Page 11 of His Plaything

Before he could make it, the door cracked open.

“Seth? I brought–”

“Oh!” Seth stopped dead in his tracks. “S-sorry, I was in the shower.”

Instead of retreating at spotting Seth there in just a towel, Clark stepped further into the room, a frown at the edges of his mouth. “And now you’re dripping wet.” He dropped something on the bed as he closed the distance between them in two long strides while Seth just stood there frozen. “You silly boy, it’s freezing outside. You can’t be walking around like this.”

“Uh, I–”

“Let me,” Clark said, but didn’t pause to wait for Seth to catch up. Clark reached for the loose knot on Seth’s towel and tugged it free. “We must at least do something about this dripping hair.”

Seth’s mouth dropped open, and he felt himself shiver as Clark bared him completely. The guest room was perfectly warm, but his skin prickled. Clark was so close, the scent of his cologne intoxicating…

The soft fabric of the towel settled around Seth’s shoulders as Clark began drying his hair.

“I’ll have to warm you up,” Clark said with a slow smile. His hands worked with the towel, scrunching the dripping ends of Seth’s hair and then smoothing over Seth’s neck where rivulets of water had slithered down. “Did you enjoy your shower?”

His eyes dipped down Seth’s body as though assessing, and Seth felt a wave of heat drop through him. He was standing here naked. Clark could see everything.

“Y-yeah. It was nice.”

“Long showers are a guilty pleasure of mine,” Clark said. The towel traveled down, the soft fibers rubbing over Seth’s shoulders and then to his arms. “There’s nothing as good as a hot shower after a hard day, don’t you think?”

“I-I don’t really–” The towel moved to dry his back, Clark’s arms nearly encircling him. Seth tried to find his voice. “I don’t really t-take long showers usually.”

“Oh?” The towel slid back around to Seth’s front, rubbing slow circles across his chest. “That’s a pity. We’ll have to address that in the future.”

In the future?Seth thought, mind whirling.We?

“Would you like that?” Clark asked softly, leaning down to speak right in the shell of Seth’s ear. “Getting hot and wet, just for me?”

Seth opened his mouth, but no sound could escape amid the mix of sensations. The soft towel, Clark’s cologne, hisvoice,and Clark’s hands almost on him–Seth was frozen there, under Clark’s touch, trapped and wanting more.

There was a low chuckle as the towel slipped away entirely, one of Clark’s thumbs coming to rest on the curve of Seth’s hipbone. “But it looks like you already are, aren’t you, sweetheart?”

There was no use denying it. Clark could see all of him, and the toweling had done a lot as far as warming him up.

“Sorry,” he said, uncertainly.

The thumb made a slow circle against his skin, and Seth’s whole body felt like it tuned into that single touch.

“You don’t have to apologize for the way your body reacts. I like making you feel good. I’d like to continue to.” Clark was still so near, his breath tickling Seth’s ear. “Would you like that?”

This time the question was heavy with promise. It made his heart pound. Seth’s head turned unconsciously toward the man, seeking something that he could hold onto, something more solid than this freefall feeling in his chest.

Clark pulled back just enough to look him in the eye. He was so handsome with those laugh lines creasing the corners of his eyes, the edges of his lips tilted up into such a fond smile. There was a softness in that gaze when their eyes met that made Seth breathless.

And then Clark looked down, a blink-and-you-miss-it moment. A glance at his mouth.

“Seth?”

His name, velvet on the man’s tongue. A request before it went any further.

Seth licked his lips. “Yessir. I–I want that.”

Then Clark’s hand was cupping his chin and tilting his mouth up. Their lips came together tentative at first, Clark holding him so gently it sent spirals of heat through Seth. This wasn’t like the time in the kitchen, hidden away in the dark where there was just enough ambiguity that Seth could write it off.

He was standing here naked in the morning light, and Clark was kissing him.Kissing him.

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