American Prince

“Really?” he asked savagely, twisting his fingers again and moving behind me. I heard his zipper, and the sound of that metallic purr made my cock go from mostly erect to so-hard-it-hurts erect within the space of a few seconds. “Do you really believe that?”

His fingers left me, replaced almost instantly by the thick head of his cock, pushing in without warning. I cried out and he clapped a hand over my mouth.

“I’ll stop,” he said, “if you want me to. But then you have to admit this isn’t just as good. You have to admit you’re wrong.”

He shoved in another two or three inches and I groaned against his palm. Fuck me, but that was rough…and so fucking hot. I’d never be able to explain that to him, though. Not even if I had a thousand years, because I couldn’t explain it to myself. Because of course furtive fucking would never be as good as loving him the way I goddamned wanted, of course not. But being brutalized like this, subsumed by Ash and his indomitable will and his indomitable cock—well it wasn’t bad. If my consolation prize for saving Ash’s future was this, well…

I mean, it was hard to complain about in any way more than in an abstract sense.

I licked the inside of his palm—which in my mind is the only consent stronger than the word yes—and he groaned, bracing his knees on either side of mine and pushing all the way in. The pressure was insane, not quite like being shot, but not quite unlike it either, and the moment he curved out of me and then pushed back in, I felt it. The elemental, orgasmic glow of it.

“Fuck,” I marveled against his hand.

He ignored me, moving his hand from my mouth to the back of my head, pressing my face into the floor as he fucked me the way he wanted, deep, piercing thrusts that bottomed him out and left me seeing spots. “Come,” he ordered. “I want you to come all over this dirty fucking floor, and after you do, tell me it’s better this way.”

So I did.

I came from being pounded into the vinyl, from squirming my hips against the hard floor as a massive dick drilled into me, and when I was finished, Ash grabbed my by the hair and spun me to face him, his own cum dripping out of my ass.

“It’s better this way,” I told him.

A flash of sadness, a flash of anger. “Then this is what you get to have,” he said, yanking me up and bending my over my bed, cruel fingers back inside me. “It’s better this way,” I told him after I’d come all over my sheets.

“It’s better this way,” I told him after he made me wash his cock and then choked me with it for an hour.

“It’s better this way,” I whispered as the orange-peel light of dawn crawled through the window and he left my room.

And it was. Better this way.

I almost believed it myself.

20

Embry

before

Things continued like this for a long time—three and a half years, to be precise. Three and a half years of furtive fucking on the periphery of war, of stolen kisses, of long nights tracing our breath as we stared up at the cold stars. He liked the company when he couldn’t sleep—which was always—and I liked falling asleep next to him, safe in his presence.

He never grew less bruising or rough, I never stopped fighting it, and even though we hid it, not a day went by without something from each other. Maybe a hurried kiss in the long pantry by the canteen, the one that locked from the inside, or maybe he’d call me in for a meeting in his office and then wrestle me into sucking him off after he closed the door. And some days, it was as simple as teaching him to dance. The waltz, the foxtrot, even swing-dancing for no other reason that it was fun and swing music made him smile.

It was the purest heaven in the midst of the worst hell, and I loved every minute of it, even though it was all underpinned by a lie—my lie—and I knew one day it would burn down around me.

I had two reminders of the impermanence of our relationship, and the first came early on—very early, in fact, within the first year of my return after being shot.

I woke up barely able to walk that morning; the night before, Ash had tied me to a chair and rubbed me with his hand until I writhed in delight, pulling his hand away just before I started to come. And instead of spurting all over my stomach, cum leaked out of my tip like tears and the orgasm fell flat, a punctured balloon, a stalled motor. But I stayed hard and hornier than ever. And he started rubbing me again, once again pulling away just as my balls drew up, and I had the same kind of ruined orgasm.

Twice more he did this, and when he was done, he sat back on his shoeless heels and observed his handiwork. I was straining against my ties, my cock so hard that the skin shone like bruised silk, like the skin itself was about to split apart. I was covered in sweat and my own semen, every muscle bulging and flexing and every vein standing out in sharp relief. And best of all, my thoughts were quiet. My mind was open, my heart was still and brimming full of him.

His gaze traced over the rigid ache of my erection and he nodded to himself. “I’m going to fuck your mouth now,” he said, “and if it’s good enough, then I’ll let you come for real.” A small smile. “On my skin. Would you like that?”

I nodded so enthusiastically that his smile grew bigger, his boot-on-my-wrist smile that was all sharp corners and white teeth. He untied me and yanked me by the neck down to my knees, his other hand fumbling with his belt. His cock was hard and heavy enough to push its way out of his fly after he unzipped it, and the single glimpse of ridged shaft was all the warning I got before it was down my throat. I could taste the salty slick of his precum, so much of it all over him, and I groaned to myself. He’d been hard all this time, his ignored erection weeping softly in his pants.