Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Kristen
The hallway stretches before me like a gauntlet. Every creak of the floorboards sounds like a gunshot in the silence.
This is insane. You're insane. Turn around.
My feet keep moving.
Nico's door looms in front of me. Dark wood. Brass handle. A barrier I'm about to obliterate because apparently I've lost my entire mind.
I raise my fist. Lower it. Raise it again.
My hand trembles.
I knock. Three quick raps that sound pathetically timid.
Nothing.
Maybe he's asleep.
The door swings open.
Nico stands there in low-slung sweatpants and nothing else.
"Took you long enough."
Before I can respond his hand shoots out, fists in my shirt, and pulls.
I stumble across the threshold. The door slams behind me. My back hits it a second later, his body crowding mine, and then his mouth is on me.
This isn't like the kiss on the couch. That was testing. Exploring.
This is claiming.
His tongue sweeps into my mouth, and I moan against him. An embarrassing, needy sound that would mortify me if I could think straight. But I can't think. Not with his hands sliding down my sides, gripping my hips, pulling me flush against him so I can feel exactly how much he wants this.
Wants me.
"Been thinking about this all day," he growls against my lips. His fingers find the hem of my cardigan, tugging it down my shoulders. "Couldn't focus. Couldn't work. Just kept seeing you underneath me."
The cardigan hits the floor.
Oh God.
Then his hands go to the sweater underneath—the thin, worn cotton I layered because I'm perpetually cold and also because—
I grab his wrists.
"Not that one."
He pauses. Tilts his head. "Why?"
Because underneath is the map of everything wrong with my body. Because Jack used to trace those marks with his finger and tell me they made me look "damaged." Because I've spent four years hiding them under clothes and in the dark.
"I have..." I swallow hard. "Stretch marks. From Lily. They're on my stomach and they're... they're not pretty."
Nico's expression doesn't change. Not pity. Not disgust. If anything, his eyes darken further.
"Let me see."
"Nico—"
"Kristen." His voice drops, rough and commanding. "If you want me to fuck you, you're going to be naked. All of you. No hiding."
My face flames. "That's not—you can't just—"
"I can." He leans in, lips brushing my ear. "And I will. Because those marks? The ones you're so ashamed of?" His teeth graze my earlobe. "They're proof you created life. They're proof your body did something incredible." A pause. "That's kind of hot."
I laugh because this is absurd. "You're insane."
"Probably." His hands find the sweater hem again. "Now let me see."
This time, I don't stop him.
The sweater comes up and over my head. My bra follows seconds later—he unclasps it with one hand like he's done it a thousand times, and maybe he has, and I can't think about that right now because I'm standing half-naked in front of Nico Sartori and his eyes are burning.
"Bed," he commands. "Now."
My legs move without permission. I lower myself onto the mattress and he follows me down, caging me with his arms.
For a moment, he just looks.
I want to cover myself. Want to curl into a ball and hide the silvery lines tracking across my lower belly, the slight softness I've never been able to lose, the body that Jack made me hate.
But Nico's gaze holds me pinned.
"Beautiful," he murmurs. "Fucking beautiful."
Then he lowers his head.
I expect him to go for my breasts. My neck. Anywhere but—
His lips press against my stomach.
I jolt. "What are you—"
"Shh."
His tongue traces one of the stretch marks.
My brain short-circuits.
He kisses another mark. Then another. Working his way across my belly like he's memorizing every silver line, every imperfection I've spent years hiding.
His stubble scrapes my skin, rough and perfect, and I'm making sounds I've never made before—whimpers and gasps and something dangerously close to a sob.
"Nico..."
Tears prick my eyes. I blink them back furiously.
His mouth travels upward. Kissing. Licking. Tasting. Until his lips close around my nipple and I arch off the bed with a gasp.
"Oh—"
He sucks gently, then harder, his hand coming up to cup my other breast. Fingers rolling, pinching.
"More," I hear myself beg. "Please—"
His teeth graze my nipple, and I shatter into a million pieces.
Nico's already moving down my body, his mouth trailing fire across my ribs, my stomach, my hips. His fingers hook into my underwear and drag them down my legs in one smooth motion.
Oh God. Oh God. Oh God.
"Nico, you don't have to—"
His shoulders wedge between my thighs, spreading me open, and I've never felt more exposed in my entire life.
Nico's breath ghosts over my center.
Then his mouth descends.
My back arches off the mattress. A sound tears from my throat as his tongue drags through my folds.
"Fuck—"
His hands grip my thighs, holding me open when I try to close them. Pinning me in place so he can devour me at his leisure.
And devour me he does.
His tongue circles my clit. Flicks. Sucks. Returns to those slow, torturous licks that make my vision blur. I'm babbling now my fingers fisting in his hair.
He growls against me.
"That's it." His voice is rough, wrecked. "Pull harder."
I do.
His tongue plunges inside me.
The world whites out.
I come so hard my entire body seizes. Wave after wave crashing through me, endless and overwhelming, and Nico doesn't stop. He works me through it, lapping at me, drawing out every last tremor until I'm shaking and gasping and half-convinced I've died.
When did I last feel this? When did anyone make me feel anything like this?
Never. The answer is never.
Jack treated sex like a chore. Something I owed him. Something to endure while he took what he wanted and left me empty.
This is worship.
"More," I whisper. The word surprises me. "I want more."
Nico lifts his head. His chin glistens. His eyes are nearly black with want.
"Good."
He rises to his knees.
Those sweatpants hang low on his hips, revealing the V of muscle that disappears beneath the waistband. His chest is a landscape of hard planes and old scars.
His hands go to his waistband.
I stop breathing.
The sweatpants drop.
Holy shit.
Nico Sartori is big. Thick and hard and straining toward me. A vein runs along the underside, and the head is already leaking at the tip.
My thighs clench involuntarily.
"Like what you see?"
I tear my gaze away from his cock to find him watching me with that infuriating smirk.
"It's... adequate."
He laughs.
"Condom," I manage. "Please tell me you have—"
"Nightstand."
He reaches over, yanks open the drawer, and produces a foil packet. I watch as he tears it open with his teeth and rolls the latex down his length.
Then he's back. Hovering over me. The head of his cock pressing against my entrance.
"Look at me."
I do.
"If you want to stop—"
"I don't."
"Kristen—"
"I don't want to stop." I grab his face, pulling him down until our foreheads touch. "I want you. All of you. Please."
He pushes inside.
The stretch burns. He's bigger than anyone I've been with—which, okay, is just Jack, but still—and my body struggles to accommodate him. But the burn is good. Real. Grounding me in this moment, in this man, in this impossible thing happening between us.
"Breathe," he murmurs against my temple. "Relax for me."
I force my muscles to unclench. He slides deeper. Inch by devastating inch until he's fully seated, and I feel impossibly full.
Neither of us moves.
His forehead drops to my shoulder. His breathing is ragged, harsh, like he's barely holding himself together.
"You feel..." He swallows hard. "Fuck, Kristen. You feel incredible."
I shift my hips experimentally. We both groan.
"Move," I whisper. "Please move."
He does.
Nico
She's perfect.
I've seen beautiful women before. Plenty of them. But Kristen is just like goddesses must be. The soft curve of her hips. The way her stomach rounds gently above those stretch marks. Her breasts, full and natural, rising and falling with each ragged breath.
"Stop staring," she whispers, but there's no conviction in it.
"No." I thrust into her again, harder this time, and her back arches off the mattress. "You're fucking gorgeous, and I'm going to look at you while I take you apart."
Her cheeks flush deeper.
I pull back, then drive forward again. Kristen gasps, her hands flying to grip the sheets. Her breasts bounce with the force of it, and I can't look away.
"Nico—"
"Tell me if it's too much."
"It's not." Her voice comes out breathless, broken. "Don't stop."
So I don't.
I find a rhythm. Each thrust pulls another sound from her throat. Little moans. Sharp gasps. My name, broken into syllables she can barely form.
Her body is soft where mine is hard. Warm where I've been cold for years. She takes everything I give her, and she doesn't break. Doesn't flinch. Doesn't look away.
I lean down, capturing her mouth. Her fingers tangle in my hair, pulling me closer.
"More," she breathes against my lips.
I pull out completely.
Her eyes fly open. "What—"
"Lift your hips."
She blinks, confused, but does as I ask. I grab one of the pillows and slide it beneath her, angling her pelvis higher.
"Better leverage," I explain, settling back between her thighs. "You'll feel everything."
I push back inside, and her whole body shudders.
"Oh." Her eyes go wide. "Oh, that's—"
"Yeah." I start moving again, watching her face. Every expression. Every flicker of pleasure. "That's it."
The new angle changes everything. Deeper. More intense. I can feel her tightening around me with each stroke, her body climbing toward something she can't control.
Her head tips back. Her chest heaves. Those beautiful breasts move with each thrust, and I palm one, rolling her nipple between my fingers.
"Nico." Her voice pitches higher. "I'm going to—I can't—"
"Look at me."
Her eyes snap to mine.
"Don't look away," I command. "I want to see you when you come."
She whimpers, her walls clenching around me. Her hands find my forearms, nails digging into skin. She's close. So fucking close.
"Let go, Kristen." I thrust harder. Faster. "Come for me."
She shatters.
Her whole body seizes, her pussy gripping my cock tight. Her back bows off the mattress, and I watch every second of it. The way her lips part. The way her eyes squeeze shut despite my order. The way her body trembles beneath me.
I follow her over the edge.
The orgasm rips through me. I bury myself deep, spilling inside her as my own groan tears free. My arms shake. My vision blurs. For a moment, there's nothing but her.
I collapse forward, barely catching myself on my elbows before I crush her. We're both breathing hard, slick with sweat, tangled together in ways I can't quite process.
"That was..." Kristen trails off, her chest still heaving.
"Yeah." I press my forehead to hers. "It was."
I kiss her again. Gentle in a way I didn't know I could be.
Kristen shifts beneath me, her skin still flushed. "I need a shower."
Thank fuck.
I don't say it out loud, but the relief is huge. I can't stand being sticky after sex. Never could. It's one of those things that drives me insane. The sweat. The mess. The feeling of everything drying on my skin.
"Good idea." I pull out of her slowly, watching her face for any sign of discomfort. She winces slightly, and I file that away. Too rough? No. She asked for more.
I roll off the bed and stand, not bothering to cover myself. Kristen's eyes track down my body, and I let her look. Fair's fair. I've been staring at her for the last hour.
"We'll shower together," I say, reaching down to scoop her off the mattress.
She squeaks as I lift her, her arms flying around my neck. "Nico! I can walk."
"I know." I carry her toward the bathroom anyway. "But this is faster."
"You're ridiculous."
"And you're naked in my arms. Stop complaining."
She giggles.
The bathroom is all black marble and glass. I set her down on the heated floor and turn on the shower, adjusting the temperature until steam starts rising. Kristen watches me, her arms crossed over her breasts in a way that's more habit than modesty.
"Stop covering yourself," I say without looking at her.
"Stop bossing me around."
"No."
She huffs, but her arms drop. Progress.
I guide her into the shower. The water cascades over both of us, hot enough to sting. Kristen tips her head back, letting it soak her hair, and I watch the droplets trace paths down her throat, her collarbone, the valley between her breasts.
Focus.
I grab the soap and start lathering my hands. "Turn around."
"Yes, sir." The words come out teasing, but something flickers in her eyes. Like she's testing how it sounds.
My cock twitches. Down, boy. We just finished.
"Careful," I murmur, stepping closer until her back is against my chest. "Keep calling me that, and this shower is going to take a lot longer than it should."
Her breath catches. "Maybe that's the point."
"Is it?" I run my soapy hands over her shoulders, down her arms. Slow. Deliberate. "Because you seemed pretty tired a minute ago."
"I was. I am." She shivers despite the hot water. "You're not playing fair."
"I never play fair." My hands slide around to her stomach. "It's not in my nature."
"Shocking revelation."
I smile against her wet hair. "Smart mouth."
"You like my mouth."
"I do." I turn her to face me, cupping her jaw. Water streams down both our faces. "I like everything about you, Kristen. That's the problem."
She kisses my thumb.
I wash her properly after that. Her hair. Her back. Every inch of skin I can reach. She does the same for me, her small hands running over muscles I've spent years building for violence.
When we're both clean, I shut off the water and wrap her in the biggest towel I own. She looks cute, swimming in white cotton, and I can't stop staring.
"What?" she asks, catching my expression.
"Nothing." I grab a towel for myself, scrubbing it over my hair. "Just thinking."