“It doesn’t mean nothing,” I admit, each word dragged from somewhere deep I swore I’d never touch again. “It means everything. But not in the way you think.”
She stares, confusion flashing through the exhaustion in her face.
I lean closer, breath hot against her ear. “I don’t want to date you. I don’t want to wine and dine you. I want to own you. To keep you exactly where you are now—fucked out, marked, mine.”
Her body jerks, her lips parting with a sound between a gasp and a sob. “That’s not love.”
I laugh, bitter, dark. “No, baby girl. That’s obsession. And it’s all I’ve got to give.”
I press my mouth to her shoulder, biting down just hard enough to leave another mark, another reminder she won’t escape.
She shudders under me, torn between pulling away and sinking closer. “And if I don’t want to be owned?”
I lift my head, eyes burning into hers. “Then you’re lying to yourself. Because your body already gave me the answer your mouth is too afraid to say.”
She clutches the surrounding sheets, like they can hide what we just did, like they can erase the bruises I left across her throat and chest. Her breath is still uneven, lips swollen, hair tangled from my hands. She looks like sin and confession all tangled in one body, and it makes my pulse pound harder than it should.
Her voice is small, trembling, but sharp enough to cut me open. “Do you have any idea how guilty I feel? She’s my best friend, Dean. And I just—” She swallows hard, eyes glistening. “I just fucked her dad.”
The words hang heavy in the air, like smoke from a fire neither of us wants to put out.
I should tell her she’s right. That it’s wrong. This is exactly why I tried to keep her at a distance. But I don’t. I can’t.
Instead, I drag my fingers across her jaw, forcing her to meet my eyes. “You think I don’t know? You think I don’t hear thatsame voice every time I look at you, every time I imagine what my daughter would say if she saw you on your knees for me?”
She flinches, shame flooding her face. But her thighs press tighter together under the sheets, and I see it—the guilt tangled with desire. The ache she can’t kill, no matter how much she hates herself for it.
I lean closer, my voice low, deliberate, dark. “Guilt doesn’t stop me. It won’t stop you either. You’ll keep coming back, baby girl. Because no one will ever fuck you like I do. No one will ever make you feel like this again.”
A tear slips down her cheek. She tries to blink it away, but I catch it with my thumb, smearing it into her skin like another claim.
Her voice cracks when she speaks. “And what if… what if I fall in love with you?”
The words hit me harder than any blade, harder than any enemy ever could. For a second, I can’t breathe.
Her eyes lock onto mine, wide, terrified, pleading. She wants an answer. She wants the truth.
I grip the back of her neck, pull her forehead to mine, my voice a growl through clenched teeth. “Then you’re more fucked than you already are.”
Her lips part, like I just told her she’s standing on the edge of a cliff and I’m the one who’ll decide if she falls.
Her voice is barely there, shaky, almost breaking. “That’s it? That’s all you have to say? That I’m fucked?”
I cup her jaw, forcing her to look at me. “You are fucked, baby girl. You’ve been fucked since the second you walked into my office in that little dress and made me want you more than I wanted my next breath.”
Her chest rises fast, unevenly. “That’s not the same as love.”
I laugh darkly and bitter. “Love? You really think I’ve got that in me? I’m not some boy you can save. I’m not gonna write youpoems and pick you flowers. What I feel for you…” My thumb brushes her lip, presses just enough to remind her who owns her body. “…it’s not soft. It’s not safe. It’s not love.”
Her eyes glisten, but she doesn’t flinch away. She leans into my touch, like she’s begging me to keep cutting her open.
“Then what is it?” she whispers.
My hand slides down her throat, feeling her pulse kick under my palm. “It’s hunger. It’s possession. It’s knowing that even if you hate yourself for it, you’ll crawl back into my bed again and again. Because I’m the only one who sees you—the real you. Not the mask you wear for your friend, not the smile you fake for the world. Just you. Broken. Mine.”
Her breath hitches. A tear streaks her cheek, but her thighs shift under the sheets, betraying her.
“And what happens,” she says, voice cracking, “when it’s not just my body that’s yours? What happens if I can’t stop myself from… from giving you more?”
