Throughout the whole of his romantic history, Cas had never been quite as tempted to throw caution to the wind as he was with Iris in their private room. The feeling of her torso pressed against his as she arched her back made his skin feel hot, and he shifted his weight as his muscles grew taut under the tension they were both feeding with their passionate kissing. His heart hammered inside his chest as he took her bottom lip between his teeth, losing his sense of reason as the heat of the moment took over his brain. Despite the repercussions, he couldn’t bring himself to pull away from her. She stirred a fire inside of him with which he was too unfamiliar to control. The flames demanded to be fanned, and he gave in to them with reckless abandon.

Almost instinctively, his fingers drifted toward the hem of her shirt as the spell coaxed him to take things farther. He had never slept with anyone before—truthfully, he’d never even gotten to the point of removing clothes—but he’d always had the desire to. The only reason he’d been abstinent for so long was because his father had forcibly involved himself in his love life. With each prior relationship ended too prematurely for anything to happen, coupled with his own reservations about one night stands, he’d never had the opportunity to find out what it would be like to actually go all the way. Now, with nothing to stop him besides his own stifled conscience, the devil on his shoulder had taken the wheel, and he took the fabric in his hands.

Before he could begin to lift it, though, Iris’s whispery voice made him stop. Her question was a cold reminder of the very thing he’d been trying to forget. [color=#b97703][i]Is this really okay?[/i][/color] He wanted to groan in frustration as he repeated the inquiry in his mind. As much as he wanted her, he couldn’t tell her that he thought everything would be fine or that there wouldn’t be any repercussions to letting themselves be stupid for one night. [color=#b97703]“I don’t know,”[/color] he admitted reluctantly, dropping his forehead on her shoulder with a long exhale. His hands still held the hem of her shirt, but he made no move to pull at it. He knew that he still wanted this, but he couldn’t lie to her. It would have been irresponsible and selfish. He hadn’t been lying when he’d told her he cared about her more than most people, and—unfortunately—that meant doing the mature thing and telling her the truth. [color=#b97703][i]Damn you, moral compass.[/i][/color]

[color=#b97703]“I want this,”[/color] he told her, lifting his head to meet her gaze with a frown. No matter what, he wanted to make sure she knew that he wasn’t slowing down because of anything to do with her. [color=#b97703]“But… we shouldn’t do something we’ll regret later. I mean, we don’t even have protection. I’d hate for this to turn into a catastrophe because we got careless. We’re not safe right now, we don’t know when we will be, and whether I go back to the capital or not, we’re probably going to have to jump through hoops to be together. It’s already going to be a mess without throwing a pregnancy into the mix… I don’t want to ruin your life by pretending like that couldn’t happen.”[/color]

He studied her flushed face with a twinge of discouragement. [color=#b97703]“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have gotten so carried away. I wasn’t thinking.”[/color]