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Shrugging, I push my own shorts down. “Because my balls are so big.”

She gives my cock a dubious glance. “I don’t think male anatomy works like that.” But her gaze snaps back to my dick, a curious glint in her eyes. “Is it because you were never…” Swallowing, her gaze skitters away. “Er, circumcised?”

“Not used to seeing a dick uncut?” My eyebrow ticks up when her blush deepens. “I doubt that has anything to do with it.”

It’s only half hard now, but I've always been a show’er, my cock hanging heavily between my legs. It’s something that used to add one more check to the column of things that make me different from my brothers. Different hair. Different skin color. Different height. Different eyes. Different dick. Something like that could be really alienating to a kid going through puberty with two other boys, except the first time Wicker saw it, he grew so fucking envious that I’ve never been able to feel anything but sort of proud of it.

Stepping beneath the spray, she beckons me in. “Let’s get the tape off and clean those wounds out.”

I follow her in because she’s naked and wet, and no matter how fucked my mind is at the moment, I’m still a man. I fix my eyes to that smear of blood across her tit as she unwinds the wraps, pointedly ignoring the way my cock is growing harder by the second.

If it’s my blood, then fine.

But if it’s Maddox’s?

“You didn’t have to cut him, you know.” The words come out tensely admonishing as she leads my knuckles under the spray. “You could have beat him without it. People in West End respect a fair fight, even if they lose.”

Remembering the boos of the crowd–the sense that I lost–I bite out, “People in East End respect a sure thing.”

Her green eyes flick up to me. “Then why did you run away after the fight?”

“I didn’t run away,” I argue, looking between the blood smear and the spray of water. My fingers twitch. “I just needed to collect my spoils.”

She gives me a skeptical look. “You seemed really upset. Like you were having a panic attack or something.” Her lips purse as she assesses me. “You look a little bit like that now, actually.”

I snap, “I’m not panicking,” and the harshness in my voice makes her flinch. I’m all too aware that I’m on the edge of losing all my progress with her. She needs to fear me. She needs to respect me. She needs to look at me and see a master–a Prince–not a victim.

She keeps her eyes cast down to my knuckles, her thumb sweeping gently over the places they’ve split. When she speaks, her voice is full of defeat. “I’ve never seen someone try so hard to make no effort.”

I look at the blood smear again. Finally losing my patience, I reach out to wet my palm, splashing it on her tit before swiping it away. Something in my chest loosens at the sight of the flesh, clean and unblemished.

“That’s bullshit,” I say, scoffing. “You see Wicker every day.” Her eyes rise to mine with a confused spark, even though amusement tugs at the corner of her lips.

“You’ve got me there.”

As if the name itself summons him, the door to the locker room bangs open, his voice calling out, “Pace? You in here?” The shutters fall over her expression so quickly that she might as well be a china doll, stiff and wide-eyed.

The sensation courses through me like fire–this understanding that what I’m seeing here is for my eyes only. A moment that’s ours. No one else’s.

Holding her gaze, I reach out to snag the towel from the wall, winding it around my waist as I step out. “Go ahead and clean up,” I whisper, even though the thought of her washing my cum out of her cunt makes my fists clench painfully. I stare at the trail of cum on her thigh, assuring, “I’ll distract them.”

Some of that woodenness leaves her spine. “Thank you.”

When I walk out of the row of lockers, it’s to the sight of my brothers peering down every aisle.

Wicker sees me first, the crevice in his brow disappearing the moment he sets eyes on me. “Jesus, there you are. We’ve been looking everywhere. This place is a goddamn maze.”

“We should have known,” Lex says, the crevice never leavinghisbrow. “The fight–it’s a lot like…”

He doesn’t say the words, but all three of us hear them. It’s just like work. The dungeon. “Yeah,” I reply, voice gruff. “It’s a lot like that.”

“You back now?” Wicker asks, and I notice the bottle of expensive champagne dangling from his fist. “Because we just had a talk with Father, and dude,” he hoists the champagne into the air, smirking, “he’s on cloud motherfucking nine.”

Hope burns in my chest. “No shit?”

I know it’s serious when even Lex grins. “A Prince hasn’t taken a Fury in like two decades. He’s out there stroking his ego like it’s his cock.”

“Fuck,” I breathe, the tension falling out of me like a boulder. “I thought maybe… when everyone was booing–”