I lean my forehead on the glass, close my eyes, and don’t think. When the car stops, I don’t care. I still don’t look. It doesn’t matter where they take me or what they do to me now.
Devlin opens my door and lifts me out. My arms link around his neck. I don’t care if it shows weakness. None of it matters. I won’t play the game anymore. He carries me out of his garage, his feet crunching on gravel as he walks to the house. He enters through his back door and carries me up the stairs, through a room, and into a bathroom. After turning on the hot water and pulling the shower door closed, he finally looks at me.
“Are you okay?” he asks, his voice soft and sweet with that accent. I don’t want it to affect me, but it still does.
I want to tell him no, that I’m not okay. Nothing about this day has been okay.
But I can’t seem to muster the words.
Devlin’s brow knits into a fierce frown. “Of course you’re not fucking okay,” he mutters, wrenching back the door of the shower. Steam billows out. He unwraps the towel around me, his hands rough and his mouth set in a grim line. Then, he pulls me into the shower and steps in, still fully clothed in his football uniform. The hot water washes down my back, thawing me from my frozen state. I start shaking again, as if my body’s too confused to know what to do.
Devlin turns me away from him, so the water hits me right in the face. I splutter and turn my face away, then relax into the warm spray as it caresses my skin. For a minute, two, five, we don’t move. I let the water wash away this day, wash away everything.
Devlin’s hands rest on my hips, gentle yet firm and possessive. He presses a kiss to the back of my neck, his lips lingering. Slowly, his lips part, and his tongue meets my skin. An involuntary shudder of pleasure grips my body as he presses closer, his grip becoming more commanding and his chest brushing against my back with each breath. His mouth moves along my bare shoulder to the column of my neck, and I tilt my head, giving him access. He nips and sucks and licks, his tongue growing bolder with each stroke.
I stand motionless, my eyes drifting closed and a sigh escaping me. I can’t deny the pleasure I feel at the sensations swirling through me—his commanding grip, his soft lips and tongue on my wet skin, the hot water coursing over my body. We stand there for a long time, until I lose all track of time, and all that exists is my body and this boy making it come alive again, making it ache for the familiar comfort of his touch and the pleasure it unleashes.
He turns me slowly, until I’m facing him. But I can’t face him. Not yet. Maybe never. I can’t meet his eyes, so I slide my tired arms around his neck and kiss him. He moans into my mouth, a rough, animal sound, pushing me back against the wall. He hooks a hand behind my thigh and drags it up, positioning himself between my legs. He grinds against me slowly, rolling his hips against mine as he pins me to the wall. His kiss is gentle, though, his nose angling away from my swollen one.
After a minute, he makes a frustrated sound and pulls away, dragging his wet jersey off his body and tossing it into the corner of the shower. I’ve never found football pads sexy, probably because I’ve seen my brothers in them so many times, but seeing Devlin standing there in a set of pads and his lace-up tight pants, I can’t help but stare. His taut abs show through his soaked undershirt, the fabric clinging to his skin and revealing every ridge of muscle. His arms are bare, his tats on full display. I want to touch them, to run my fingers over them until I have every curve and line memorized.
I grab his hand when he reaches for his shoulder pads. “Leave them,” I say, not even embarrassed that I’m panting at the sight of him.
Devlin’s breath is coming as short and fast as mine, and he rips his eyes up from my body to meet my gaze. His eyes are swirling with some mix of anguish and lust, and his voice is husky when he speaks. “Can I go down on you?”
The madness in his gaze should scare me, but it doesn’t. It sends a flare of heat straight to my core. I’ve never been wanted so much, so desperately. I don’t know why he needs me, needs this, but he does. And god, I need it, too. I don’t want to, but I do. I need him to prove to me that it wasn’t all for show, that he really was doing what I thought he was in that locker room—tell the whole world that I’m his, that I’m off limits to every other man on this earth.
I swallow hard before nodding, feeling suddenly vulnerable as he stares at me. He steps forward, his body colliding with mine. His mouth crashes against mine roughly this time, his tongue sliding between my lips with commanding force. He pulls away, lifting my chin, his lips moving along my jawline, down the column of my neck again, gently this time. My fingers curl into his wet hair, and I drop my head back against the shower wall, the cold contrasting with the heat of the water and the desire pumping through my veins like blood.
Devlin drops lower, his hands gripping my sides and holding me up while his mouth devours the water sluicing down my chest. He buries his head between my breasts, then slides to one side, drawing my nipple into his mouth. He moans against my flesh, sending shivers of heat through me. Grabbing my breast, he squeezes and massages while his mouth sucks hard. Pain and pleasure spiral through me, and I cry out, the sound echoing around the bathroom. He moves to the other side, biting and sucking, licking and kissing, until I’m dizzy with want. He drops lower, mouthing my belly, flicking his tongue into my bellybutton before he’s on his knees in front of me. My legs tremble as he grips my hips, holding me to the wall and pressing his nose to my mound and inhaling deeply.
He moans and opens his mouth, sucking at my flesh, opening my lips with his tongue. He works it deeper, lapping at me, stroking me, caressing me until I’m breathing so hard and fast I think I’m going to black out. I grip his shoulder pads, gasping out my pleasure in wordless little moans. The connection between us is different this time, both of us desperate for the moment of no return. Or maybe we’ve already passed that moment. Right now, I know there’s no going back, that Devlin Darling has claimed me in a way no one else ever will, and I’m not sorry. I want to be his, want to wear the marks of his claiming proudly on my thighs and hips and neck where he’s bruised me. I don’t care if the whole world shows up to watch him fuck me next time. I want them to know.
I want them to know because I’m not the only one who’s being possessed. Whatever this is between us, it’s possessed us both. There’s something between us that can never be broken, no matter how hard we try.
Devlin grabs me and lifts me, and I wrap my legs around his neck, resting my thighs on his shoulders while his tongue drives relentlessly into me. He slips a finger into me from below, working it deeper and then plunging it rhythmically as his tongue strokes at the very center of my pleasure, at the heart of me, until I break. My body goes rigid and then melts, and I spill over his fingers, his name tearing from my lips, stroking my tongue with the novelty of a first kiss and the finality of last words.
twenty-nine
Crystal
We lay on our sides in Devlin’s bed, facing each other. He washed me clean before bringing me here, to the place where the devil himself sleeps. It’s odd to think of this boy sleeping. I resist the urge to press my nose into his pillows, to inhale the scent of him collected there. Instead, I watch him, and he watches me. We’re both naked, but we don’t touch. We gaze into each other’s eyes without words, without needing them. I don’t know how to put it into words, but I feel the shift. Something’s changed.
At last, when the sun creeps lower, slanting across the floor in hazy, pale strips of light, I speak. “What happened back there?” I ask, folding my hands together and sandwiching them between my cheek and the pillow.
Devlin’s quiet for a long moment, and I think he’s going to refuse an answer, like he always does. But at last, he speaks.
“I didn’t tell Preston,” he said. “Now, he knows.”
I swallow hard, my pulse racing in my throat. “What does he know?”
“He knows you’re mine.”
He says it with such matter-of-fact certainty that there’s no use arguing with him even if I wanted to. Like Preston said, I never had a choice in any of it. Why should this be any different?
But I don’t want to argue. My heart soars at his words.
“Your dog?” I press, because I have to hear him say it. I have to know it’s real.