Page 48 of The Fighter

Tav let me, kissing me back like he wanted to drink from me.

He was hard between my legs, grinding into me. It was awkward, but I managed to lift his legs, gain purchase on the bottom of the tub, and enter him with my own hardness. His hole was slick with the lube from my fingers, and he let out a strangled cry as I took him bare to the hilt.

And fuck, he felt amazing. Hot and tight, nearly molten compared to the cooling water surrounding us. His walls rippled around me as he threw his head back, his knees bobbing on the surface of the depleted water. I gripped his thighs, spreading him wide, and stared through the water as my cock plunged into his stretched hole. The water splashed around us, and Tav grunted with each thrust. I angled his one leg higher on my hip, and when he cried out, I knew I’d hit his prostate.

“That’s it, Tav.” I dug my fingers into his skin. “Trust me to know what you need. Always.”

“Fuck, Con,” he turned his head into his biceps, mouth open against his skin, eyes squeezed shut as his body jolted with each of my savage thrusts. “Fuck, please come. Wanna feel you.”

I reached between us, and it only took a couple of tugs on his shaft before his cock kicked between us, spilling milky white cum into the water between us. I pulled out just before my cock pulsed, my own cum mixing with his in the water between us.I dropped my face into his neck, whispering his name, his real one, against his skin.

I let his knees drop. He hadn’t pulled on the end of the tie, so I peeled back his fingers and tugged until the fabric fell from his wrists. I dropped it over the side of the tub, and it made a wet smack on the drenched floor. I rubbed Tav’s wrists, his arms, his shoulders. He watched me in silence, his body passive and at rest. His eyes were barely open.

When he spoke, his voice was rough. “Did I hurt you?”

The tense altercations with him, from the time he lost it over the ropes to today in the bathtub, might have given me a bruise or two, but not in the way it mattered to me. Those felt like occupational hazards, like a part of the job when dealing with a fresh and new stallion who was just learning how to be a part of a herd.

I didn’t look at him, my eyes on his wrists. “No.”

He paused for a moment. “Were you worried I’d hurt you?”

I met his gaze and spoke honestly. “No. I wasn’t worried. You said you’d never hurt me. And I know that’s still true.”

He rested his forehead on my shoulder and wrapped his arms around my waist. The last of the tension in his body left on a giant exhale that fluttered the surface of the water. “Yeah, Con. It’s still true. It’ll always be true.”

SEVENTEEN

Tav

I felt like a declawed kitten.

My arms ached, and my head pounded. Was I supposed to have this many orgasms when I was concussed? That had never been a concern before. My ass was killing me. I had no defenses. None. Lounging in bed, we’d eaten sandwiches that Con had slapped together with random stuff in his fridge, and they’d still tasted like a million bucks. Now, all I could do was lay on top of the sheets, my head on Con’s lap, as he ran his fingers through my hair.

“Sorry I freaked out. Again,” I muttered. I wasn’t normally like that. I rarely lost my cool, but I’d done it twice in like twelve hours.

“Don’t apologize for that,” he said.

“Okay.” He must be half-wizard. I vowed a long time ago never to tell anyone the circumstances of my life. Yet all Con needed was a silk tie and agile fingers to make me spill everything. I resented him a little, that he was able to get toreach inside me, turn me inside out, until he saw Tav and Husk and all those parts I never wanted anyone to see.

It had to have been ugly. But I was still here in Con’s apartment. I was in his bed wearing a pair of sweatpants while he wore soft pajama pants that I wanted to rub my face on. He was still touching me. There was still a lot to talk about. And despite my admission that I wanted to belong to Con if my life didn’t exist outside of this apartment, the fact was that my lifedidexist outside of my apartment. I would have to check in with Chen soon. If I didn’t, he’d sound the alarm, and if it went up the chain to Devlin…

“I can feel you stressing again.” Con murmured.

I rolled onto my back, head still in his lap, and squinted at him. “You can stop poking around my head anytime now.”

He swiped a finger between my eyebrows. “You get a little line right here when you’re stressed. You don’t have a poker face around me.

“Around you? I guess I don’t.”

“You did last night at the fight. I hated it.”

“That was Husk.”

He sighed. “Yeah, I guess it was.”

“Can I ask you questions now? Or do I have to tie you up and finger your ass to get you to talk about yourself too?”

A laugh burst out of him, a sharp cracking sound that startled me. It startled him too, because it quickly dissolved into an embarrassed chuckle. “That was a good one,” he smiled at me.