Textual Confusion, page 42
A hand on his mouth stopped Asher before he could really start laying into Markus (again) about all the expensive gifts he’d gotten him. “Sweetheart, you’re rambling.”
Asher flushed. “Sorry,” he mumbled when the man released his mouth.
“It’s fine,” Markus assured. “I like listening to you talk… at least, when you’re not trying to tell me I can’t spoil my own boyfriend at Christmastime – or any other time for that matter.”
Asher’s flush deepened.
“Now, hold out your hands,” Markus commanded.
Asher huffed, but he did as he was told.
“Close your eyes.”
Asher obeyed, feeling something small and rectangular placed in his palms. He wondered what it could be.
“Now open.”
As soon as he opened his eyes, Asher’s gaze immediately went to examine what the man had put in his hands. His eyes widened at what looked suspiciously like a jewelry box. Surely this wasn’t…
“This isn’t…” Asher started before trailing off, tittering nervously… “I mean, it’s not, right?”
Markus raised a pair of unimpressed eyebrows. “You think when I ask you to marry me, that I’m going to settle for something as uninspired as this?”
Asher stared helplessly at Markus in response, forcing himself to ignore the man’s wording – he'd said when he asked Asher to may him, not if.
Markus sighed. “No, baby,” he clarified. “You can relax. There’s no ring inside that box. But, for the record, if I thought for even a second that you would agree, I’d have already asked.”
Asher released a strangled-sounding noise similar to what he imagined a dying cat would make on its death bed. “You can’t just say stuff like that, Markus,” he protested.
“I’m a billionaire, baby. I can say whatever I want.”
Asher groaned, the noise filled with half-exasperation/half-affection.
“You want to keep arguing with me like a brat, or are you ready to open your present?” Markus pressed, sounding amused.
Asher pouted, and he was tempted to refuse to open the box out of sheer principle, but curiosity got the better of him, and he carefully uncovered the top. He blinked stupidly down at its contents. “What’s this?” he asked, although he already knew the answer.
“It’s a keycard to my penthouse,” Markus explained. “I want you to move in with me.”
He made it sound so simple. So logical.
Like they had known each other for longer than a handful of months. Like their relationship hadn’t started out as an arrangement – an arrangement based on a lie, at that – before evolving into what it was now.
Asher chewed nervously on the inside of his cheek. “I feel like we’ve had this discussion before…”
“You didn’t take me seriously then,” Markus pointed out, taking Asher by the wrists and forcing him to look at him. “I don’t want any room for misunderstandings this time.”
Asher swallowed around nothing. “I… I don’t know what to say,” he admitted.
“Say yes,” Markus said bluntly. “My closet is half your wardrobe at this point, and you already stay over most nights. Plus, this way you won’t have to stop at the front desk anymore. I know you don’t like Natalie.”
Asher scoffed. “More like she doesn’t like me,” he corrected on autopilot, his brain still stuck on the fact that Markus was genuinely asking him to move in with him. (Although Asher was absolutely correct. Natalie had been downright hostile since finding out their breakup hadn’t stuck. At least, her glare was hostile. She didn’t dare say anything to him when Markus was around.)
Markus refused to be distracted. “Then there’s the fact that my apartment is closer to the café than yours is. You’d get to sleep in an extra half hour every morning if you lived here.”
“You’ve thought about this,” Asher accused.
“Every day since I originally brought it up,” the man freely admitted.
Asher’s face warmed, his stomach swooping with something undeniably pleasant. But still. “I can’t just move out of my apartment, Markus,” he pointed out weakly. “I’m under contract until July-”
“I’ll buy you out,” Markus hastily assured. “Or you can keep the apartment, if that’s what you want,” he immediately retracted upon spotting Asher’s fast-forming scowl. “That’s fine, too. Whatever you want,” he reiterated. “Whatever it takes to be able to come home to you, to hold you in my arms every night, I’ll do it.”
Jesus. Was Markus trying to kill him? Why did the man have to be so fucking sweet? He was making it impossible to say no.
Probably because you don’t want to say no, a voice pointed out.
It was true. Asher was practically burning alive with the desire to say yes. But he couldn’t quite forget what had happened the last time he’d agreed to move in with someone he loved. Someone he’d thought loved him, too.
“I’m scared,” Asher admitted, voice hushed. “The last person I moved in with was Trent, and things didn’t exactly turn out the way I’d hoped…”
Gaze glued to his own lap, Asher didn’t see the way the man’s eyes darkened at the mention of his ex. He did, however, notice when the man abruptly removed himself from the couch and kneeled before him.
“What…?”
Asher stared uncomprehendingly as a man who begged for nothing put himself on his knees before him.
Markus took Asher’s hands into his own. “I can’t promise to never make mistakes when it comes to you,” he said, like it pained him to admit it. “But I can promise to always do everything in my power to keep you safe, to always put your well-being above my own, and to sooner rip my own heart out than ever hurt you on purpose. I love you, Asher. Will you please do me the honor of moving in with me?”
That was all it took for the last of Asher’s defenses to fall.
He nearly knocked Markus over in his rush to throw himself into his arms, their teeth clacking in his haste to slot their mouths together. Regardless, Asher didn’t pull away until he’d nearly turned blue in the face from lack of oxygen.
“Is that a yes?” Markus asked, the gravel in voice causing a pang of desire to shot down Asher’s spine, straight to his dick.
“Sasha’s going to kill me,” he muttered, eyeing Markus’s spit-shiny lips and unconsciously leaning closer, eager to get back to what they were doing moments before.
Unfortunately, Markus’s commanding grip on the back of his neck stopped him from reconnecting their mouths. “Words, baby. I need words,” he ordered in a near growl.
Asher whimpered, forcing his eyes to leave the man’s mouth so he could meet his gaze. His answer was the same as it always was when it came to Markus.
“Yes, Daddy. My answer is yes.”
So… don’t freak out.
Danny
You’ve got to know that saying shit like that will only serve to freak us out.
Sasha
Who do I have to kill?
Danny
See?
Why is it always murder with you?
Sasha
What can I say? I feel very strongly for the people I care about, and I want the people that hurt them to suffer for it.
Regular people call that psychopathy.
Meh. To-may-to, to-mah-to.
So… what’s the problem?
It’s not a problem, per se. You just might not exactly approve…
Danny
Spit it out already, would you? You're giving me secondhand anxiety.
Fine.
Markus asked me to move in with him.
And I said yes.
Oh. Well, in that case, congratulations.
Sasha
That’s great, babe!
Wait.
So… you’re not going to yell at me and call me an idiot and tell me what a horrible idea it is to move in with a man I met three months ago?
Do you want us to yell at you?
No.
I just thought that after everything that happened with Trent…
I thought we agreed not to speak his name.
Danny
This isn’t like with Assface, though.
Sasha
What he said.
Really? A rich, older man asking me to move in with him isn’t like with what happened with You-Know-Who?
Danny
So, it’s a little bit like that.
Sasha
Except the way Big Daddy looks at you is nothing like with Assface at all.
How does he look at me?
Like you hung the moon and stars and hold his entire heart in your hands.
Danny
Like he wants to rip your clothes off and fuck you against the nearest, most convenient surface.
Sasha
Also, a bit like you’re a sword-wielding elfin prince with waist-long ebony hair and eyes that sparkle like jewels, who regularly sneaks away from the palace to feed war orphans. Big Daddy’s the guard that’s been assigned to keep you safe, but you’re constantly putting yourself in danger and giving him mini-heart attacks. And lots and lots of erections.
That was oddly specific.
Danny
She’s been reading that kinky fantasy porn disguised as literature again.
Ah.
Sasha
Point is, I trust Big Daddy to take care of you.
And if he doesn’t, I’ll take care of him.
Again with the death threats.
I’m just saying, I know a guy.
Danny
Are you, by chance, referring to me?
Sasha
Wouldn’t you like to know?
Danny
I think what Sasha is trying to say is that we’re always a phone call away if you need us.
Unless you’re just calling to complain that he bought you a car again. That was fucking nauseating.
Sasha
Wah! Poor me. My hot, billionaire boyfriend cares about me so much he bought me a Mercedes Benz for Christmas.
You see how ridiculous that sounds?
You guys are the worst.
Also, the absolute best.
Danny
That makes no sense.
Sasha
We love you too, sweetie!
Samesies.
And he lived happily ever after with his billionaire boyfriend in his huge penthouse, getting railed by the man’s ginormous cock 24/7. The end.
Danny
Just spitting facts, babe.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Fifer Rose is a happily married mother of four human children and two very spoiled cats.
When she is not wiping snotty noses or being bullied into feeding her cats (again?!), she can be found obsessing over M/M romance. She loves all the tropes, some of her favorite being enemies to lovers, hurt/comfort, sugar daddy, and mistaken identity. She also has a penchant for A/B/O dynamics.
While Fifer is a sucker for angst, a happily-ever-after is a MUST in all she reads and writes.
Unrelated hobbies include baking, attempting to golf (for her husband’s sake), and daydreaming about traveling. (No actual traveling because did you see the part about four kids?)
Check out other stories, such as her M/M dark mafia romance, by Fifer here.
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Fifer Rose, Textual Confusion
