Page 37

“Take it, take it, take—” I gasped, echoing the words Kit had growled just before he came.

My cock kicked in my hand. Cum streaked my stomach, hitting warm and cooling fast. I kept stroking, wringing out the pleasure, making it last. As soon as it ended, I knew the crash would come.

The last of my cum dribbled out, and I dropped my hand to my side, trembling where I lay.

Alone.

Always so alone.

The comfort of Kit’s touch—even in anger—and the release of my guilt drifted away with the last tendrils of orgasm. The uncomfortable truth snuck under my skin.

None of this did anything to absolve me. Kit’s anger, Kit’s punishment, Kit’s pleasure. It didn’t touch Dakota’s pain. Nothing could ever make up for the harm I’d done to her.

Kit couldn’t punish me for that. He didn’t own her suffering.

But he carried his own grief and rage. I’d taken it into myself, atoned in some small measure for the betrayal he must have felt after learning who I really was. That I wasn’t just a cute hookup, a guy he’d wanted to date, but the last guy he’d have ever connected with by choice.

Maybe it was fucked up that I’d liked the treatment tonight. Liked being shoved against a wall and ordered to beg. Liked swallowing his dick while he glared at me like I was the devil.

It didn’t really matter. It wasn’t as if it were going to happen again. Kit had walked out without looking back. He’d looked sick…and sad when he’d stumbled away from me.

Lost, even.

But he couldn’t be any more lost than me. I didn’t even know who I was anymore.

I woke to the phone ringing. I rolled over, eyes crusty and mind fogged. “Hello?” I croaked.

“Joey, it’s Matteo. You’re going to be late for your first day at Paws & Claws.”

“Shit,” I groaned.

Starting a new job was the last thing on my mind.

I’d gotten fired from the print shop last week. I’d been unfocused, stressed about writing and then delivering the letter of apology to Dakota. Unmotivated, even on a good day, to pretend I enjoyed being at work.

Molly had hated me, and I’d hated working there. It’d been a mutually beneficial firing.

Matteo had been a step ahead of me as usual and had another job opportunity lined up for me. And what did it say about me that he expected me to need another job so quickly?

He’d made a couple of calls, I’d signed a job offer, and voila, new dead-end job acquired.

But in the aftermath of delivering that letter to Kit—and, god, had he really shown up and fucked my mouth or was that a vivid sex dream?—my job status hadn’t been a priority.

“Get your ass over here now,” Matteo said, the most exasperated I’d ever heard him. “We can’t keep going on this way.”

“I know. I’ll be there.”

I raced through a shower. I’d have skipped it, but I’d acquired the stench of cum and sweat overnight. I soaped up, rinsed, and dried off in five minutes. Threw on my most respectable outfit: jeans instead of sweats, a green polo instead of a hoodie. I finger-combed my messy hair into some semblance of order. It’d have to do.

Matteo was waiting outside the store when I arrived. He checked his phone and raised an eyebrow at me. “I called and made an excuse about a meeting running long. She thinks we’re late because of me.”

I swallowed. “Thanks.”

“You have to make this job work,” Matteo said. “This needs to be the last time you’re late.”

“Yeah, I got it.”

“Do you?” Matteo asked, voice hard. “Because if you don’t make this one work, I can’t justify keeping you in the program.”