Chapter 46
Forty-Six
NOW | SISK
Ican tell Jax is still exhausted by the way his breathing keeps hitching, his body jerking every now and then like he’s still fighting something in his sleep.
He’s huge. Powerful. A man who could probably level this entire city if he wanted to, but right now, half-passed-out on my chest, he feels… fragile. And fully human.
I run my fingers through his thick hair, and he melts into me like he’s been waiting for my permission to rest. It should be illegal to have hair this good.
“You know I love you, right?” I whisper.
He’s so far gone he barely forms the words. “Monster and all?”
A smile spreads across my lips as I keep stroking his hair. “Monster and all.”
He drifts off again and I hold him tighter. As much as he hates himself for what he is, I know some part of this is on me. Maybe all of it. And if I could go back—back to that night—I would have never asked him to come with me.
At some point, exhaustion wins. My eyes slip closed with Jax still curled against me.
The sound of a fist hammering the door wakes me up. Jax is already swearing against my chest.
O’s voice booms through the door. “This isn’t a damn hotel! Either start helping or go home!”
Jax groans, voice rough with sleep. “Five minutes, old man. Some of us almost died yesterday.”
“If you’re alive enough to complain, you’re alive enough to work.” O barks back, footsteps stomping away.
I laugh, and Jax lifts his head to glare at me before his mouth finds mine. Lazy at first, then not lazy at all.
One second, I’m lost in the kiss. The next, my brain just screams one word. “Scotch!”
Jax pulls back with a gasp. “You okay? What did I do?”
“What? No!” I blink. “The dog.”
He stares at me. “…the dog?”
“Who’s watching him?”
He drops his forehead to my shoulder and groans. “Fuuuck. We need a new safe word.”
I laugh. “I forgot!”
“He’s fine,” Jax mutters. “Matt watches him when I disappear.”
“Disappear? As in magic disappear?”
He snorts. “No. As in gone too long. Happens sometimes.”
“…right.”
He moves to kiss my neck, his breath warm on my skin, but then curiosity wins.
“So what else can you do?” I ask.
He squints at me. “What?”
“You know. Magic-wise.”
“I’m not a fucking wizard, Sisk.”
“You made me levitate last night.”
He rubs his face. “That was different.”
“Different how?” I press. “How did you just… float me? Was it your eyes? Your hands? All these years, and you still won't tell me how any of this works.”
He settles over me, clearly trying to get this conversation back into making-out territory, his erection pressing against me.
“Come on,” I tease, tracing a finger down his chest. “Tell me.”
“It’s not a fucking choice. It’s a reaction. It’s like… if I need something to move, it moves. If I need someone to hurt, they hurt. It’s not a goddamn superpower, it’s a fucking temper tantrum with collateral damage.”
“You don’t know,” I laugh. “You don’t actually know what you can do, do you?”
His jaw tightens slightly. “I know enough.”
I smirk. “That sounds like a no.”
“You ask too many fucking questions,” he mumbles against my lips.
“And you avoid answering them.”
His hand slides down, his fingers digging into my clit. “Because I have better uses for my mouth.”
I grin. “That sounded smoother in your head.”
He bites my lower lip lightly. “You weren’t complaining earlier.”
“Fair.”
Curiosity still wins one last time. “So… if you don’t know your limits…”
He groans into my skin. “Siiiisk.”
“…does that make you the most powerful guy alive or just the most stubborn?”
He lifts his head. “Both.”
He kisses me again and I decide the interrogation can wait.
His hand slides to my hip, gripping tight as he turns me.
He guides me forward, pushing me down until my face is in the pillow and I’m on my stomach with him over me.
He kneads the flesh of my ass with a rough squeeze that pulls a low moan from my throat before I can stop it.
“Quiet, unless you want to be kicked out of here for good.” Another squeeze of my ass.
“Five minutes,” he adds. “That’s all we get. ”
My fingers curl into the blanket as his weight settles behind me.
Outside the room, the old floorboards creak, O moving around, reminding us exactly how little privacy we actually have.
I haven’t bothered putting any clothes back on, so Jax wastes no time.
He’s pressing against me, thick and hard.
I’m already dripping wet for him but when he pushes inside, the stretch steals my breath.
It’s been too long since we did this. I miss him so much I actually bite down on the pillow to keep from screaming and pouring my entire heart out at once.
“Fuck, Sisk,” he groans. He shifts his hips with a shallow thrust. “I can’t believe I held out this long. Now that I’ve started again, I don’t think I can stop. I’m addicted to this pussy… Now answer me, rabbit. Did you miss my cock splitting you open?”
“Yes,” I try to say, the word muffled by the pillow.
His hand slides down my spine. “You remember our deal?”
I think he’s gonna go for it right here and now. He uses his finger to spread my wetness back, circling the tight pucker of my ass. “The sooner we start stretching and prepping you, the better,” he teases.
We’ve done a lot together since our first time. We’ve experimented with things, but we’ve never gone that far, not fully. I know he wants it, and right now he wouldn’t even need to ask. I’m so into whatever he’s doing to me, I’d just fold and beg.
“We have no time right now, so my finger’s gonna have to do,” he says, and then he pushes.
The blunt pressure is a shock, a heat that borders on pain as he works his finger inside, inch by slow inch.
I hiss, and he stills. “Relax,” he rasps, then I feel it—a warm wetness as he spits on my ass. But now I know, this isn’t just spit.
A deep, tingling heat spreads through me.
The burn instantly vanishing, the ache melting away as the area gets impossibly slick.
“I take care of what’s mine, Sisk,” he growls, rubbing it in slowly.
“And your ass is all mine.” He spits again, and the slick heat lets him push deeper, my body accepting him now.
The dual sensation is overwhelming—a fullness so complete it’s almost too much. I can’t breathe. I can’t think. I can only feel as he finally sinks his finger in to the knuckle. My body clamps down around him, a helpless, convulsive spasm, and pleasure shatters through me.
I’m at my highest point, still trembling, but he doesn’t give me a second to calm down.
He rams into me, one brutal thrust after another.
Each time he buries himself to the hilt, it forces another strained cry from my throat, a fresh wave of pleasure-pain crashing through my already oversensitive body.
He’s chasing his own end now, using me, and the thought only makes me clench around him harder. I don’t know what’s better—feeling him lose control because of me, or him making me lose it myself. His whole body goes rigid. A guttural groan tears from his chest as he comes inside me.
He pulls away with a strangled breath, and the silence is broken by a loud clatter from the other room, a reminder that O is waiting. We both look toward the door, then back at each other, and start moving, grabbing our clothes.
My jeans are mostly fine, but when Jax finds his, he holds them up. The denim is shredded at the knee, dark and stiff with blood. “You can’t wear these,” I say, my voice still raspy. “They’re soaked in blood.”
He sighs. “Asked O for a pair. The old bastard’s built like a fucking tree trunk.” He glances down at his ruined jeans, then at me.
I look at him. “Well… pants ARE kinda optional.”
He gives me that look. The one that says he’s already tired of my shit.
I laugh.
“Fuck,” he mutters, dragging the bloody jeans on. “We’re too old to be sneaking around like horny teenagers again.”
I scramble for my shoes. “You have learned a thing or two since then,” I wink.
“Funny. I remember you being the one who couldn’t keep your hands to yourself back then too.”
I laugh again, tugging the large shirt into place. “I need a shower so bad.”
“No argument there.”
“Hey!” I snap, grabbing the nearest thing—a balled-up sock from the floor—and chucking it at his head.
He catches it without looking, smirking.
“You reek too, just so we’re clear,” I say.
I grab the pillow, aiming better this time, but it freezes mid-air just before smacking him in the chest. He snorts, not even bothering to look at me. “Nice try.” He tugs O’s too-small shirt over his head, the fabric stretching tight across his shoulders. “Let’s go home.”
The word surprises me. Home. He says it like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
A part of me wants to see if Jax is even capable of snuggling, watching bad TV, and eating ice cream straight from the carton.
I’m genuinely curious what his most mundane, relaxed self looks like.
But then guilt crashes the party. I glance toward the door, hearing O banging on something in the other room.
“We can’t just bolt,” I say. “Let’s at least get coffee with him. He’s probably lonely.”
Jax snorts. “He’d kill you for saying that.”
“Which means it’s true.”
He sighs, shoving his feet into his boots. “Fine.”
We step out into the shop a minute later, trying to look like two normal people who didn’t just almost break the bed—or each other.
O is hunched over the workbench, loupe pressed into one eye, tiny screwdriver in hand. He’s got an old watch cracked open in front of him, gears laid out on a square of velvet.
I grab a mug and lean against the counter.
“You two done hiding?” O asks.
Jax scratches the back of his neck. “We weren’t hiding.”
O snorts. “Riiiight, and I’m young and full of hope.”
I slide onto a stool. “Morning to you too.”
He throws a rag in my direction. “If you’re standing, you’re working.”
I start wiping down the counter.
Jax pulls out a chair and turns it backward, straddling it, forearms resting on the back like he’s settling in for a fight.
O finally looks up. “So. What’s the plan?”
Reality crashes back in, the warmth inside me fades under the reminder—we’re not here for fun.