Page 52 of A Game So Reckless

I don’t even realize I’ve said it out loud until Valentina twists her neck to meet my eyes. Hot gold and long lashes. Confusion spins in her gaze.

“What?” I grunt, pressing the tampon applicator against her until I feel the slick, sucking give of her cunt. “No one’s ever told you that before?”

I find that hard to believe, considering how maddeningly obvious it is. As I press the plastic tube inside her and watch a frisson of wary heat go through her expression, I force myself to find a flaw. Some kind of imperfection, an edge of ugliness. Something I can latch onto to say, “There, see, she’s just as pathetic and forgettable as everyone else on this planet.”

But she’s not. I know she’s not, even as I repeat the process again and again, my eyes scraping over her skin so hard they should be leaving scars.

Her legs are shaking. Her hands have curled into fists against the wall. She’s no longer looking at me, but letting her head hang down between her shoulders.

“What are we doing?” she whispers. “What areyoudoing?”

“Told you before,” I grunt, fighting to keep my voice even, fighting to maintain control. “I wasn’t going to stand by and let you bleed.”

I slide the plastic further, further, until my fingertips meet her flesh and I can’t go any deeper. Valentina’s barely breathing. She might even be holding her breath. Trying not to make a sound.

Maybe trying not to come.

That thought goes right to my balls, a swift, aching stab. My hand on her hip surges lower, sliding over skin that feels like paradise, until I find her swollen clit. I let out an animal groan when she arches frantically against me in response. I circle that hot point of her flesh, my eyes falling shut against the hellish holiness of the sensation.

She’s so fucking soft down here. It’s like touching a goddamn angel’s wings. I inhale deeply, as if she’s weed, as if she’s crack, as if she’s the shit that killed my mammy and sent my da swinging ’til his neck gave out.

I promised myself I’d never get addicted to anything. Not money, not violence, not pussy. Not what comes in crystals or needles or smoke.

I promised my grandda, too.

There’s an ocean between us, but I can practically hear him in this room with me right now. Telling me to keep my fists up, telling me to hit before my opponent can hit back. Telling me that pain is the only thing worth feeling, and that obsession can kill a man as surely as a bullet.

But I don’t feel like I’m dying. I’ve never felt more fucking alive. Usually, I only feel this way in the ring, when I’m dodging and punching my opponent into oblivion.

Or when I’m killing someone.

But rubbing Valentina’s little clit beneath my calloused fingers blows every other sensation right out of the water. My cock is so hard it hurts. My skin, my very bones, feel like they’re mere moments away from combustion.

Valentina’s swearing, her moaning, her defeated cries of, “Oh,God,” wash over me, a rhapsodic revelation. I’m in church. I’m at an altar. I’m stripped and shattered with every fucking sin on display.

I’m in trouble.

She comes, and it’s beautiful, and that’s all I can think. I’m in trouble. I am so fucking lost. Like if I let go of her, if I stop touching her now, my brain and blood and body – my whole goddamn life – will vanish.

Like I never existed at all.

My eyes fly open, because this must have been exactly what my da thought. When he woke up and found she wasn’t breathing.

He must have thought that everything was gone. Including him.

Like I just took a blow to the head, I stumble away from Valentina. My shoulder hits the wall, and I stay there for a second, trying to steady myself. Trying not to fall, trying not to come, trying not to puke.

Valentina is breathing hard. Slowly, she lets one weak hand drop from the wall. It goes between her legs, pushing on the applicator to eject the tampon inside her. She shudders when she pulls the bloodied, empty plastic out. Then, she tosses it into the garbage.

She picks up her panties and does the same thing with them.

As predicted, her shorts are bloodstained. She bends and grabs them, but I stop her with a word.

“Wait.”

She stands, watching me in silence, with the denim held in front of her body. Apart from a hot flush in her cheeks, her expression is pristinely emotionless.

Like this hasn’t affected her at all.

---