He pouts again as he faces me. “Don’t call me that.”
“It’s your name.”
“Not to you,” he argues as he steps forward, and it catches me off guard as he pushes me.
I land in the chair behind me, and his knees fall onto either side of my thighs as he sinks into my lap. The fabric of the shirtlifts to expose his panties, and the defined crease between his thigh and hip is practically begging to be touched.
“Xenesis,” I warn with the last threads of my control, and I grip his hips to still him even as everything in me screams to pull him closer.
He shakes his head defiantly, white hair falling across his forehead in disheveled strands that make him look even wilder.
“No,” he murmurs, the word soft but stubborn. “I’m not that to you. I’m your Xen… your peaceful place.”
“You were,” I agree, the admission rough in my throat, “but things are different now.”
“They don’t have to be,” he whispers, draping his arms over my shoulders and threading his fingers into my hair.
He leans in until his breath ghosts my lips, and his hips roll slowly, grinding against me in a rhythm that’s pure torture. I bite back a groan as the friction ignites memories I’ve tried so hard to bury.
Nights when this felt like salvation, not destruction.
His fingers dig into the nape of my neck, nails scraping lightly in that way he knows undoes me. The tip of his cock presses against the satin of his panties, dampness spreading across the fabric in a warm bloom.
“We can’t keep doing this,” I manage, my hands tightening on his hips in a futile attempt to hold us both still.
He pulls back just enough to meet my eyes, his gaze dark and pleading beneath the haze of alcohol.
“Why not?” he breathes, hips rolling with maddening patience. “Tell me you don’t want this. Tell me you don’t feel it too.”
I swallow hard, throat dry as the words stick. “It’s not about wanting. It’s about what happens after.”
His expression flickers, hurt flashing across his face before defiance clamps down hard.
“After doesn’t matter right now,” he murmurs as he leans in until our foreheads touch, his breath unsteady against my lips. “Just this. Just us. Please, Bash… let me have this.”
“Wecan’t.”
“Wecan,” he argues, the words both fierce and fragile, and he presses a quick, desperate kiss to my lips. “Hate me again tomorrow if you need to. Just love me tonight.”
The plea in his voice unravels me further, and I close my eyes against the storm, hands sliding up his back despite myself.
“Xeni…”
“Say yes,” he whispers against my lips, the words a soft demand wrapped in desperation. “Just for tonight. Say yes.”
He arches his spine, offering himself completely, but as my eyes move down his body, a streak of crimson on his inner thigh catches my eye.
My haze clears in an instant.
“What’s that?” I ask as I stand, arms banded tight around him to keep him steady.
He whimpers at the shift, a needy, broken sound that tugs at my chest, and he clings to me as I lift him and set him on the edge of the table. He spreads his legs wider, wanton and unashamed. His hips rock forward as he tries to pull me back in for another kiss, lips chasing mine like he’s starving.
I nudge his shoulders until he’s propped on his elbows, knees parted wide and chest heaving with ragged breaths. His gaze burns with raw need, but my focus locks on the roadmap of scars covering the inside of his thighs.
Hundreds of thin lines scatter in chaotic, overlapping patterns, some faded to pale pink ghosts, others fresh and angry red against his skin. One weeps slow drops of blood that glisten in the dim light.
My heart breaks all over again, and the fracture steals my breath.
