My fingertips brush the skin beside the dressing. He is warm. Alive.
His hand catches my wrist.
The grip is sudden and complete—his fingers wrapping around the bone with a pressure that stops my hand mid-motion and holds it against his bare flank. His palm is hot. Rough.
"Stop being a doctor," he says.
His voice is low. Rough. The gravel-and-whiskey register that I heard in the kitchen, in the container, in every moment where the distance between violence and want collapsed to nothing.
I look up. His eyes are on mine. The green is dark—dilated, the pupils swallowing the iris. It is a physiological response I can identify and categorize.
Arousal.
"What do you want me to be?" I ask.
The question comes out before the filter catches it. Unscripted. Unanalyzed. A live round fired from the hip.
He pulls my wrist.
The motion is fluid—one continuous force that brings me forward, off balance. I stumble between his spread knees. His other hand catches the back of my neck, fingers tangling in my hair, and he pulls me down.
His mouth crashes onto mine.
He bites my lower lip, hard enough to split the skin. The taste of blood floods my mouth—copper and salt—mixing with the chemical tang of the antiseptic on my fingers. He doesn't ease off. He bites harder.
I make a sound—low, surprised—and surge upward. He rises to meet me. We collide standing, his chair rocking backward on itslegs. Our bodies slam together with a force that drives the air from my lungs.
He walks me backward. His hands are on my hips—both of them, the grip crushing. His fingers dig into the muscle above the iliac crest hard enough to bruise.
My back hits the drafting table.
The impact jars my spine. Sketches scatter across the floor. A jar of pencils rolls off the edge and shatters on the concrete, the sound lost under the ragged noise of our breathing.
"Off," he growls.
His hands find my jacket. He doesn't unzip it—he shoves it off my shoulders with a force that threatens to tear the fabric. The tactical vest underneath is next, hauled over my head and thrown into the corner. The t-shirt follows, stripped with a single violent motion.
I am bare to the waist. The cool air of the studio hits my skin, raising gooseflesh.
He looks at me.
He looks at me with unfiltered hunger. A carnivore’s focus trained on a body that is no longer an obstacle, but a meal.
It is hunger. Unfiltered. Undisguised. A carnivore’s focus trained on a body that is no longer an obstacle but a meal.
His mouth hits my collarbone. Teeth. He bites down hard—the kind of bite designed to leave a mark. I arch into it, my hand finding the back of his head, fingers fisting in his dark hair. I pull him closer instead of pushing him away.
The edge of the drafting table digs into my spine. It hurts. I don't care.
He drops.
Not slowly. Not with the controlled descent I gave him in the kitchen. He goes to his knees with the impact of a man falling—hard, graceless, the concrete punishing his kneecaps.
His hands yank my belt open. The button pops. The zipper rasps down. He shoves my trousers and briefs down my thighs in one motion.
My cock springs free, hard and aching.
He doesn't wait. He opens his mouth and takes me.
