Page 108 of Controlled Burn
Pointed avoidance. Like she was trying not to register how often King hovered at her side. How his hand lingered when handing her a tool. How his gaze tracked her movements like a slow, steady flame.
Dean wanted to trust the guy. On paper, King was clean, having served in the army. No ego. Quiet. Capable.
But paper didn’t matter. Not when Talia smiled—just barely—at something King said. Dean hadn’t seen her smile in weeks. Now she was giving it to someone else.
He sat in his truck after shift, engine off, watching the bay doors roll shut. The memory of her—lips parted, voice ragged, thighs locked around his hips—looped through his head like a curse.
He hadn’t touched her since and hadn’t dared.
But he wanted to. God, he ached to.
Even now, his hands clenched around the steering wheel, his cock hard from nothing but the memory.
He felt like a monster.
She’d told him to stop. Told him to get off. And she’d pulled him deeper anyway. Let him take and take and take until she shattered for him.
And afterward? She hadn’t reported it and hadn’t said a word.
That silence terrified him.
He knew silence. He’d lived in it with Rachel. Knew how it could rot everything it touched.
Now it lived between him and Talia like a fuse waiting for a match. He didn’t know when it would blow—just that it would.
And when it did? He wasn’t sure who would burn first.
If she asked him to light the whole fucking world on fire
He’d ask how big she wanted the flames.
Hastings
Jake didn’t like King.
Didn’t like the way the new guy looked at Talia like she was whole. Didn’t like the way she tilted her head when he talked, like she gave a damn what he had to say. Like she hadn’t already been broken.
Jake watched her from the shadows of the rig bay. Ponytail tight. Bruises fading. That blank expression she wore like armor now.
He’d peeled it off once. In the turnout room. Made her flinch. Made her whimper.
She hadn’t told anyone. That meant something.
It meant part of her liked it.
He just needed to remind her.
Jake lay in his bunk, eyes open in the dark, staring at the ceiling like it owed him something.
Tomorrow, he’d get her alone again.
Remind her who touched her first. Who made her gasp. Who she belonged to.
And when she finally broke, she’d know exactly who to thank.
One touch at a time.
King
