Chapter 43: Under the rain
"Rhys..." Eun-woo whispered.
Rhys didn’t respond, just leaned in again. Their lips met slowly, with a fire that twisted his insides and scorched Eun-woo to the core. Rhys ran his tongue across his lips, seeking gentle entry, and Eun-woo, trembling, opened his mouth to let him in.
His hands moved up almost instinctively, gripping Rhys’s shoulders, pulling him closer, pressing their bodies together in a desperate attempt to feel warmth.
Rhys kissed him as if Eun-woo were the air he needed to keep breathing. Desperate, rough, hungry. He held onto him with an almost painful strength, as if letting go for a second would mean losing him forever.
And Eun-woo, paralyzed by the mix of emotions coursing through him, let him. He let Rhys kiss him until he was breathless, until his body trembled not from desire, but from sheer exhaustion, only opening his mouth to breathe when it became impossible to keep holding it back.
Eun-woo wanted to speak, to stop him, but his voice was muffled between each kiss. Rhys’s weight on top of him kept him pinned to the ground, trapped, his mind clouded and his heart racing.
He felt Rhys’s fingers slide around his waist, clumsy and desperate, until they clutched at his clothes. Rhys tugged at them roughly, ripping off buttons and fabric as if he couldn’t bear the distance between their skin.
Eun-woo gasped, not out of desire, but out of fear.
They were soaked. The rainwater continued to fall persistently, soaking them to the bone. Their clothes weighed against their bodies, clinging like a second skin. The ground beneath them was uneven, covered in slippery stones and mud, with small puddles forming between the roots and cracks in the riverbank.
Every time he moved, Eun-woo felt the rocks sink under his weight and heard the river water roaring near his ear.
"Wait..." he tried to say, but his voice was drowned out as Rhys kissed him again, again and again, leaving him no space to speak, no time to think.