ONE SIXTY ONE

“It’ll be okay,” I whispered, barely more than a breath, like if I said it too loud, the lie in it would become too real to ignore. I didn’t want him to hear the tremble in my voice. I didn’t want him to feel how much I was cracking on the inside. I needed to be the one holding us together, even if my hands were shaking, even if my heart was crawling out of my chest with fear.

We had too many loose ends, too much blood in our wake, too many ghosts in the rearview. Dane was still out there with Vaughn, God knows in what state and every time I let myself think about it, I felt something sharp twist inside my ribs. But I didn’t want to go there now. I didn’t want the weight of that truth. I didn’t want to feel that helplessness. I didn’t want to think of what my innocent brother was going through now. I couldn’t imagine Dane strapped to a chair somewhere, being tortured, bloodied face, wondering why he was being hurt, wondering where I and Dominic are. Wondering why we hadn’t come to save him. 

I didn’t want to think of any of that. 

Right now, all I wanted to feel was him.

Dominic.

His chest rose, then deflated in a deep sigh that seemed to carry all the weight of the past few days. Weeks. Maybe even months.

“Yeah?” he asked quietly, like he wanted to believe me. Like he needed to.

I nodded, slowly. “Yes. I’ve got you, and you’ve got me. That’s what matters right now, just us.”

But his mouth twisted, and he shook his head.

Not a sharp no. A slow, broken one. The kind of gesture that felt like surrender. And then came that smile. Not the cocky smirk that usually curled up the corner of his mouth. Not the warm, lazy grin he gave me when I woke up beside him years ago. This one was… uncertain. Faint. A shadow of what it used to be. And it made my heart clench in the ugliest way.

“This isn’t a movie, Eleanor,” he murmured, his voice low and tired, rough like gravel. “We don’t get happy endings just because we want them. Sometimes shit just isn’t okay, and no amount of hope is gonna change that. If it’s broken… it’s broken.”

I didn’t let him go further.

I couldn’t.

I reached for him, bent low, and cut off the rest of his sentence with my mouth.

Soft at first. My lips found his with a kind of reverence, like touching something holy. Because for me, in that moment, he was. My only sanctuary in a world turned on its head.

I felt his breath catch, his body tense. The gun he’d been gripping in his lap fell to the ground with a loud clatter that neither of us reacted to. His hands hesitated for a heartbeat.

And then, he broke.

His fingers grabbed my waist, dragging me into him with a kind of hunger that had my entire body sparking to life. There was nothing gentle now. No hesitation. Only need, raw, desperate need like we’d both been holding our breath for weeks and finally remembered how to breathe through each other.

I climbed into his lap, knees on either side of his hips, thighs hugging him close. I felt his hands run up my sides, slipping beneath my shirt, his touch hot and possessive. My fingers tangled into his hair as I kissed him deeper, harder, more feral.

His lips parted for me, and I slid my tongue against his, the taste of him making my stomach twist with heat. The kiss turned filthy. Wet, messy, filled with gasps and soft moans that echoed off the walls. Every time our mouths separated, we came back together harder, greedier, like it hurt not to be touching.

“God, I missed you,” I gasped against his mouth.

“Show me,” he growled, hands moving lower, fingers digging into the curve of my ass, squeezing like he was trying to brand the shape of me into his palms.

I ground against him slowly, cautiously at first as he was still healing and I didn’t want to hurt him. But when I slowed, his mouth left mine, and he whispered against my jaw, “Don’t hold back. I can take it. I need it.”

I believed him.

I rolled my hips harder, pressing myself against the thick ridge straining beneath his pants, dragging myself over him like I was starving and he was the only thing that could keep me alive.

He groaned deep in his throat, his head falling back against the couch, eyes squeezed shut, mouth parted.

The sound he made when I did it again, it went straight to the core of me.

Every inch of me burned. My pulse raced, my skin hypersensitive, my breath coming in shallow gasps. I felt drunk on him. Drunk on the feel of his body under mine, the heat of his hands, the stubble scraping against my neck as he kissed down to my collarbone.

My hips never stopped moving.

Each grind pushed his breath out of him and pulled another sound from his throat. One hand stayed on my ass, the other slid up to cup the back of my neck, pulling my mouth back to his like he couldn’t go another second without kissing me again.

Our lips collided. Again. Again.

Tongues. Teeth. Breathless moans.

His name left my mouth like a secret I’d forgotten how to keep.

His hands clutched me like I might disappear.

“Eleanor…” he breathed, against my lips, against my throat, against the edge of my sanity.

I pulled back just far enough to look into his face. His cheeks were flushed, sweat beading at his hairline, his eyes wild with need and something dangerously close to love.

“I thought I lost you,” he said, voice rough, breathless.

“You never did,” I whispered, brushing his hair back, then pressing kisses, gentle, slow, and aching along his cheek, his jaw, the corner of his lips. “I’m right here.”

His eyes flickered shut, lashes trembling, and when he looked at me again, the look in them stripped me bare. I felt it, how badly he wanted me. Not just physically, but to have me. To make sure I was real. That I was his, and I was here.

He pulled me in again, and the next kiss was different: deeper, hungrier, less careful. His hands, large and warm, slid around my waist and tugged me down harder onto him. I gasped against his mouth as I felt the pressure of his growing hardness through the denim, pressing firm between my legs.

My hips moved on instinct. A slow, grinding roll that made both of us exhale at the same time. The friction between us had turned molten, my body responding like it had been starving for this, for him, for us. I could feel the dampness soaking into the thin cotton of my sweatpants, the ache between my thighs intensifying to the point of dizziness. I needed him. Now.

I wanted him to penetrate. 

Fuck me. 

Pound me hard. 

While I bit into my lips and nearly cried for mercy. 

While my fingers dug into his skin, and each thrust snatched the breath out of me. 

Dominic's fingers curled tighter against my hips, and then they slid lower, gripping the soft curve of my ass in a way that made me whimper into his mouth. His grip was possessive, rougher than before, but still careful, like he wanted to own me and protect me all at once. Like he didn’t want to let go.

His tongue licked into my mouth, deep and slow, then faster. Kissing me like he was still trying to memorize every inch of me, like he hadn’t already, like the taste of me was something he’d been denied for too long. It left me breathless. My lungs burned, my heart slammed, and still, I couldn’t stop. I didn’t want to stop.

I was grinding on him harder now, more desperate, the warmth and pressure of him nestled between my thighs pushing me closer to the edge with every slow thrust of his hips. I pressed a hand to his stomach, remembering his wound, but he didn’t stop. Just grunted softly, dragging me down onto him again, letting me feel all of him.

It was reckless. Stupid. The entire house could wake. Tina, half-dead and sarcastic, could limp in and ruin everything. Adam could call my name from the room upstairs. Isabella could be awake, wandering about the house. Gael could be… anywhere. But that tension, that thrill of being caught, had always been part of us. Always.

I bit my lip, trying to stay quiet, but the memory of other nights rushed in fast.

One summer, years ago. His father’s house. We’d snuck into the laundry room after dinner. He’d bent me over the dryer, my dress bunched at my waist, my mouth buried in a towel to muffle the sounds he was pulling out of me with each punishing thrust. His mother had been just two rooms away.

Another night: Christmas. My bedroom. I was barely seventeen. The family asleep downstairs, the snow falling thick against the windows. He’d pushed me against the wall, hand clamped over my mouth as he rocked into me so hard the picture frames shook. We nearly knocked the bookshelf over.

Then, the worst one, the kitchen. Early morning. My parents had gone for a walk and we didn’t know when they’d be back. He’d lifted me onto the counter, yanked my panties to the side, and slid into me so slow it made me cry. We were so careful, so quiet, my teeth sunk into his shoulder the whole time to keep myself from screaming.

And God, the memories kept coming.

Like that one time in the backseat of his car, parked just off the road on the way back from a bonfire party. We were still buzzed on cheap beer and the taste of each other, smoke clinging to our clothes and hair. He’d tugged my shorts aside, one leg over the armrest, the other wrapped around his waist as he slid into me with the windows fogging and my hand pressed over my own mouth to stay quiet. His breath was hot in my ear, his pace merciless as he whispered filthy things between kisses and promises I never stopped clinging to.

Another time in his room. The door barely shut before he had me pinned against it, his textbooks still spread across the bed from doing high school assignments. We didn’t even make it to the mattress. He hiked my skirt up and dragged my underwear down in one motion, and I remember biting his neck hard enough to bruise, trying not to moan as he rocked into me again and again. 

Then there was the rooftop.

Late spring. New York skyline behind us. We'd broken into the roof of a building we didn’t even live in, hearts pounding from the climb. It was stupid and reckless and perfect. He’d taken his jacket off, laid it down, and I’d crawled into his lap while the city lights blinked all around us. The wind was cold, but his hands were fire, on my hips, my thighs, cupping my breasts beneath my top. I remember the thrill, the pure adrenaline of knowing anyone in the next building could see us. Of knowing we didn’t care.

We were always chasing the edge. Pushing boundaries. And now, even years later, that same need lived in us like something feral, untamed, buried but never forgotten.

His breath was back in my ear, warm and urgent, and I realized I was grinding against him harder now, chasing the same high I remembered from all those nights.