Page 22 of Merrick

“Yes.”

“Then, yes,” he agreed. “You can call me Sir.”

“And what will you call me?” Merrick asked, tucking his chin against his chest. “Sir.”

Wilder pressed their mouths together again, a soft kiss against the corner of Merrick’s mouth.

“I think I’ll call you mine.”

CHAPTER 9

Merrick

They madeout on the couch for an hour before Wilder tapped him against the outside of the thigh and untangled their bodies.

“Time for bed,” Wilder said. “Are you staying the night?”

“Can I?” Merrick was painfully hard, desperate and leaking and overwhelmed. Nerves threatened when Wilder took him by the hand and walked him down the short hallway into the bedroom.

“Strip. Under the covers,” Wilder told him before disappearing from the room.

Merrick did what he was told, brain moving on autopilot in a way that only ever happened when he got into the flow of his art. It could have been painting or tattooing, but there was always a time when his brain went into a state of performance where he didn’t even need to think to know what would happen next. Merrick could see the finished piece in his mind like it was real, and his brain kicked into control to make it happen. Wilder giving him orders activated the same parts of his brain, and everything else went quiet. There was no guesswork involved, no worrying about if he was doing well enough or doing the rightthings. Wilder told him what to do and he did it, and there was a simplicity in that Merrick didn’t even know he’d been missing.

He stripped out of his clothes and folded them, setting them on the edge of the dresser before climbing into bed and pulling the blanket up to his waist. He didn’t know if Wilder had a preferred side of the bed, though only one of the nightstands had things on it. Merrick made the opposite side of the bed, the one with the empty nightstand, his.

Wilder returned and looked quickly from Merrick’s clothes on the dresser to Merrick himself in bed.

“Where’s your phone?” Wilder asked, holding up an extra charger.

“My jeans. Front right pocket.”

Wilder pulled Merrick’s phone out of his pants and padded around to Merrick’s side of the bed. He reached around behind the nightstand and plugged the charger into the wall, then plugged Merrick’s phone into the charger. He set it face down, then walked around to his side of the bed and joined Merrick under the covers. Wilder turned off the bedside lamp, plunging the both of them into darkness.

Merrick blinked, waiting for his eyes to acclimate to the shadows. He rolled onto his side, and Wilder did the same. He couldn’t see much still but knew they were face to face. Slowly, Wilder’s features came into focus, the curve of his lips, the sharp angle of his nose.

“I’m not going to fuck you tonight,” Wilder said, almost a whisper but still assertive. “Not going to fuck you in the morning either.”

Disappointment surged through Merrick’s whole body, and it must have been as visible as a searchlight on his face because Wilder tutted his tongue against the roof of his mouth, brushing his fingers across Merrick’s mouth until his frown relaxed.

“We had a big conversation and there’s a lot of information between us now. If you still feel sure about all of this in the morning as you do right now…ifIstill feel sure about all of this in the morning, we’ll go from there.”

Merrick hated how reasonable that sounded. He’d come over to Wilder’s house thinking it was going to be an all-night fuck fest, and the reality couldn’t have been further from that. Wilder wasn’t telling him no. He was telling him not now and there was a level-headed kind of reasoning in there that Merrick had to appreciate, even if he was horny to the point of distraction. He shifted his weight, rubbing his thighs together before rolling onto his back and covering his eyes with his forearm.

“Do you hate that?” Wilder asked, also turning onto his back.

“I’m so hard I can’t think straight,” Merrick admitted. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to fall asleep.”

Wilder pushed down the sheets—and his pajamas—revealing the same problem.

“Please let me suck you,” Merrick whispered. He could see it clear as day. He would notch himself between Wilder’s legs, suck that thick cock into his mouth, and he would suck until Wilder screamed out his name. He would touch himself, tightening his hold on his own dick every time Wilder groaned or whimpered, and he could come all over his hand and then, andthenthe two of them would fall asleep.

“Not tonight.”

Wilder was steadfast and as much as Merrick hated that, he loved it a little too. It meant Wilder was a man of his word, a man he could…depend on…if he wanted to. Fuck, that was heavy.

“You’re hard too,” Merrick almost whined.

Wilder pulled his pajamas back into place and tugged the sheets up to the middle of both of their chests.