8. Lucas
EIGHT
Lucas
Now that I’m alone in the bed, I feel a little stupid. I completely fell apart. I came twice . Without ever touching my cock. While being fucked by a man.
I have never, ever had a sexual experience like that. It rewrote something inside me, changed me fundamentally. Or maybe it simply revealed the truth, showed me what I need.
I loved how he took control of me. It was scary, but giving up control was part of what made it feel so good. I didn’t have to make decisions or think, which meant I didn’t over think like I usually do. All I had to do was feel.
And, god, it felt good.
I didn’t even know I could come handsfree like that. I had no idea it would feel so good to have a man’s cock inside me.
More than that, it felt good to be wanted. And seeing that huge cock so hard for me, feeling the way he fucked me, how he came, how he held me after with his cock inside me like it belonged there … I definitely felt wanted.
In his arms, with him inside me, some anxious, restless part of me settled for the first time in my whole life. I felt … peace.
But the instant he got up from the bed to go wash up in the bathroom, that anxious, restless part stirred again, and my usual feeling of being pathetic and dumb returned in full force.
I was so loud. I’m never loud. I don’t cry out like that. I don’t moan. And I was so needy after. That’s not like me.
The worst thing is that I’m attributing so much meaning to this. I know, logically, that I’m wrong. I have to be. I mean, come on. I don’t know him. I don’t know anything about him. I don’t even know his name. He doesn’t know me either.
And what am I imagining that any of this could mean anyway?
I’m in a prison cell, and not even a legal one. I’m not getting out of here, regardless of whether Frank repays his debt.
My disappearance will barely be a blip on anyone’s radar. The guy who owns the gym I clean might try to call me, but when I never answer, he’ll be annoyed and hire someone else. When I don’t pay my rent, my landlord will bitch about clearing out my shit, but that’s all.
No one will look for me. No one will report me missing. No one will care.
These thoughts form so easily, so automatically that I’m lost in them in seconds. I’m so lost in them that I don’t see Briggs approach the gate. I don’t notice him until he’s unlocking it.
He pulls it open and puts a finger to his lips. My heart jumps. I glance toward the bathroom. I can’t see the fighter around the partial wall, and all I can hear is the tap running.
I look at Briggs again. He motions me forward.
I almost, almost get up at the sight of that open gate. Of course I want out. Of course I want freedom. But I have a very bad feeling about the man offering it to me.
Briggs opens the gate further. He glances at the bathroom then steps into the cell. He draws his gun and points it at me.
“Make a noise,” he whispers, “and I’ll fucking kill you. Get over here. Now.”
Shit.
I toss the blanket aside and get up. Before heading into the bathroom, the fighter used some gauze to clean up the traces of cum on my stomach, but I can feel it leaking from my hole as I stand. I can feel the soreness of having been fucked. That, combined with the fact that I’m naked? I feel pretty fucking vulnerable.
And that’s before I notice the hard ridge of Briggs’s cock in his black pants.
Fuck.
I halt. I glance at the bathroom again, where the faucet is still running. He can’t hear us. He doesn’t know what’s happening.
But what could he do anyway? He’s a prisoner. He has no power over Briggs, and he can’t protect me from a gun. Why would he even try? He could get shot, maybe even killed. He won’t risk that for me.
Briggs marches my way. I take a step back. I don’t like the look in his eyes. I don’t want him to touch me.
With his gun ready in one hand, Briggs grabs my wrist with the other.
“Move, bitch,” he hisses in a low voice as he yanks me forward, slinging me toward the open gate.
I try to catch myself as I stumble, but his boot lands in my back and sends me flying through. As I slam painfully to my hands and knees on the concrete outside the cell, a roar splits the air behind me. Briggs shouts. The gun fires.
By the time I can scramble around to see, the fighter has charged into Briggs and is slamming him into the bars. The gun goes flying.
The fighter gets his hands around Briggs’s neck, but Briggs pulls something from his belt. The fighter barks in pain and jolts back. Briggs scrambles for the gate. The fighter launches after him. He’s unsteady, half falling, but he still manages to grab Briggs around the knees.
Briggs slams to the ground. A taser goes spinning out of his grasp. They scramble and wrestle, but Briggs doesn’t stand a chance. It doesn’t matter that the fighter has just been tased. It doesn’t matter that he’s naked and wholly unprotected and bleeding from a fresh wound on his shoulder.
Briggs is going to die.
They end up on their knees with the fighter behind Briggs, wrapping his neck in a stranglehold. Briggs’s face is red and straining, his hands scrabbling at the fighter’s powerful, corded arm.
The guardroom door flies open and three men charge in with guns raised.
“Let him go, Beast!” one of the guards shouts.
“MINE!”
As the word explodes through the room, everyone freezes. Everyone stares.
Did he just speak ? Jesus, I didn’t even know he could.
The faces of the guards reflect total shock. They’ve never heard him speak either.
The fighter’s face is contorted with fury. He still has one arm hooked around Briggs’s neck. His other hand grips Briggs’s head, knuckles white. He’s equally ready to strangle him or snap his neck.
Is that what he wants? Is that what he’s claiming as his? The kill?
That’s what one of the guards seems to think. He shifts nervously, clearly aware that he might not be able to control this situation. He says in a careful tone, “Let him go, Beast. It’s not worth it.”
“MINE!” the fighter shouts again, his voice rough and deep.
The redhaired guard, the one who brought the sweatpants, says, “I think it’s the kid he wants.”
Physically, I don’t move from where I’m crouched at the edge of this conflict, but internally I jolt. What? No. That can’t possibly—
The fighter grunts in clear assent.
Briggs shouts in a strangled tone, “Just shoot him in the fucking head!”
“The boss will have our balls, dickhead, and what were you doing anyway?”
“He doesn’t need the kid anymore, I was taking him out—”
The fighter snarls and turns his face toward Briggs, who screams high and loud as the fighter seems to bite him. The fighter spits out a bloody chunk of flesh as blood spills down Brigg’s neck from the ragged end of his bitten-off earlobe.
Chaos erupts.
The guards shout and dance around. Guns are waved in the air.
I’m still frozen, still feeling like I’m outside of this, like it can’t possibly have anything to do with me. I’ve always been shut out, shut away. I’m not the center of anything, so I can’t imagine—
One of the guards storms toward me. His gun points at my head. I recoil, but he grabs me and yanks me up.
Roaring, the fighter hauls Briggs to his feet. The fighter is furious, shaking with rage. His eyes are burning with it. But he controls himself because Briggs is his only leverage for what he wants.
Me.
Somehow, even in the midst of the chaos and danger, a strange layer of protection seems to settle over me. The fighter is the most dangerous man here. Even naked and unarmed, the others fear him and he doesn’t fear them. He’s facing them, standing up to them—for me.
“Jesus, just give him what he wants!” yells the redhaired guard. “Put the kid in the fucking cell!”
I get hustled through the gate, but I don’t fight it. It’s where I want to be. I certainly don’t want to be outside the cell with the guards.
“All right, big guy,” the redhaired guard says, “you got what you wanted. The kid is yours. Let Briggs go.”
The fighter releases Briggs, who flings himself away, scrambling for his dropped gun. He snatches it up and points it at me. I jump back from where I’m standing at the bars.
The fighter lurches toward him but stops at the threat to me.
“Fuck, Briggs,” the redhaired guard says. “Just let it go. It’s done.”
“It’s not fucking done, O’Neil!” Briggs shouts, face twisting with fury. “Fucking animal bit my ear off!”
The redhaired guard, O’Neil, says, “You obviously went in the cell, so I don’t know what the fuck you expected.”
“Does he look like he needs a fucking nurse? I was taking out the extra trash. If he wants to keep the kid as a fucking toy, let him prove that it’ll motivate him to behave.”
“Jesus, Briggs, what—”
Briggs glares at the fighter. “On your knees, animal. Prove you’ll behave, or I shoot the kid in his pretty face.”
The fighter’s chest is heaving, his abdomen contracting hard. His eyes are furious. His fists are clenched.
But he does it. He drops to his knees.
Foolishly, desperately, I hope that’s all it will be, that he’ll be told to get in the cell, that Briggs won’t—
Briggs yanks his baton from his belt, storms toward the fighter, and strikes him hard in the abdomen.
“No!” I shout, bolting for the open gate only to be caught by one of the guards.
The fighter lets out a loud huff at the awful impact, but he doesn’t drop. He growls at Brigg, lip curling.
Briggs sneers, “That’s right, beast, remember what you are. A fucking animal.”
Briggs hits him again with the baton.
“Stop it!” I scream, yanking against the guard’s hold. “Stop!”
O’Neil catches Brigg’s arm before he swings the baton again. “You know the boss doesn’t want him damaged outside the ring. You wanna explain this shit to him?”
Briggs yanks his arm free. Stowing his baton and gun, he stalks a few feet away to snatch up his dropped taser.
“Fine,” Briggs snaps as he returns. “No visible damage.”
With that, he hits the fighter in the back with the taser, making him arch and cry out in pain as the electricity jolts through him.
I’m screaming, thrashing in the hold of the guard as it goes on and on. It’s fucking awful, and my fighter just takes it. To prove he’ll behave. So he can keep me. So they won’t hurt me.
Briggs tases him again and again until he collapses onto his hands and knees and vomits.
“Animal!” Briggs shouts again and kicks the fighter in the gut—then he storms away down the hallway that runs along the guardroom.
“Jesus Christ,” O’Neil mutters, swiping a sleeve across his forehead as Briggs’s footsteps fade. “Just get up easy, okay, big guy? Get back in the cell. It’s over.”
The fighter gets shakily to his feet. The guard who was holding me back shoves me away and darts out of the cell as the fighter walks unsteadily toward it. The second he’s inside, the gate clangs shut behind him.
“Oh my god ,” I mumble, darting toward him. I don’t know exactly what I think I’m going to do, but it quickly becomes irrelevant because he grabs me and hauls me toward the mattress. He pushes me down on it and grunts a warning to stay. Then he stalks off and starts pacing back and forth across the cell.
Outside, the guards argue among them themselves. One of them leaves. The others remain, glancing now and then at the fighter as he paces across the cell, eyeing them. His movement is stiff, a little uneven. I can tell he’s in pain, but when I start to get up from the mattress, he growls at me to stay put.
The guard who left returns with a mop bucket and cleans the floor—because, good god , he just got beaten and tased until he threw up . Then they all leave, closing the guardroom door behind them.
When they’re gone, the fighter stalks to the punching bag and starts hitting it. For a while, I just let him. He’s upset, and though I’m relieved to be back here with him, he still scares me a little. I hate that fact, but it’s there. He’s too strong. He’s too angry.
But … he has every right to be angry.
As for his strength, it’s incredible—and it’s not just physical.
I don’t know how he’s so fucking resilient, but the scars on his body and little things about his behavior tell me he’s been enduring these circumstances for a long time. He’s been held captive. Abused. Tortured. I think … fuck, I think that’s why he doesn’t talk. He obviously can. It’s not a physical disability. It’s mental. Or maybe a choice.
But he did speak today, and what he said was “mine”—and he meant me .
No one has ever claimed me before.
Go away.
Be quiet.
Let us pretend you don’t exist.
That’s what I expect from people. That’s what I know of myself. That I’m unwanted. Unnecessary. In the way.
A nasty little voice inside me says, He claimed you because he didn’t want to be alone. Because there was nothing else to claim.
Maybe that’s true.
Maybe I’m wanted only for lack of other options.
But he didn’t have to want me. And he didn’t at first. He pushed me away. And they expected him to kill me.
He claimed me instead.
He allowed himself to be abused to keep me. I wasn’t hurt—because he protected me.
I get up from the mattress. Cautiously, I approach him. He keeps hitting the bag. With him naked, I can see every muscle in his body flexing as he pounds the leather side of it.
I guess I’ve never stared at a male body before. I guess I never understood how beautiful it can be. The structure. The power. His lats pop out along his side with every punch. His abs flex. Muscle shifts along his arms and legs and through the curve of his ass. His heavy cock swings between his legs.
Self-consciousness starts to niggle at me. He’s so much stronger than I am. So much tougher. His scarred body bears wounds that haven’t yet healed from his match. He just got beaten and tased. He has a fresh wound, a bullet graze, on his shoulder.
In comparison, what am I?
He stops hitting the bag. He stills it with his hands and looks over his bleeding shoulder at me. Then I see it. A hint of vulnerability amid the anger. He needs something and can’t ask for it.
Or maybe he doesn’t even know what it is that he needs. But I do. I know. So I put my insecurities aside and hold out my hand.
I don’t think I’ve ever held out my hand to anyone. I’ve never felt like I was in a position to be something for someone else. It’s strange to experience it for the first time with someone so powerful and dangerous.
But I can see past that right now. I can see that he needs something. Needs … me.
He stares at my offered hand like he has no idea what to do with it. Almost like, maybe, he’s a little scared of it.
I take a step forward. Another. I lay my hand over his on the bag. His fingers twitch. I curl mine around them. When I pull his hand away from the punching bag and gently tug, asking him to follow, he does.
As he walks with me to the bed, his fingers never close on mine in return, but that’s okay. It’s enough that he comes with me.
With pressure and body language, I ask him to sit. I want to look at his shoulder. Blood has spilled down his delt. I want to see his older wounds too. They’re not healed yet, and he just got struck in the abdomen a bunch of times.
He does sit, but he doesn’t give me a chance to look at him. He pulls me into his lap. We’re front to front with me straddling him, my legs folded on either side of him. His arms hook around me, tugging me close, locking me against him. I press my face against his neck. His stubbled chin brushes my temple.
I feel myself calm down as he holds onto me. I thought I was calm before, but I realize now that I wasn’t. I feel the difference as I relax against him.
It’s strange how much I like the feel of a male body against mine— his body against mine. I like his size and strength. I like the way he smells. I like being naked with him, how there’s nothing between us, how aware it makes me of what we did together and what I know we’ll do again soon.
And maybe it’s awful, but I like his violence too.
He protected me, hurt others to defend me.
But however strong and tough he is, he just got the shit beaten out of him. And he just spoke for the first time in god knows how long. He’s trembling. So I slip my arm under his and hook it around his back. My fingers twitch at the scar tissue. Somehow, I had forgotten to expect it. But I splay my hand over his scarred back and hold on.
I still don’t know his name. I still don’t know why he’s here in this cell. We’re still strangers to each other.
So why doesn’t it feel like it?
Within seconds of being in his arms, I feel right again. I feel that sense of belonging that I felt right after sex. But it’s stronger this time because no amount of self doubt can make me forget the word that broke his silence.
Mine.
I try to draw back. I want to look at his injuries. He needs a doctor, not me, but I still want to see. He doesn’t like it. He resists, clamping on tighter. Tentatively, I lift my hand to the back of his head. I stroke his thick, buzzed hair.
“Let me look,” I murmur.
He makes a small sound of protest, but I can tell he’s going to let me, so I draw away. His hands drift down to my waist as I look at the bullet graze on his left delt. I’m sure it should be stitched, but I can at least put some wound closure strips on it.
As I extricate myself from him, I take his hand so he knows I’m not leaving. This was an issue once before, and I understand it. He’s been really alone, like I have, worse than I have. He needs to feel, physically, that I’m still here.
And giving that to him feels really fucking good. It gives it back to me too.
Despite the fact that we remain in physical contact as I do what I can for his injuries, he never looks at me. Compared to his usually intent gaze, the avoidance is notable.
Is it because he spoke?
I want to push him for more words. I want to know his name. I want to know why he’s here in this cell.
I want to know why he wants me.
But it’s enough, for now, just to know that he does. It’s enough just to be together.
By some miracle, the baton hit him above the stitches in his abdomen. He’ll have an awful new bruise, but no more stitches where torn.
“I want to clean up,” I tell him when I’ve done all that I can. “I’m …” I trail off, face heating. I don’t know why I’m embarrassed to say itchy, but I am. I can still feel cum between my ass cheeks.
He looks at me finally. He frowns at my obvious embarrassment, seemingly confused, then his eyes widen in understanding. He gets up so fast that he startles me.
He snatches up one of the blankets then walks me to the bathroom with a hand on my lower back.
“I can—” I try as we reach the bathroom entrance, but he makes a sound of denial.
He keeps glancing at the guardroom door. I think he’s afraid to let me out of his sight.
There’s no hot water, but he soaks a corner of the blanket. I try to take it from him.
He bends me over forcefully. I catch myself against the sink.
“Oh my god,” I mutter, mortified when he starts cleaning between my ass cheeks. “I can do that my—”
A growl cuts me off this time, and the hand on my lower back says he’s going to do this whether I like it or not.
At first, I don’t like it at all. It’s embarrassing as hell.
I’m not sure why that changes. Maybe because there’s very little light in here and no mirror. Without visuals, all I have is sensation and sound.
Warmth begins to move through my body as he sweeps the cloth against my sensitive skin. His hand is heavy and sure on my lower back. He’s making deep, rumbling sounds of something like pleasure.
When the cloth moves between my spread legs and grazes my balls, my breath catches. He crouches behind me, continuing with his gentle cleansing—then his tongue strokes across my hole. I gasp at the unfamiliar sensation. He murmurs wordlessly and licks me again.
As he continues to tease my rim, my cock stiffens. My hands clench on the sink.
“Fuck,” I breathe. “Jesus.”
Why the hell does that feel so good? Why didn’t I know that feels good?
I can’t believe how unfamiliar I am with my own body. I can’t believe how it responds to him. To his touch. His dominance.
When his tongue pushes past the tight ring of muscle, I let out a needy little sound that I don’t recognize.
I like this. I like it so much.
His hands move to my ass cheeks, roaming down my thighs and back up, squeezing and massaging. All the while, he keeps licking me. My cock hardens, twitching upward.
I reach down and grip myself, moaning at the doubled pleasure of my hand’s glide and his tongue on my hole. He rumbles against me like he’s pleased, and the vibration has me stroking harder.
I feel like I’m in another world, another reality. My experience here with him is wholly outside what I know of myself. It’s something about this place. The isolation, the bareness. It’s him too, of course. His silence and physicality and dominance.
It’s like everything is stripped away, exposing my raw, unfiltered self. I don’t think. I don’t decide. I just experience the erotic lathing of his tongue against my hole and the delicious kneading of his hands over my ass and legs. I listen to his rumbling and my own soft moans. I stroke myself like I’m entitled to this kind of pleasure.
My balls draw up taut and full and I come with a sharp cry, gripping myself through my release, letting my cock spurt into the darkness. It’s strange to come so easily, like there was never anything wrong with my body, like I simply didn’t know what it needed.
I’m left trembling and gasping, leaning against the sink. He murmurs against me. His tongue strokes one last time, then he tugs at me, turning me until my ass is against the sink.
I cry out as his tongue sweeps across my sensitive cockhead, sweeping away any traces of my release. There’s so little light in here that he’s a vague shape, huge and powerful as he rises. He grunts at me and puts his hand on my sternum. Stay, I think it means, because he walks out of the bathroom.
I peer around the empty doorframe and watch him move through the cell. He’s stiff, not moving very well, clearly in pain—and no fucking wonder. There’s a burn mark on his back from the taser, one of many reminders of what just happened to him.
It’s clearly nothing new for him. He’s scarred from every angle. With the awful lash marks, his back is almost the worst. His pain tolerance is obviously high, so when he turns to crouch by the mattress, giving me a side view, I’m not totally surprised to see his cock partially hard. I think most men’s wouldn’t be after what he just went through.
But I’m pleased to see it because it means he enjoyed rimming me. I’m pleased to see it because it’s beautiful.
Reaching inside the mattress where there must be a hole, he pulls out a toothbrush. Longing unfurls inside me. God, I’d love to brush my teeth. Maybe he’ll give me the worn out one by the sink? I almost used it earlier but didn’t. I didn’t know how he’d react if I did that.
He returns to the bathroom—and hands me the toothbrush that he just retrieved. I can tell from the bristles that it’s new. I can tell from the fact that it was hidden inside the mattress that he was saving it.
“Are you … giving this to me?”
He grunts. I can’t see his face in the dimness, but I can make out his movements. He picks up the other toothbrush, the old one, and puts a little toothpaste on it. As he starts brushing his teeth, he hands the tube to me.
I stare, stunned. I haven’t been in this cell very long, but it’s still obvious to me that such a gift is huge.
“Thank you,” I whisper, hoping he hears how much I mean it.
His hand lifts. Tentatively, uncertainly, he strokes the back of my head. He’s … petting me.
Even though I can’t see myself, when I feel the smile on my face, I know beyond any doubt that it’s the biggest one that’s ever been there.