Chapter 7
Jude
Closing time came, and I got the sticky mess of stage makeup off as fast as I could, barely registering the other performers around me. I had to find Ash. Had to—what? Apologize? Explain? Pin him against a wall and make him understand that he was mine even if I was too fucked up to say it properly?
I headed for the parking lot, figuring that he would have bolted himself, but stopped when I heard voices down one of the back corridors. Ash’s voice. And that guy again.
He was a persistent fucker.
I turned the corner and saw them standing in the shadows between equipment crates. The guy was leaning in, saying something about getting drinks this weekend, and Ash wasn’t shutting it down. He wasn’t moving away.
My vision went red.
I crossed the distance in four strides, and when I reached them, I didn’t think. I just grabbed Ash’s wrist and yanked him away from the guy, pulling him deeper into the corridor, into the darkness where the overhead lights didn’t quite reach.
“What the—” Ash started, but I cut him off by slamming him against the concrete wall.
“You’re done,” I said, my voice coming out rough. “You’re done talking to him.”
“Excuse me?” His eyes were blazing in the dim light. “You don’t get to—”
“I know I don’t get to, but I’m doing it anyway.” My hand was flat against his chest, my fingers splayed over his collarbones in a way that made me feel powerful and in control. “I’m done watching other people touch you.
“You don’t get to decide who I talk to.” His voice shook with fury. “You made it really fucking clear you can’t stand me.”
“Again. I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to. You—” He cut himself off, jaw clenching hard enough I could see the muscle jump. “What do you want, Jude? Tell me right now what you actually want.”
The corridor was dark and empty; the sound of the crowd had long faded.
We were alone back here, in the guts of the staff area where no one would come unless they were looking.
I had one hand on his chest and the other braced against the wall beside his head, closing him in despite his bulkier frame.
I’d been fighting this since the moment I met him, shoving down want and need because it terrified me. Because wanting someone this much meant they could destroy me.
But watching another man touch him tonight had broken something loose inside me. It was the last defense I’d been clinging to.
“You,” I said. The word came out rough, scraped raw from somewhere deep in my chest. “I want you. And I’m sick of pretending I don’t.”
For a heartbeat, neither of us moved. Ash’s eyes went wide in the darkness, his breath catching audibly.
Then he grabbed the front of my vest and yanked me in, and our mouths crashed together.
It wasn’t gentle. It couldn’t be, not with weeks of tension finally breaking, not with anger and want and desperation all tangling together.
He bit my lower lip hard enough to hurt, and I groaned and pressed closer, getting my thigh between his legs.
His hands were already working at my buckles, fingers fumbling with straps I wished weren’t there.
I was doing the same to his vest, both of us trying to get through layers of gear without stopping the kiss.
I had his shoulder harness undone and his shirt pulled free before I could second-guess a thing.
Ash pulled back just enough to speak, his pupils blown wide. “Someone could—”
“Let them.” I kissed down his jaw, his throat, finding the places that made his breath hitch. Let them see! Let that guy see me staking my claim on Ash here, against a fucking wall like an animal.
But then Ash changed it up. Unpredictable as always.
He made a sound low in his throat and spun us, pushing my back against the wall instead. His thigh jammed between my legs, forcing me to spread them apart, and the pressure was perfect and not nearly enough. “Say it again.”
“Which part?”
“That you want me.” His hand slid up under my shirt, nails scraping over my ribs as he pinned me there. “Say it.”
“I want you,” I managed. “So fucking much it’s ruining me.”
“Good.” He leaned in to bite my throat, definitely hard enough to leave a mark, and I didn’t care. I wanted it. I wanted evidence of this tomorrow during our performance, wanted to feel the ache and remember how good it could be to give in to impulses.
His hands were on my belt now, and mine were on his, and we were both breathing hard, pressed together in the dark with our tactical gear half-undone.
This was insane. We were still in costume, still at work; anyone could walk down this corridor and find us.
But I just didn’t give a flying fuck. Not when Ash’s hand finally got my belt open and slipped inside, not when I was doing the same to him, not when we were both making sounds that would be embarrassing later but felt necessary now.
“Turn around.” Ash growled the words into my mouth. His voice made my knees weak.
But that wasn’t how this was supposed to go.
I wanted him, but I wanted to take him. I wanted to hold him against the wall and spilt him open until he screamed my name.
“Make me.”
His eyes narrowed, and then he was using those strong arms to spin me.
Ash pressed my chest against the wall, trapping me with his body. He held me there with a fist in my hair while his other hand worked my cargo pants down just enough. The concrete was rough against my palms and a shock against my freed cock, and it echoed my gasps back at me.
This really wasn’t what I’d planned. I wanted him under me, beneath me on his knees, mouth open and waiting. Not manhandling me into position while parting my ass cheeks like I was a whore.
But fuck if it wasn’t the hottest thing ever.
“Tell me if you don’t want this,” Ash said, and his voice was wrecked. “Tell me right now.”
“I want it. Stop talking and—”
He bit down on my throat, hitting the same tender spot as moments ago, and I forgot how to finish the sentence.
I heard his zipper open and then the gargled sound of him spitting into his hand.
Fuck.
He pinned me there by the back of my neck as he worked me open with nothing more than his spit on his fingers, and I bit down on my forearm to stay quiet because the sounds I was making were obscene.
Ash had a second finger inside before I’d even stopped gasping over the first. He showed no mercy as he scissored, stretching me with just the slick of his saliva.
It burned in the best way possible, making my thighs shake and my cock drip against the wall.
He pinned me there so easily. Despite my height, despite my thinking I had the upper hand, Ash was all muscle and strength when he wanted to be.
His chest pressed against my back, his breath hot on my neck, and I was completely trapped between him and the wall.
Helpless. The realization made my cock throb.
His fingers withdrew, and I heard him spit again. Then a groan that went straight through me, deep and ragged. I could picture it without seeing it. Ash stroking himself with his own spit, getting his cock slick enough to fuck me in a dark corridor like we were animals.
Christ.
His hand moved to the back of my head, pushing my cheek flat against the concrete. The other gripped my hip hard enough to bruise. I felt the blunt head of his cock press against my hole, and then he was pushing inside.
The burn was immediate and overwhelming. Too much, too fast, not enough lube, but I didn’t care. I wanted it to be rough. I felt it everywhere, a fullness that made my knees go weak and caused me to pant against the wall.
It wasn’t until he shuffled forward to get deep leverage that the rational part of my mind acknowledged what we were doing. There was nothing between us. No condom.
The realization hit me through the haze of pleasure. Ash was taking me raw, skin on skin, and I should care about that. I should have stopped him and thought rationally about safety and consequences.
But his hips pressed flush against my ass and fucked upwards, forcing himself even deeper, and rational thought dissolved like sugar in water.
“So fucking tight,” he groaned against my neck, his breath hot and ragged. “How long has it been?”
I couldn’t answer. I could barely breathe with how full I felt, how right it was despite being completely wrong. My pants bit into my thighs where they were bunched just below my ass, keeping my legs close together when I desperately wanted to spread them wider.
He pulled back and slammed in hard, and the sound I made was mortifying.
“Answer me.”
“Years,” I gasped out. “Five years, maybe six. I don’t bottom; I don’t—”
“You do now.” His hand wrapped around my throat from behind, possessive and claiming, and it was all I could do to nod.
Ash rolled his hips again, and I saw stars.
I’d never been a fan of bottoming. The whole concept went against everything I needed. Control slipping through my fingers, being open and exposed while someone else set the pace. It was too vulnerable and made me feel weak in ways I couldn’t stand.
I liked being in charge. I always had.
But then Ash snapped his hips forward, driving deep, and the angle sent lightning up my spine. My legs went weak, my vision went white, and a sound ripped out of me that I’d never heard myself make before.
Oh.
He did it again, and I fell apart completely.
There was something about being pinned here, about having no control over the rhythm or the depth or anything at all. Something about letting him take what he wanted while giving me exactly what I needed. The powerlessness didn’t feel weak. It felt like relief.
“Fuck,” I hissed. “More. I need more.”
He gave it to me. No mercy or gentleness, just exactly what I’d been asking for without knowing how to voice it.