With money.
With distance.
With clear, unspoken boundaries that everyone understood.
Kitty pressed closer, and her lips brushed my shoulder. "You're awake. Bad dreams again?"
I didn't answer.
Puppy's eyes fluttered open on my other side. Those striking violet contacts he wore even to bed—a vanity I found oddly endearing. "Want us to help you relax?"
Months ago, I would have said yes.
Would have let them both work me over until the tension dissolved, until the images in my head blurred into nothing but sensation.
But now. . .
"No." My voice came out rougher than I intended. "Go back to sleep."
Puppy stilled.
Kitty's breath caught.
I felt it then—that shift in the air. The confusion. The hurt they tried to hide but couldn't, not completely.
They'd caught feelings long ago.
Both of them.
I'd known for a while now. Seen it in the way Kitty's eyes lingered on my face when she thought I wasn't looking. Heard it in the way Puppy said my name—my real name, not the playful "Master" he used during scenes.
They wanted more.
More than money.
More than an arrangement.
More than the hollow transaction we'd all agreed to.
And I couldn't give it to them.
Not because they weren't beautiful. They were. Objectively, devastatingly beautiful.
Not because they weren't skilled. They knew my body better than anyone. Knew exactly how to touch me, where to press, when to push and when to yield.
But after Nura. . .
I closed my eyes, and her face swam up from the darkness. That single date. One dinner. A few hours of conversation about nothing important—books, music, and places we'd never been.
She'd laughed at my terrible jokes.
She'd stolen food off my plate without asking.
She'd looked at me like I was just a man, not a monster or a weapon forged in blood and fire.
I'd wanted to kiss her so badly my teeth ached.
Wanted to bite her.
