Chapter 177

Aiden

The moment his mouth met mine, the world steadied—like I’d been bracing against an impact that finally arrived, and instead of shattering, I just… let go.

“Baby boy,” I breathed against his lips, the nickname slipping out raw and reverent. He made a soft sound, something close to a sob, and his fingers curled into the back of my neck like he needed proof I was real.

“I thought you left,” he whispered when I paused for air. His voice was unsteady, ragged around the edges. “I thought you were gone from my life.”

“Not a chance,” I said. It came out rougher than I intended, scraped straight from my chest. I kissed him again—slower this time, deeper, like I could pour the entire apology into the warmth of his mouth. He kissed back with the same urgency I felt—too long denied, too much unsaid.

His hands slid beneath my shirt. Tentative, searching, and burning, all at once.

The brush of his fingertips against my skin pulled a low sound from me—one I didn’t even know I was holding back. He felt it. I felt him feel it. Something in the air changed.

I pulled him with me as I sat back on the small couch, and he followed. The shape of him in my arms was familiar in a way that hit like impact—bone-deep recognition, like breathing after drowning.

“Noah…” I murmured, though I wasn’t sure if it was a warning or a plea.

He didn’t answer with words.

He kissed me harder, fingers curling in my shirt, like he was afraid that if he loosened his grip, this would all dissolve back into silence and distance again.

So I held him just as tightly for a long time. Just breathing each other… before we slowly began to undress, one piece of clothing at a time.

I stood, lifting him without thinking, his legs locking around my waist like it was instinct. We didn’t stop kissing—not even when I walked us across the room, not even when we brushed the bedroom doorway and he pulled back just enough to look at me.

His cheeks were flushed.

His lips were swollen.

His eyes were wide and open and burning.

“Aiden.”

Just my name.

Soft. Certain. Enough.

I kissed him again—slow, deep, and reverent. He melted, hands threading into my hair, his breath catching in that way that always unraveled me. I lowered him onto the bed, the sheets gathering around his body, his scent pulling me down more than gravity ever could.

He drew me closer, mouths meeting again—this time unhurried, deliberate, nothing rushed, and everything desperate anyway. His hands slid along my back, my fingers tracing the line of his jaw, both of us breathing hard, like we were relearning how to exist in one another’s orbit.

I rested my forehead against his. Our breaths tangled, and the world stilled.

“I’m here,” I whispered into the space between us.

His eyes softened—then flared with something achingly familiar.

Something I knew.

Something that had always been ours.

There was no distance left.

No hesitation left.

No doubt left.

I took a second to look at his beautiful body under mine, as my hands travelled along his skin, memorizing every inch, every curve, every muscle, claiming him. Taking in his scent, the heat of his body against mine, the way he trembled beneath me—all those things that made moving apart unthinkable.

My lips journeyed from his neck to his chest, then descended over his smooth abdomen, fingers tracing the path of his happy trail until I reached his groin. Noah's gasp, so primal and intense, sent a surge through me when I fisted his cock, stroking it deliberately, spreading his pre-cum across the swollen head. He arched up to meet my rhythm, entirely at my command. I dipped my head, pressing my tongue flat against his balls, circling them before drawing each into my mouth.

As I licked the base of his shaft, I maintained eye contact. His gaze was heavy-lidded, lips parted, chest rising with each shaky breath. He was a vision.

I was always the type who expected others to pleasure me, not the reverse. But since the first taste, I’ve yearned for the feel of his smooth shaft on my tongue, the sharp, masculine scent filling my lungs, the way his hands gripped my hair, directing my pace as he thrust into my mouth... Every part of him was a feast for my senses. His pre-cum, sweet and salty, coated my tongue as I sucked his head, relishing every moment.

Noah trembled with a cry, and the sound made me grin against his cock. He started to thrust deeper into my throat, my vision blurring from the intensity, and fuck—I was lost in it. Every moan, every whimper, every desperate thrust had me aching and on the brink.

Time to take him deeper.

I released him from my mouth, smirking as uncertainty flashed in his eyes. “I don’t want you to finish yet,” I whispered. “Turn around. On your hands and knees.”

He complied instantly. I seized his hips, forcing his thighs apart with my knee, and leaned over him, my voice a low rumble in his ear. “Relax. I’m not taking you yet, Noah.”

He slumped with a sigh. “You’re not?”

My hand closed around his cock again, stroking slowly as I pressed my length against the crease of his ass. “I want to work you some more, baby boy… Until you’re trembling with need.”

If he had resisted, pleaded, begged—I would have crumbled. I had no control where he was concerned. So instead, I diverted us both by spreading his ass cheeks and tracing my tongue down between them, lingering over his tight entrance.

Noah jerked, moaning, “Oh, God, Aiden, I’m already trembling…”

His body quaked beneath me, gripping the sheets as if they could save him. I devoured him nonetheless, licking and sucking until I was breathless, drowning in his flavor. Teasing Noah was a drug, each moan a hit I couldn’t deny. His hands were on every boundary, tearing down my walls, clawing into my soul—if I even had one.

I was starting to yearn for him like the worst addiction. Obsession. Possession. Enough to let him be my downfall.

“Aiden—please.” His voice broke with need. He bucked against my tongue, my hold, every nerve ending ablaze. “I need… more.”

His cock pulsed in my grasp. I pulled my tongue back, replacing it with a finger, sliding into his tight heat. His muscles clenched around me, spasming, and I groaned. A second finger, then a third—he flinched with a cry, then pushed back, moaning through the stretch until he was frenzied, panting, riding my hand.

“Fuuuck—” he cried out, voice cracking.

Jesus Christ. My cock throbbed painfully against my stomach at the sight of his hole engulfing me to the knuckles, eagerly pulling my fingers deeper. I was drooling, overwhelmed by the urge to plunge into him, to claim him entirely.

We hadn’t talked about what came next. Not yet. Understanding the stakes, what he had accomplished tonight, and risking it all was like tearing down the last barrier—the one we might never recover from.

That’s why, when Noah turned to me, his eyes wide and imploring, his voice a raw whisper of need, my world crumbled.

“Please, Aiden,” he begged. “I need you to fuck me. Now.”

Goddamn it. His plea wasn’t just desire—it was surrender. Something in the way he looked at me changed.

Not desire. Not urgency.

Something older. Deeper. Final.

His hands were still in my hair, our breaths tangled, our bodies flush and aching, but the air between us had shifted—as if we’d reached the edge of something irreversible. And maybe I should have been afraid. Maybe I should have stopped. Maybe I should have thought about the contracts, the cameras, the school, William, the goddamn world.

But all I could think was:

If we cross this line tonight, there is no line left.

No more hiding.

No pretending we can walk away.

No doorway back into our old lives.

We would be choosing each other—against everything.

And I loved him too much to let him choose blindly.

Turning him around on his back, I cupped his jaw, my thumb brushing the dampness beneath his eye. He didn’t look away. He didn’t flinch. He just breathed, steady and trusting, like he already knew what I was going to say.

“Noah,” I murmured, my voice rough, “before we go any further… I need you to understand something. If we do this tonight—after everything—there won’t be another goodbye. Not from me. Not ever.”

His lips parted. His pulse fluttered fast against my fingertips.

“I know,” he whispered.

But I shook my head.

“Not just know. I need you to choose it. Because once we step into this—into us—despite everything… William’s blackmail, your father’s threats, every risk that still waits for us… there is no slipping back into who we were before. After tonight, I may need to sign confession papers, resignation letters. You may still sign William’s contracts—marriage contracts, whatever cages he thinks he can hold you with. Whatever we lose. Whatever we fight. Tonight, we are making our commitment. Our own vow. Private. Sacred. Untouchable. And once we make it… it will not break. Do you understand?”

His eyes filled. Really filled.

Not from sadness. From certainty.

And then he nodded. Once.

Slow. Trembling. Unbreakable.

He leaned in, their foreheads touching, his breath warm against my mouth as he spoke—quiet, but with a clarity that rang through my bones.

“I, Noah,” he whispered, “right here, tonight, give you my heart.”

His fingers slid to my chest, pressing over the place his name already lived.

“Even if everything else gets stripped from me—my name, my career, my future—this stays yours. I stay yours. Now and always.”

My breath left me all at once as tears ran down my face.

I lifted his hand, pressing my mouth to his palm, slow and reverent, like it was an altar.

Then I gave him mine.

“And I, Aiden,” I said, voice unsteady, “give you mine. All of it. The parts you already hold. The parts I’ve never let anyone see.”

His breath hitched. His eyes closed.

“I’m yours, Noah. If the world burns for it, let it burn. I’ll walk through every fire at your side.”

He didn’t speak.

He didn’t need to.

He simply pulled me back into him—mouth to mine, kiss deep and shaking and absolute.

And with that kiss—

We were no longer falling.

We were choosing the fall.