Page 62 of Martyr

West laughed.

“Both, okay? It’s both.” Nix should have known it’d been too easy. Only… “Aren’t you upset? I went behind your back.”

“Did you?”

“Didn’t…I?”

“I left a known hacker alone in my bedroom with my entire system,” West drawled. “I’m not a moron, babe. If I didn’t want you snooping, you would never have gotten the chance. I did wonder why you went straight for Iris’s King account though. Were you curious?”

“Yes,” that wasn’t a lie. Technically. “It’s more complicated than that but…I’m not ready to explain. Will you try to be patient?”

“Feel like I’ve already been patient by waiting all this time for you to confess on your own,” he pointed out, but ended up sighing anyway. “But all right. You can’t hide it from me forever.”

“I never planned to.”

West stared at him a bit longer and then got to his feet, offering a hand to help Nix up. Instead of letting go once they were both standing, however, he tugged Nix to the edge and leapt down, keeping hold of him the entire time.

“What are you doing?” Nix asked as he was pulled toward the locker room.

“We’re both sweaty and gross, so we’re going to shower.” West shoved Nix into the room and then stepped in after him, blocking the exit with a lascivious grin on his face. “And I’m going to make you come at least three times as punishment.”

His eyes went wide. “But you knew the whole time!”

“That doesn’t change the fact that you thought you were sneaking around behind my back.” West pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it to the tiled floor before taking a step forward. “Pick a shower stall, Nixie. For the next two hours, that’s the only choice I’ll be giving you.”

Cursing, Nix spun on his heels and ran to the furthest stall, even knowing he was playing right into the Demon’s hand.

Even knowing that he kind of liked it.

A beating with West’s cock was definitely preferable over a beating with the guy’s fists, after all.

Chapter 15:

It took a few more days before Nix was able to shake off his Demon escorts and head to classes on his own. His neck was pretty much healed thanks to the synthetic skin—and later the sun cream that West had applied nightly—and there’d yet to be another attack or weird fake dead animal in his bag.

The text messages had kept coming though, but he’d kept his mouth shut about those, opting to stick with his plan to speak with Grady first. There was no point in dragging the guy into danger until Nix was one hundred percent certain his roommate didn’t have good intentions. He was convinced Grady was merely looking out for him and going about it in all the wrong ways.

When Nix stepped into his dorm room, he wasn’t even sure if he’d find his roommate there, a bit relieved he wouldn’t have to go searching campus for him when he was. He smiled weakly when Grady glanced up from his halo screen and then grimaced when he immediately turned away.

“Hey,” he greeted and closed the door at his back, standing there awkwardly.

“What? Get kicked out of the Roost already?” Grady asked in a clipped tone, typing at his keyboard with more force than necessary so that the incessant click-click of the keys felt like punches to Nix’s gut.

“Sorry, all of that happened so fast, I didn’t get a chance to tell you I was moving out in person.” This was going to be more difficult than Nix had assumed. “Can we talk for a minute? I get you hate the Demons, but—”

“Idespisethem,” Grady corrected with a sneer, shoving himself away from his desk in a heated move that had Nix bracing.

“Is that why you did that to me?”

Grady swore, a flash of guilt entering his eyes before the anger returned. “Yeah, fine. That’s why I did it. I just wanted to try and scare you away from them before it was too late and you got hurt. Which,” he motioned toward Nix’s neck, “you did.”

“Thanks to the stunt you pulled,” Nix shot back, even though that wasn’t entirely fair.

“What are you talking about?”

“If you hadn’t pushed me—”

“Whoa, hold up.” He frowned, some of the animosity draining away in a blink. “What do you mean? I never pushed you. I would never resort to physical violence, especially when violent people are who I was trying to get you to stay away from.”

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