Chapter 23 #2
"Axel," she whispers, her hands sliding up my back, nails dragging lightly.
"I'm here. I've got you."
I make love to her. Because that's what this is. Not fucking. Not just physical release or stress relief. This is something else entirely. Something I've never done before, never wanted before.
Her legs wrap around my waist, pulling me deeper. I lean down, capture her mouth in a kiss that's achingly tender, pouring everything I can't say into it.
"You're mine," I murmur against her lips between kisses. "Not as possession. Not as property. As choice. You're mine because you choose to be."
"Yes," she gasps, clenching around me. "And you're mine."
"Always."
The pace stays slow, languid, unhurried. Our bodies moving together like we've done this a thousand times instead of just a handful. Like we know each other completely, like we were built for this.
"I'm going to come again," she warns, her voice breathless.
"Good. I want to feel it."
Her second orgasm builds gradually, then crashes over her in waves. She clenches around me rhythmically, and the sensation is almost too much to bear.
"Aurora," I groan, feeling my own release building. "I'm..."
"Inside me. Please. I want to feel you."
That does it. I come with a shudder, burying my face in her neck as pleasure washes through me in waves.
We stay locked together, both breathing hard, neither wanting to move or break this connection.
"That was different," she says eventually, her voice soft.
"Yeah."
"Good different."
"Very good different."
I pull out carefully, and she makes a small sound of loss that goes straight to my chest. But before I can move away or suggest we sleep, she's pushing at my chest.
"What are you doing?" I ask, letting her push me onto my back.
"Round two." Her eyes are dark, hungry, full of renewed desire. "That was beautiful. But now I need you to fuck me."
My cock, which hasn't even fully softened yet, goes fully hard again at her words.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah." She straddles me in one smooth motion, taking charge. "I need it hard. Need to feel it tomorrow when I walk. Need you to mark me so I remember who I belong to."
Fuck.
She sinks down onto me in one smooth motion, and we both groan at the sensation.
"Like this?" I grip her hips hard enough to leave fingerprints. "You want it hard?"
"Yes."
I flip us over, pinning her beneath me with my weight. Her eyes go wide, excited, aroused.
"Then hold on tight."
I start moving, and this time there's nothing slow about it. I'm pounding into her, the bed frame hitting the wall with each thrust, probably loud enough for the whole house to hear.
"Yes," she's gasping, her nails raking down my back. "Yes, like that, oh fuc..."
"This what you needed?"
"Yes!"
I grab her wrists, pin them above her head with one hand. The other goes to her throat, not squeezing, not restricting air, just holding. Claiming.
"Mine," I growl.
"Yours."
"Say it again."
"I'm yours, Axel. Only yours."
The possession in her voice, the way she surrenders to it, drives me wild. I'm fucking her like an animal, desperate and rough, and she's taking it all. Begging for more.
"Harder," she demands breathlessly. "I can take it."
I give her harder. Give her everything I have, every ounce of strength and desire and need. The room fills with the sound of skin on skin, her gasps, my grunts, the rhythmic thud of the headboard.
"Touch yourself," I order. "Make yourself come on my cock."
Her hand slides between us, finding her clit. I watch her face as she works herself, see the pleasure building in her expression, and it's the most erotic thing I've ever seen.
"That's it. Show me how good it feels."
"So good," she moans. "So close..."
"Come. Come for me right now."
She shatters with a scream, her whole body convulsing beneath me. The feeling of her clenching around me, pulsing and squeezing, triggers my own orgasm. I come hard, seeing stars, barely keeping myself from collapsing on top of her.
We're both sweating, shaking, completely spent and wrung out.
I roll off her, and we lie side by side, staring at the ceiling while we catch our breath and wait for our hearts to stop racing.
"That was serious branding," she finally says.
"Yeah." I smile. “It was.”
We're quiet for a long moment, just breathing. Then she turns onto her side to look at me.
"What are we doing, Axel?"
"What do you mean?"
"This. Us. One minute we're fighting like we hate each other. The next we're..." She gestures at the bed, at our naked, sweaty bodies. "And I don't know what we are to each other."
"What do you want us to be?"
"I don't know. Something more than just people stuck together by a baby. But I don't know what that looks like or how to get there."
I turn to face her, reaching out to tuck her hair behind her ear. "Then we figure it out. Together. One day at a time."
"Just like that?"
"Just like that." I pause, searching for words that don't come easily to me. "Aurora, I don't know how to do this. A relationship. I've never had one. Never wanted one. Never thought I was capable of it. But with you..." I stop, trying to find the right words. "With you, I want to try."
"Even though we fight constantly?"
"Even though. Maybe especially because you fight with me. You don't let me get away with anything. You call me on my bullshit. That's... that's something I need. Something I didn't even know I needed."
She's quiet, processing this. "I want to try too. But I need you to understand something."
"What?"
"I can't be locked away. Can't live my entire life behind walls, no matter how nice those walls are. I need freedom. Need to make my own choices, even if they're sometimes stupid choices."
"I know. And I'll try to give you that. But you have to meet me halfway."
"How?"
"Tell me when you want to do something. Let me set up security. Don't just disappear and hope for the best." I touch her face gently. "I can give you freedom, Aurora. But I can't give you recklessness. Not when there are people who want to hurt you to get to me."
She considers this for a long moment. "Okay. I can do that. No more sneaking out. But in exchange, you stop making decisions about my life without asking me first."
"Deal."
"And we talk. When we're angry, when we're scared, when we don't know what to do. We talk instead of just fighting or walking away or shutting down."
"That's harder for me. I'm not good at talking about feelings."
"I know. But you have to try."
"I will. I promise I'll try."
"Tell me about your mother," I say after a moment, the need to really know her welling up.
Her voice goes quiet, small. "She was everything to me. Kind, strong, beautiful. She used to read me stories every night. Made up silly songs while she cooked. Taught me how to be brave even when I was scared."
"And then the Kozlovs killed her." The horror story is not unknown in the mafia world.
"I watched it happen. Hid under the dining room table while they shot her. Heard her scream. Saw the blood spreading across the white carpet." She's shaking now against me. "I was eight years old, and I watched my mother die because of my father's business. Because of this life."
I hold her tighter, wishing I could take that memory away. "I'm sorry."
"It's why I'm so scared of this world. Of violence. Of being trapped in it with no way out." She looks up at me with eyes full of old pain. "My mother never had a choice. She married my father, got pulled into this life, and it killed her. I don't want that to be my story."
"It won't be. I promise you, it won't be."
"You can't promise that. You can't control everything, no matter how much you try."
"No. But I can try. Can do everything in my power to keep you safe. To give our child a better life than we had."
"And I can learn to be more careful. To think before I act. To not put myself in danger just to prove a point or feel normal."
We're both quiet, holding each other in the dark, sharing our pain and our fears.
"What do you want for our baby?" she asks finally. "What kind of life?"
I think about it seriously. "Safe. Loved. Better than what I had. Better than what you had. I want them to know they're valued for who they are, not what they can do for the organization."
"Me too. But how do we do that in this world?"
"I don't know. But we'll figure it out."
"Together?"
"Together."
She yawns, her body relaxing against mine, the tension finally draining away. "I'm exhausted."
"Sleep. I'll stay."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
She drifts off in my arms, her breathing evening out into the rhythm of sleep. I lie there awake, staring at the ceiling, my mind racing.
This is new territory for me. Staying the night with someone. Talking about feelings and the past. Making promises about the future that I actually intend to keep.
But with Aurora, it feels right. Feels like something I want to try, even though it terrifies me more than any gun ever has.
Tomorrow we'll probably fight again. We'll clash over something stupid, test these new boundaries we're trying to set. Push against each other because that's who we are.
But tonight, we're okay.
And maybe that's enough.