"I don't want to feel like this anymore," I whisper. "Like I'm already dead and just waiting for my body to catch up."
"What do you want to feel?"
"Alive."
He turns toward me, his free hand coming up to cup my face. "Hazel. You've been through trauma."
"I know what I've been through." My voice cracks. "I watched Marcus die. I held Sarah while she bled out. I couldn't save any of them, Travis. Not one."
"That's not—"
"I need to feel something else." I grab his shirt, fisting the fabric. "Anything else. I'm drowning in it—the guilt, the failure, the fucking helplessness. I need..." I can't finish. Don't know how to sayI need to remember I'm still alive, that my body still works, that I can still feel pleasure instead of just pain.
"Hazel—"
"I've been watching you for two days like you're the only solid thing in a world that won't stop spinning. I know you held my hand while I was unconscious. Jess told me."
"Jess talks too much."
"She talks exactly enough." I lean closer, until our foreheads almost touch. My hands are shaking. "Tell me you don't want this, and I'll back off. Tell me it's a bad idea and I'll respect that. But don't pretend you're only refusing to protect me, because we both know—"
He kisses me.
His mouth is demanding, tasting of coffee and sleepless nights and something raw. One hand tangles in my hair while the other pulls me closer, and I go willingly, desperately, climbing into his lap and wrapping my arms around his neck like he's the only thing keeping me from falling apart.
"This is a bad idea," he mutters against my lips.
"I don't care." I'm already pulling at his shirt, my fingers clumsy and urgent. "I need this. I need you. Please don't make me beg."
"Fuck." He captures my wrists, holds them. "You're grieving. You're hurt—"
"I know. And right now grief is the only thing I can feel and I can't—" My voice breaks. "I can't keep feeling it. Please, Travis. Just make me feel something else. Anything else."
I see the recognition in his eyes, like he knows exactly what I'm asking for because he's been there too.
We don't stop.
He lays me down on his bedroll with surprising gentleness, mindful of my injuries. Then the gentleness ends. His hands strip my clothes away roughly. Everything is discarded like obstacles between me and the oblivion I'm chasing.
"Fuck," he breathes, looking at me. "When I saw you on that road, covered in blood and still fighting. I haven't been able to think about anything else."
"Then don't think." I reach for him, pulling him down. "Just feel. Help me feel."
I pull him down and kiss him hard, fumbling with his belt, needing to feel him against me and needing the weight of him, the heat, the proof that I'm still here, still capable of wanting something. He helps me strip him, and when his cock springs free—thick and hard and already leaking—I wrap my hand around it.
"Fuck, Hazel."
"I need to feel something other than failure." I stroke him, watching his pupils dilate, feeling the pulse of him against my palm. "Make me forget everything but this. Please."
He groans and captures my mouth again, his hands finding my breasts, thumbs working my nipples until I arch into his touch.The sensation cuts through the numbness, sharp and real, and I gasp.
"Tell me if this hurts your shoulder."
"Right now, I can't feel anything but how empty I am. How much I need your cock inside me. Need to be filled with something other than grief."
"Fuck." His hand slides down my stomach, between my thighs, finding me wet and ready. He pushes two fingers inside me without warning, and I cry out. "Already soaked for me."
"Please, Travis. I need more—"
