on Jian’s waist and slid up, over the ribs, across the chest, thumbs dragging over his nipples on the way past.

Jian twitched.

Xing Yu noticed, of course. He noticed everything. He did it again, slower, and watched Jian’s face the entire time.

"Oh," Jian breathed.

"Sensitive."

"Shut up—"

Xing Yu bent his head and took one into his mouth. ℯℯ𝑙.

Jian’s spine arched clean off the wall. His hands flew into Xing Yu’s hair and held on, and Xing Yu made a low sound of approval against his skin that Jian felt all the way down to his toes. His tongue was warm and relentless — flicking, sucking, then closing his teeth around it with just enough pressure to make Jian whine — while his hand rolled the other side between his fingers, matching the rhythm, pinching softly, until Jian was making noises he’d deny in the morning.

"Xing Yu—"

The man hummed in answer, mouth still full.

Jian looked down at the top of his dark head and felt something in his chest turn over.

Five years. Five years of this man standing one respectful step too far away.

"Get up here," Jian rasped. "I want your mouth on mine while you do the rest."

Xing Yu lifted his head. His lips were wet and slightly swollen. His eyes had gone black.

"The rest," he echoed.

"The rest," Jian said, and reached for the ties of his own trousers.

He got them open himself, impatient, shoving the fabric down and kicking it away — and then stood there under the low green light of the guest room, completely bare, while a Farian general looked at him like he was a meal.

Xing Yu swallowed.

"Jian."

"Yeah?"

"Turn around."

Jian’s pulse kicked. He turned, palms flat against the wall, and heard Xing Yu move behind him — the soft whisper of fabric as he finally stripped, the quiet inhale when he stepped close enough that bare chest met bare back.

He was warm. He was *everywhere*. His hips fitted against Jian’s and Jian could feel the shape of him pressed into the small of his back, thick and hard and not remotely casual about it, and had to bite the inside of his cheek.

Xing Yu’s hands found his waist. Then they slid lower.

"Tell me," he murmured against Jian’s ear, "if you want me to stop."

"I will absolutely not be doing that."

Xing Yu laughed, low and warm, and one palm curved over the swell of his ass.

Jian’s forehead dropped against the wall.