But even like this, sated and at least partially relaxed, there’s something primed about him, like he’s just pretending to be docile, right up until the moment he’s able to strike with the most impact.
We stay like that for a while, locked in together, breathing in tandem, holding onto one another.
It’s only when the feel of Jack’s cum leaking out of my stretched hole becomes truly unpleasant that I shift under him. Jack takes the hint and pulls out. He moves off me, lying down at my side and releasing me from his grip.
I stretch a little, feeling out my body, testing the aches and pains I know will be there. You don’t get fucked like that without leaving behind some heavy reminders.
Jack watches me as I slide off the bed and stand on embarrassingly shaky legs, like a drunk Bambi. He doesn’t say anything, and neither do I, when I leave the room to go and clean myself up.
I go to the bathroom and wet a small hand towel, using it to wipe away what I can of Jack’s cum, which is still leaking out of me.
A quick look in the bathroom mirror reveals more evidence of what Jack and I did together. My hair is a disaster, black strands sticking up all over the place. My bottom lip looks like it’s been ravaged, dried blood smeared across it. There’s the start of bruising on my both my hips from where Jack held onto me during sex. I brush my fingers over one of the bruises and feel a sharp ache of pain.
My lip and arsehole both throb from the abuse they received from Jack, and I have a very hard time not smiling like an idiot about it.
Once I’m moderately sure I look less like a porn star mid-film, I head back to my room. Jack is waiting there on my bed, right where I left him. He’s lying down on his back, eyes trained on the door, watching for me.
His eyes seem to lighten when I walk in, and I take that as a good sign. At least there don’t seem to be any regrets yet.
Jack gestures with a raised hand for me to rejoin him on the bed. I comply with the silent request, climbing onto my bed and thumping down artlessly next to him.
Once I’m within touching distance, Jack throws an arm across my stomach and tugs me in closer to him. I turn onto my side, letting Jack tug me half on top of him. I rest my head on his shoulder, pressing my face into the crook of his neck. Jack wraps both arms around me in a loose hug.
It feels good to be held by him, which is a thing I do not think I will be admitting out loud any time soon.
Jack must feel similarly about us having shared enough vulnerability for one night, or possibly this lifetime, because his opening gambit is as low stakes as it gets.
“It would have been easier to rail you from behind.” He touches the bruising on my hips. The bruises he put there. He doesn’t sound sorry about it.
“I didn’t want easy.” Neither of us would know what to do with easy. We’d probably just end up breaking it. “I wanted. This. Flat on my back, your eyes on me as I came apart for you.”
“Really?” Jack puffs out a disbelieving breath, gently blowing the hairs on top of my head. “Your reckless arse was okay with playing it safe?” He pauses, presumably for dramatic effect. Then. “Sounds fake.”
“Excuse me.” Caustic response locked and loaded. “That was what the well versed in sex-positions history like to call “Missionary Magic,” Jack. Have some fucking respect for the classics or get off the field of play.”
A rumble of laugher spills out of Jack. He gives me a quick squeeze. The release of tension is good for both of us.
When Jack first got naked, I was initially unable to ignore his numerous scars but managed to push past the feelings that seeing them caused. Pressed in this close, I find myself drawn back to them. I’m careful to pay special attention to Jack’s reaction when I start tracing my fingers lightly over the scars within reach.
Jack doesn’t tell me to stop or otherwise react physically to indicate his discomfort, so I keep going. Running my fingers along each scar. There’s no patterns and therefore no obvious connection. His scars are stepping stones, a memory, a story, a nightmare threaded into each one. I want to know about them, and at the same time I really don’t.
I hesitate when I come to the thick, jagged scar cutting a path just below his belly button. It’s a savagely torn piece of work, markedly different to all the others.
Jack lets me touch the puckered skin without comment at first. It must be particularly sensitive, though, because he sucks in a sharp breath when I increase the pressure of my sliding fingers.
“Leo.” He grabs my wrist, stopping my hand from moving any further. It doesn’t sound like a reprimand. More an exhalation of warning.
I want to ask how he got the scar on his abdomen, but I refrain from actually doing so, afraid of forcing him to remember what must have been a terrifying and perhaps gruesome event in his life. I’m not sure how Jack would react to that. As much as I trust him not to hurt me when in his right mind, Jack can’t possibly be as stable as he outwardly appears. The last thing I want to do is trigger a mental spiral by accident. He doesn’t deserve that kind of carelessness from me.
So I don’t ask.
Jack tells me anyway.
“I got captured during a mission OI sent me on by a group of violent radicals. They had this signature way of killing their enemies. They’d open them up and insert a bomb inside a person’s abdomen and set it on a timer.”
Following the track with disturbing ease, I feel bile rise at the back of my throat.
“Someone put abombinside you.” What the fuck, though. Human race, take a look at yourselves. Have a word, please, Jesus Christ.
