(BL) Hunting The Field Guide-Chapter 458: Who doesn’t love a good meatstick?

Kellen felt numb. He felt so exhausted from his emotional outburst that he could barely lift a fork to his lips, but he needed to. Rhys was babying him, and that only added the heavy weight on his shoulders.

He should be able to take care of himself, of feeling himself and making sure he was okay. He’d been able to do this before. Had always been able to do this before. He’d never really had people who he could fully rely on when he’d been on the front lines, outside of Brent, but Brent wasn’t always at his side. Brent was a busy man, so Kellen had to go through the bursts of anxiety and worry on his own mostly.

He felt terrible for putting this weight on Rhys, and tried to apologise for it too.

Rhys wouldn’t let him.

They were both rubbed a little raw, not as smooth around the edges right now, so Rhys wasn’t as polite as he normally was about it. Not as sweet.

"Shut up, Kellen. If you’re about to apologise for the state you are in right now, I swear to god I’m going to get really mad." Rhys growled, and the hair on the back of Kellen’s neck stood on end. Kellen shuddered as Rhys sat next to him at the island, holding up a fork.

The spread of food that Kellen had ordered was in front of them, and Rhys was warming up each plate individually so that Kellen could take his time eating all of the food he had ordered. Kellen was pushed up to the edge of the island by Rhys so he’d either need to push hard to get out from under the countertop, or Rhys would have to pull him back out to get down. Rhys was hovering beside him, shoving food into Kellen’s mouth rather lovingly despite everything.

Kellen was feeling loved, even given the situation that they were finding themselves in.

"I-I just...I just feel you shouldn’t be looking after me like this. I’m just...out of sorts." Kellen admitted in between bites. Rhys stared at the man like he had two heads, not even hiding it.

"Sweetheart, you’re my priority. Even when I’m upset at you, angry at you, the world is crumbling around us. You are my priority. Always." Rhys’ expression shifted slightly before he sighed. "Let’s not get into this again. I don’t want to make you cry again, but please, this is nothing. This is just taking care of my partner after something terrible happened to him. Now stop fucking worrying about me taking care of you and just let me taking fucking care of you." Rhys’ yellow eyes held an edge to them that finally had Kellen’s emotions stirring.

He was so annoyed at Kellen for his behaviour that he was swearing. Rhys rarely swore in front of Kellen unless they were in bed.

Kellen felt his shoulders begin to shake as he laughed. Rhys sat back, watching him as Kellen shook his head, laughing. He raised his hand up, rubbing it down his face as he felt his shoulders continue to shake.

"You’re that upset, huh? Sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you this much. Will a kiss appease you?" Kellen asked softly, his eyes warm as he looked over at the other man. Rhys, who had unintentionally been rather bristly, softened as well.

"Hmm. I’ll consider it. But only after you’ve finished eating. You need to fill yourself up." Rhys said and Kellen chuckled.

"I can think of another thing that could fill me up." He said and watched as Rhys’ expression flooded with shock. He gasped.

"Kellen Woods!" That exclamation had Kellen dying. He bent over the counter, laughing as Rhys stared at him in stunned silence. "I can’t believe you would say that!" Rhys followed up with and Kellen just couldn’t contain his laughter. There was a part of him that felt terrible for laughing right now, knowing it wasn’t the time, nor the place for him to be doing this, but this also felt...perfect. He hadn’t expected that Rhys would act so scandalized by Kellen’s words.

Not when the man had said stuff that was so much worse to him in the past.

Kellen couldn’t stop laughing, it almost hurt. Rhys was still staring at him in shock. Finally, Kellen was able to gain some restraint, calming himself down with deep breaths but he couldn’t stop the grin from crossing his face.

"What? It’s true, isn’t it? I’ve seen your dick. You could fill me up." Rhys gasped again.

"Kellen! I never expected you of all people to say something like that." Rhys was truly appalled and that only had Kellen grinning wider.

"What? Who do you think I hang out with a lot? I’m clueless in practice, but I know how to do it. Remember? You got mad at my kit that I had. That I should still have, because I believe once this gets past that point, you aren’t going to be able to control yourself." Kellen said it a little proudly and it was Rhys’ turn to cover his face and groan.

"What makes you so confident about this? Why are you speaking like this now?" Rhys asked, clearly confused, but also...happy to be speaking about something not dark. Not ominous. The dark shadow that was looming over them was still there, but this was a welcome distraction.

"Why wouldn’t I be confident? You’ve liked all other parts of my body so far, why would that change? Plus, I know how warm I am inside. I haven’t been able to fuck myself, but you haven’t exactly kept your mouth shut when talking about how excited you are to slide you snake into my hidden chamber." Kellen’s eyes were bright, laughing, as Rhys started coughing. The man had choked on air as Kellen said the words.

"Ugh. No! You are never allowed to say that again!" Kellen was delighted to see how turned off and disgusted Rhys was by his words. The romance books from Hill were really coming in clutch right now, and Kellen loved it.

"What? Aren’t I a snake charmer? A pole wrestler? A meat stick connoisseur?" The look of disgust only grew with each word out of Kellen’s mouth and he had no idea that this would be such an effective way to bother Rhys.

"Stop. Stop! Who taught you those words? Where did they even come from? Who the fuck calls their dick a pole or a meat stick? Fuck. Was it Brent? Or Hill? Who was it? I need to-" Kellen reached out, grabbing the other man and pulling him in close, laughing still at Rhys’ obvious distress.

"There’s no need to point fingers, and I’m not going to tell you who showed me it because I don’t want to watch a bloodbath. Plus, there was a chance I was going to find it on my own when I looked up how to seduce a Captain online." Kellen said, and Rhys froze under his hands.

"Did you do that?" He asked, his voice more...controlled and Kellen chuckled.

"No. I didn’t have to because I got the reference materials mentioned above. There was a chance that I would have gone down that route, and honestly, it’s still not off the table. I don’t want you to get bored of me." Kellen said and Rhys groaned.

"Bored? Bored? How the hell would I even get bored of you? There is no way that is ever happening. You keep me on my toes all the time, like right now." Rhys said, but his hands grasped at Kellen’s shoulders, holding him tighter. Because of how the chairs were, they couldn’t hug completely, especially because Kellen was shoved against the counter like a disobedient toddler.

Kellen smiled up at Rhys.

"Who knows? I might need to learn how to seduce you. I could be terrible at it." Kellen said and Rhys narrowed his eyes.

"Terrible? At seducing me? Kellen, you could bend over and I’m hard. It doesn’t take much to get me going around you. You’re so damn sexy all the time. Every little thing you do just gets me going. I’m perpetually hard." Rhys told him, his eyes sliding from yellow into gold territory. Kellen blinked, a little surprised before he chuckled.

"I’m not sure I believe you. You’ve been doing a great job at hiding that from me. Why?" Kellen asked and Rhys huffed.

"Who the hell would be happy to find out that their sister is missing, along with several of their other friends but look! My boyfriend still wants to touch me? No one, Kellen." Rhys’ voice held a bit of bitterness to it, and Kellen just stared at the man.

"I would. Maybe just telling me is fine instead of acting on it, but I get anxious. I worry that you might fall out of love with me. I know I’m an A Class now, but I know that there are deep scars inside of me from my time as a C Class. We’ve...kind of talked about it before, but I’m sure you’ve noticed it a little bit more the longer we’ve been together. I have worked on making sure it doesn’t affect others as much, but it does. I would like to know in situations like this, maybe not at the exact moment, that you are still attracted to me. Wouldn’t you like to know that?" Kellen asked and watched as Rhys’ expression froze.

Like he hadn’t expected Kellen to take him so seriously. He was a fool for thinking so. Kellen always took Rhys’ words rather seriously, and that was because he cared about him so much.

Rhys took a moment to respond, clearly a little unsure by Kellen’s straightforward antics. Again, he shouldn’t be. Kellen had been like this for years.

"I...I would like to know it too." Rhys admitted, swallowing thickly. "I...just thought that was a weird thing to ask for." Kellen nodded.

"It’s not weird for us." Kellen told him softly. "We don’t have to listen to what others do in their relationships, this is ours." Kellen said and watched as the words seem to have a great effect on Rhys. The man was gulping like his life depended on it. Like he was pushing down tears, or strong emotions. The way his breathing was a little shaky, his fingers twitching on Kellen’s shoulders, all the little signs told Kellen his words had a great impact on the other man.

Kellen smiled at him, reaching out and gently tapping his nose.

"I love you, Rhys." Kellen told him and watched as Rhys took in a shuddering breath, closing his eyes as he let the words wash over him. It was a silly thing, but now that he knew he was probably going to be in the gate, and that he had Rhys had discussed it, he wanted to make sure that the man knew that he cared deeply for him. If words got that across, he would say them.

There was no reason not to.

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