"Hold it," he commands softly. "Now out. Slow."
I focus on him. The scent of him—leather and smoke and skin and something uniquely Xavier. The heat radiating off his body even through the pain. The sheer, stubborn reality of his presence here, now, solid and real when everything else feels like it's dissolving.
Slowly, the alley fades. The panic recedes like a tide going out, leaving me hollow and trembling and wrung out.
"There," he whispers, thumb stroking my cheekbone in a gentle rhythm. "You're okay. You're safe. You're here with me."
I killed your brother,the voice inside screams.You're comforting me and I killed Marcus and you don't even know. You dragged yourself down the hall in agony because I was screaming and I'm his murderer.
The guilt is a physical blow. It slams into my chest, steals what little breath I'd managed to recover. Tears spill over, hot and fast, tracking down my face. "I'm sorry," I sob, and it comes out broken. "I'm so sorry."
"For a nightmare?" His voice is gentle, confused. "Don't be stupid. You can't control what you dream."
"For everything." The words crack apart. "For all of it."
"Val, talk to me." His thumb is still stroking, grounding. "Whatever it is, whatever you're carrying—we'll fix it. Together. Just tell me."
I look at him. Really look at him through the tears. The grit written in every line of his face. The loyalty that runs so deep it's in his bones. The love he won't name yet but I can see in his eyes, in the way he dragged himself down here despite the pain,in the way he's holding me like I'm something precious instead of something monstrous.
I can't tell him. It would destroy him. Would destroy whatever this is between us. Would turn that love into hatred, that gentleness into disgust.
But I can't be alone with this coldness another second. Can't carry this weight by myself. Can't exist in my own skin with these memories eating me alive.
I lean forward and kiss him. It's not soft. It's not sweet. It's a collision. A desperate, frantic need to replace death with life, cold with heat, guilt with anything else—anything at all.
He freezes for a heartbeat, surprised. Then he groans low in his throat, his hand tightening in my hair almost to the point of pain, and kisses me back. The kiss deepens, turns savage, all teeth and desperation. I climb into his lap before I can think about whether it's a good idea, mindful of his legs but needing the contact, needing to be as close as physics allows.
"Val," he murmurs against my mouth, pulling back an inch. "Wait?—"
"No." I bite his lower lip hard enough to make him gasp. "Don't make me wait. Don't make me think. Please don't make me think."
"What do you need?" He pulls back another inch, just enough to look at me. His eyes are dark, pupils blown wide, searching mine with an intensity that makes me want to look away but I force myself to hold his gaze. "Tell me what you need."
“You. Just you.” My voice breaks. “Make me forget, Xavier. Please. Make me forget everything—the dream, the fear, all of it. Just for a little while. Please.”
He hesitates, and I watch something complicated move through his eyes—not just the instinct to protect me, but something deeper. The understanding of someone who knows what it’s like when your own mind becomes the enemy, when you need something concrete and real to drag you back from the edge.
His hand shifts on my jaw, thumb brushing across my cheekbone with careful deliberateness. “You need this,” he says, and it’s not quite a question, more like he’s confirming what he already knows.
“Yes,” I whisper.
He nods slowly, his other hand releasing the mattress to find my hip, steadying himself even as his leg trembles with the effort of kneeling. The bandage on his thigh is stark white in the low light. He shouldn’t be doing this.Ishouldn’t be asking this. But the terror from the nightmare is still a live wire under my skin, and the only thing that ever truly grounds me is him.This.
“Then come here,” he says, his voice a low, rough command that vibrates right through my chest.
I don’t need to be told twice. I shift, straddling his good thigh first, careful not to jostle his injury. My thin nightshirt rides up, the cool air of the room hitting my bare thighs. His hands come to my waist, large and warm, guiding me as I move to settle over his lap, facing him. The hard ridge of his erection presses against me through his sweatpants, through my panties, and a sharp, needy sound escapes my throat.
“Shhh,” he murmurs, but it’s not gentle. It’s hungry. His eyes are dark pools, fixed on mine. “I’ve got you.”
His head dips, and his mouth finds the hollow of my throat first. A hot, open-mouthed kiss that makes me arch against him. His hands slide up my back, under my shirt, pushing the fabric up and over my head. It’s gone in one swift motion, tossed to the floor. The cool air pebbles my skin, but his gaze is hotter, sweeping over my bare breasts.
“So beautiful,” he growls, and the raw appreciation in his voice is its own kind of touch.
Then his mouth is on me. Not tentative, not exploring.Claiming.His lips close around my right nipple, sucking hard, and the sensation is so direct, so shockingly intense that I cry out, my hands flying to his hair. He doesn’t let up. He sucks, his tongue flicking and rolling the tight peak, sending jolts of pure, electric pleasure straight to my core. My hips rock against him instinctively, seeking friction, seekingmore.
He switches to the other breast, giving it the same devastating attention. He rolls the nipple between his thumb and forefinger, pinching just to the edge of pain before soothing it with the wet heat of his mouth. I’m panting, my head falling back, every thought scorched away by the single-minded focus of his mouth on my skin. The nightmare, the cold sweat, the phantom images—they’re blurring, dissolving under a wave of acute, physical sensation.
“Xavier,” I gasp.