"Going to fill you up." His pace increases slightly. "Mark you inside where no one can see. Make it so you feel me for days."
His hand slides under my hip, tilting my pelvis, and the angle change makes my vision white out.
"Right there," he growls, and pounds into me. When his teeth sink into my shoulder I come so hard I think I might black out for a second. He follows immediately, grinding so deepI swear I feel him in my throat, his hand gripping my inner thigh hard enough that tomorrow there'll be purple fingerprints bloomed across the pale skin.
"One more," he says when I whimper that I can't. "Give me one more."
His fingers find my clit again, and when I come this time it's with his teeth in my shoulder and his fingers digging into that same spot on my thigh, marking me, claiming me.
After, he's gentle. Removes the prosthetic again with a soft sigh of relief, then gets a warm cloth, cleans us both carefully. He pulls me against his chest, strokes my hair, tells me how good I was, how perfect, how proud he is of me.
"Was that—did I—" Uncertainty creeps into his voice. "Color?"
"Green," I assure him, pressing a kiss to his chest where his heart still races. "So fucking green. That was exactly what I needed."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah." I trace the scars on his residual limb gently, feeling him relax under my touch. "All of it. All of you."
He's quiet for a long moment, then: "Stay?"
"Always.”
I fall asleep feeling safe, satisfied, and completely his.
Holt’s gone.
I stretch, feeling that delicious ache everywhere, and smile into the pillow that still smells like him—motor oil and soap and sex. Last night plays through my mind in vivid flashes—every command, every surrender, every perfect moment of trust.
"Morning," I mumble, rolling over to find him sitting on the edge of the bed, fully dressed. The prosthetic is alreadyattached, his jeans covering it, boots laced. He's turned slightly toward me but won't meet my eyes, his whole body rigid, hands clenched on his knees.
His gaze is fixed on my thigh.
I follow his stare down to where a bruise blooms across the pale skin—deep purple-blue, almost black at the center, the perfect shape of his fingers spread wide. Four distinct marks where he gripped me, a thumbprint on the inner thigh.
"Oh." I touch it gently, pressing to feel the sweet ache. "Battle trophy."
He flinches so hard the bed shakes.
"Holt, it's fine. It's just a bruise. Happens with rough sex—"
"I hurt you." His voice sounds dead, empty of everything that made it his.
"You didn't hurt me." I sit up, reach for him, but he jerks away like I'm holding a knife. "Holt, look at me."
When he finally does, his face is gray. He looks at me like he's seeing a ghost. Like he's seeing someone else entirely. Like he's seeing Evan's handiwork.
"I marked you. I—" He stands abruptly, the movement awkward as his prosthetic catches on the rug. "This was a mistake."
"What?" The word comes out cracked. "Holt, no. Last night was—"
"I can't do this."
I scramble out of bed, grabbing his shirt from the floor and pulling it on, needing armor for whatever this is. "You can't just—we need to talk about this."
"There's nothing to talk about."
"Bullshit." I move toward him but he backs away, his prosthetic making him stumble slightly, and that small vulnerability in his retreat makes this worse somehow. "Holt,please. Tell me what's wrong. The bruise? It's nothing, it doesn't even hurt—"
