Page 109 of Defend Me

“Do you ever shut up?”

I bit down on his lip, then tightened my grip under his thighs. When I lifted him off the counter, he wrapped his legs around my waist, looking down at the floor with wide eyes.

“Think I’m gonna drop you?” I teased.

“Maybe.”

“I promised that I never would.”

I barely stopped kissing him as I carried him to my room. He reached behind him to turn the knob, then I kicked it open. The bed was too fucking far, so I pressed him against the wall. His grip around my waist tightened, somehow bringing us even closer.

He kissed me again and again, each one deeper than the last. Within seconds, my shirt had been flung across the room. I broke away from his lips to suck on the side of his neck harshly. He dropped his head back against the wall, baring his throat to me.

The way this man yanked this possessiveness out with a quickness might’ve been concerning if it wasn’t so hot.

He moaned and dug his fingers into my skin. I kept going, branding him with a savage kiss. It was a brutal pleasure and I didn’t think I’d ever get enough of it. Giving myself to Tilian forced me to release more of the perpetual tension that lived inside of me.

I released the suction, then circled the mark with my tongue. Thrusting my hips forward, I rubbed my hard dick against his. I buried my face in his shoulder and groaned as I repeated the motion. My dick throbbed, making me draw in a shaky breath. After last night, I was desperate for a release.

Tilian used my hair to tip my head back. His teeth dug into my lip like he had a personal vendetta against it. It felt like all of his frustration from the past few weeks was pouring out of him, just like mine was, and I was ready to drink it all in.

As his tongue pushed into my mouth, I continued my shallow hip movements. I was mesmerized by the sounds he made- sharp inhales of breath and throaty moans. The occasional whimper threatened to change my fucking brain chemistry.

I pulled away from the wall and moved to the bed. He clung to me as I dropped my knees to it and shifted to the middle. After I’d taken off his shirt, I looked down at him. My fingers traced every curve of his body- his sharp pelvic bones, the slope of his waist and his collarbone. There was tattoo there that said, ‘Where the fuck is your god now?’

“Not surprised,” I mused. “You like toxic men.”

“Fuck off.”

“Was it a ‘fuck you’ to your dad?” When he didn’t respond, I dug my nails into the spot.

“I just like the song,” he replied with a shrug.

“Be honest.”

“I got it because of my brother,” he explained tentatively. “Alex told us that he wasn’t in the right body when he was really young. My dad said that god didn’t make mistakes. We were all in a bad place and I was angry for Alex’s sake. When I turned eighteen, I wanted to get something that reminded me of how I felt back then, and this felt right.”

“Do you believe in God?”

He touched my lips, getting distracted for a second. After a minute, he shrugged. “I do, but not the Abrahamic one, at least not as they portrayed God. I think that if one exists and they’re meant to love us, that has to be unconditional, which doesn’t align with the idea of sin and hell. It doesn’t feel like any human has captured who or what God truly is. Maybe they can’t. What about you?”

“I’ve never been religious, but I like the idea of there being many of them. I don’t know if I believe in that and I’m not gonna start worshiping them or anything. The burden of proof lies on the one making the claim, so I’m content to just believe that if they exist, they’ll celebrate the way humans want to understand things beyond simply being told a thing is true and going by faith. That idea doesn’t make sense to me.”

“I respect that.”

I touched his ribs where there were two more tattoos. One said, ‘We’re all see through, just like glass,’ and the other said, ‘We scream to be free, but I stay captured.’

“What about these?”

“I asked my brother and sister to give me a line they liked from a song and those were what they chose.”

“Which one is which?”

“I’ll never tell.”

I huffed. “You guys listen to heavy shit.”

“Maybe I set a bad example.”

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