I pressed one finger against his hole, slow, deliberate, and felt the tight ring of muscle give way under steady pressure. He was hot. Tight. His body resisted for half a second before accepting me, and the sound he made was low and ragged, caught between his teeth.
I worked the finger in to the second knuckle, then deeper, feeling the way his body clenched around me, hot and pulsing. His hips rolled up, seeking more, and I added a second finger alongside the first, scissoring gently, watching his face the entire time.
The shift was visible. His jaw, which had been locked with that familiar tension, went slack. His eyes, which never quite shut all the way—some habits died harder than others—dropped to half-mast.
His breath came faster, shallow, and the small, broken sounds falling from his mouth were the kind that lived in the space between control and its complete absence.
“More,” he said. His voice was wrecked. “Christ, Braham, more.”
I added a third finger. Slow. Careful. The stretch was significant—my fingers were not small—and I watched his face for any sign of discomfort, any flinch, any moment where pleasure tipped into something else.
It never came. His body took me, clenching and releasing in rhythm, and the way his cock jerked against his stomach with every movement of my fingers told me everything I needed to know about how close he was.
The rut hummed louder. The heat under my skin had reached the point where it crossed from discomfort into something that bordered on delirium. Every sound Jai made fed into it. Every twitch of his hips. Every ragged breath.
My cock ached, hard and desperate, and the rational part of my brain was getting quieter by the second.
Jai’s hand found my wrist. His grip was tight, fingers digging into the tendons, and when he spoke, his voice had that edge it got when he’d reached the end of his considerable patience.
“Braham.” Direct. Flat. The way he said my name when he was done negotiating. “If you don’t fuck me right now, I am going to do something we’ll both regret.”
I paused. Three fingers deep inside him, feeling the way his body clenched around me, hot and desperate, and the look on his face—sharp, wanting, completely fucking done with being patient—was the thing that finally snapped the thread.
I withdrew my fingers. He made a sound—protest, loss, want—and I was already pushing my pants down, freeing my cock, slicking myself with more lube than was strictly necessary.
The rut had me by the throat now, the heat behind my eyes white-hot, and the last coherent thought I had before I lined up and pushed into him was: slow. Go slow.
I did not go slow.
I drove into him in one steady, controlled thrust that buried me to the root. The heat of him surrounded me, tight and pulsing, and the sound Jai made was raw—a punched-out groan that started low in his chest and tore its way out of his throat.
His back arched off the bed. His hands found my shoulders, grip bruising, and for one suspended second neither of us moved, locked together, breathing the same air.
Then I pulled back and thrust again. Harder. Deeper. The wet sound of skin on skin filled the room, obscene and perfect. Jai’s legs came up, wrapped around my waist, heels digging into the small of my back, and the angle changed, and the noise he made was the kind that lived in my spine for days afterward.
The rut took over. Not all at once, but in layers, like something shedding skin.
My hand found his hip, grip tight enough to bruise, holding him steady as I fucked into him with a rhythm that had nothing to do with patience and everything to do with the white-hot need burning through every cell in my body.
My other hand braced beside his head, fingers digging into the sheets, and the room narrowed down to points of contact: my cock driving into his ass, his legs locked around me, his hands on my shoulders, his mouth against my throat when I bent to kiss him.
He was tight. Hot. His body took every inch and asked for more, his hips rolling up to meet each thrust, and the sounds falling from his mouth were filthy—broken, ragged, profane in a way that would have made me laugh under any other circumstances.
Now they just fed the rut, every gasp and curse and half-formed plea adding fuel to a fire that had been building since the moment he walked into my life.
I hovered at his throat. My mouth found the junction of his neck and shoulder, the spot where his pulse jumped under my lips, and I pressed my mouth there—hard—teeth grazing the skin without breaking it.
The restraint cost me more than any physical effort I’d ever expended. My wolf paced behind my ribs, frantic, insistent, theinstinct to bite, to claim, to mark so visceral it felt like it lived in my marrow. My teeth ached with it. My jaw clenched hard enough to send a dull throb through my molars.
I didn’t bite. I’d agreed.
The willpower required was its own kind of punishment, more severe than anything my body had ever asked of me. I pressed my lips to the spot, breathed against his skin, and felt his pulse hammer against my mouth like something trying to escape.
“Fuck,” Jai gasped. His voice was shattered. “Fuck, Braham, I’m close, I’m so close—”
His cock jerked between us, hard and flushed, and I reached between us, wrapped my hand around him, and stroked once—firm, from root to tip—and that was all it took.
His body went rigid. His back arched off the bed, every muscle locked, and he came with my name on his lips—“Braham”—raw and broken and completely, utterly surrendered.
