Chapter 15
VALENTINA
It's been four months since Xavier kicked me out of the clubhouse, since he looked at me with devastation in his eyes and said no longer mine, since my entire world collapsed in the space of thirty seconds while seventy people watched and judged and whispered murderer like it was my new name.
Four months of living in this depressing apartment with its beige walls that were probably white once upon a time before years of other people's lives stained them into this sad, neutral nothing.
The furniture came with the place—a couch with springs that dig into your back if you sit wrong, a coffee table with water rings permanently etched into the cheap wood like fossilized evidence of a hundred forgotten drinks, a TV that's older than my bike and has picture quality so terrible everything looks like it's happening underwater.
The bedroom is worse: a full-size mattress on a metal frame that squeaks if you breathe too hard, one lamp with a shade that sits crooked no matter how many times I adjust it, and exactly three hangers in the closet because apparently that's all a person needs when they've lost everything that mattered.
But tonight I'm not thinking about the depressing apartment or all the days of slowly learning how to exist without Xavier or the particular kind of loneliness that comes from loving someone who hates you.
Tonight I'm sitting cross-legged on the questionable carpet with a deck of cards spread between me and Zay, both of us stripped down to almost nothing because strip poker got boring after the first month and we needed to find new ways to pass the time between his club responsibilities and my attempts to rebuild something resembling a life.
"Go fish," I say, grinning as Zay's face does that thing it does when he realizes he's about to lose another article of clothing.
"You're cheating," he accuses, but there's no heat in it, just the warm amusement that's become the soundtrack to our stolen hours together. "There's no way you have four jacks."
"I absolutely have four jacks." I lay them out on the carpet with deliberate precision, watching his eyes track the movement of my hands like he's cataloging every detail. "Which means you lose, which means—" I gesture at his boxer briefs, the last piece of clothing he's wearing. "Off they go."
"You're enjoying this too much," he observes, but he's already hooking his thumbs in the waistband, already stripping them off with the unselfconscious grace of someone who's comfortable in his own skin, who knows exactly what the sight of him does to me.
And God, it does things to me.
All this time and I still haven't gotten used to how beautiful he is—all lean muscle and warm skin and the kind of intensity that makes you feel like you're the only person in the world worth looking at.
He still shows up at my door with that particular smile that says he's thinking about all the ways he's going to make me forget about the loneliness, about Xavier, about everything except the present moment and the heat between us.
"Your turn," he says, settling back against the couch with absolutely no shame about his nakedness, with his cock already half-hard just from the way I'm looking at him. "Ask me for a card."
But I don't ask him for a card. I'm done with the game, done with the pretense that we're here to play Go Fish when we both know what this is really about—the need to feel something other than the constant ache of loss, the need to be touched like I matter, the need to forget for a few hours that Xavier exists somewhere across town probably not thinking about me at all.
I crawl across the carpet toward him with deliberate intent, watching his eyes darken as he tracks my movement, watching the way his breath catches when I settle myself in his lap with my thighs bracketing his hips.
"I'm done playing cards," I murmur, my hands sliding up his chest to rest against his shoulders.
"Yeah?" His hands find my waist, fingers digging in just hard enough to make me gasp. "What do you want to play instead?"
I answer by kissing him—deep and hungry and desperate in a way I probably shouldn't let him see but can't quite hide.
Zay has been here for all of it, showing up when I needed someone, holding me when I broke down crying at two in the morning, making me laugh when I forgot I still knew how.
He's never once made me feel like I was a burden or a complication or someone he was settling for because he couldn't have what he really wanted.
He kisses me back with equal hunger, one hand tangling in my hair to angle my head exactly how he wants it while the other slides down to grip my ass, pulling me harder against him so I can feel exactly how much he wants this, wants me.
"Bed," I gasp against his mouth, already grinding against him in a way that makes coherent thought difficult.
"Too far," he growls, and then he's flipping us somehow—a tangle of limbs and momentum that ends with my back against the questionable carpet and Zay braced above me with heat in his eyes that makes my stomach clench with anticipation.
His mouth is on my neck, teeth scraping against sensitive skin in a way that makes me arch into him with a sound that's half-gasp, half-moan.
His hands are everywhere—sliding under my tank top to palm my breasts, pinching my nipples just hard enough to ride the line between pleasure and pain, making me writhe beneath him with need that's building so fast I can barely breathe through it.
"Zay," I manage, my own hands sliding down his back to grip his ass, trying to pull him closer even though there's no more closer to get. "Please—"
"Please what?" He pulls back just enough to look at me, his pupils blown so wide there's barely any brown left. "Tell me what you want, Val. Use your words."
"I want you inside me," I say, past the point of pride, past the point of playing coy. "I want you to fuck me hard enough that I forget everything except your name."
Something feral moves through his expression at that, something possessive and dark that makes my core clench with want. "Yeah? You want it rough?"
"Yes," I breathe, and I mean it with every fiber of my being.
I don't want gentle tonight. Don't want careful or tender or any of the things that remind me I'm fragile, that I'm still broken from Xavier's rejection.
I want to feel powerful and wanted and completely consumed by sensation until there's no room left for grief.
Zay understands. He always understands. His hand slides down my body to tear—actually tear—my underwear off in one smooth motion that should probably concern me but instead just makes me wetter.
"That was my last clean pair," I protest weakly, but I'm already spreading my legs for him, already lifting my hips in invitation.
"I'll buy you new ones," he says, and then his fingers are inside me, two of them, curling exactly right to hit that spot that makes stars explode behind my eyelids. "Fuck, you're so wet. So ready for me."
"Been ready since you walked in the door," I admit, rocking against his hand, chasing the pleasure building hot and tight in my core.
He adds a third finger and I cry out, the stretch bordering on too much but in the best possible way. His thumb finds my clit with unerring precision and I'm suddenly right there on the edge, my whole body tensing as orgasm builds like a wave about to crest.
"Not yet," Zay says, pulling his fingers out just as I'm about to come, making me whimper at the loss. "You don't get to come until I'm inside you."
"Zay—"
"That's the rule." He positions himself at my entrance, the broad head of his cock pressing against me in a way that makes my hips buck involuntarily. "You come on my cock or you don't come at all."
He pushes inside in one hard thrust that fills me completely, that stretches me in a way that's almost painful but so good I see stars. I wrap my legs around his waist, my ankles locking at the small of his back to pull him even deeper.
"Fuck," he groans, his forehead dropping to rest against mine as he gives me a second to adjust to the intrusion. "You feel so good. So perfect."
"Move," I demand, my nails digging into his shoulders hard enough to leave marks. "Zay, please, I need—"
He moves.
Not gentle. Not careful. Hard and fast and rough exactly like I asked for, each thrust driving me up the carpet in a way that's probably giving me rug burn but I don't care.
I don't care about anything except the way he fills me, the way his body moves against mine with perfect rhythm, the way pleasure is building so intense it's almost painful.
"That's it," he growls against my neck, his teeth finding my pulse point and biting down just hard enough to make me gasp. "Take it. Take all of me."
I am. God, I am. My whole world has narrowed to this—to the slide of his cock inside me, to the heat of his skin against mine, to the way he's making me feel completely claimed and utterly powerless and so desperately wanted that tears are pricking at the corners of my eyes.
"Harder," I beg, because I need more, need him to fuck away the loneliness and the grief and the constant ache of missing someone who doesn't want me anymore.
Zay adjusts his angle, drives in deeper, and suddenly I'm flying apart. Orgasm crashes over me in waves so intense I forget how to breathe, my body clenching around him rhythmically as pleasure whites out every thought, every worry, every painful memory.
"Fuck, Val," Zay groans, his rhythm faltering as my orgasm triggers his. "I'm—"
He comes inside me with a shout, his whole body going rigid as he spills himself deep, his cock pulsing with each wave. We stay locked together for a long moment, both of us breathing hard, both of us coming down from the high in the warm, sated aftermath.