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One time’s a fluke. Four months? That’s a fucking nightmare.

But knowing I can fuck Verity in my sleep, that I can maintain an erection and come, means that this isn’t a physical issue. It’s mental. And that’s unacceptable with so much on the line.

Regardless, she feels good against me. Solid but light. Gentle. It’s been a while since I felt a girl touching me like this, and I bask in the moment, feeling her curves nestled against me, pressing on the thickened weight between my legs.

I’m not sure how long I stay like that, idly toying with a lock of her hair as my eyes droop, thoughts drifting to nothing in particular. Wick will buy me some time, but I’ve got a packed schedule today. I’ve got a packed scheduleeveryday, but this one includes a grad school admissions interview at ten. Then, a meeting with Father at eleven to go over how it went. A study group at one. Two hours to finish a paper on DNA synthesis. At some point, a rendezvous with whatever lackey Killian Payne sends to collect the video of us branding Oakfield down in the dungeon; a gift to his whores. Then, at seven, the campus support group for fuck-ups who spend all day jonesing for a hit of Scratch. Finally, I’ll need to make a night deposit, which could take fucking hours.

As I’m ruminating over whether or not I’ll even have time to attend the group meeting, Verity begins rousing.

She unfurls slowly. First, her feet, rubbing against my ankle, then her head, nuzzling in a little deeper. I can tell when it hits her–that she’s in bed with me–because she goes suddenly still, a breath caught in her chest.

She releases it evenly, her warm, moist exhale fluttering against my collarbone.

“Hey,” she says, pushing up to meet my gaze through heavy, squinted eyes.

Unmoving, I train my gaze to the ceiling. “We did it, right?”

There’s a beat of silence, and then her quiet, “Yes.”

It bothers me, the way she knows everything that happened last night. She knows the way I look when I come. She knows how hard I fucked her. She can clearly remember each movement, gesture, grunt. Who even knows what I did in this bed? Did I talk? Was it fast or slow?

I should leave.

Before I can, she adds in a small, reluctant voice, “We did it twice.”

My gaze jumps to hers. “Twice?”

Her hair is a fucking mess, all tangled and rumpled, and when she blushes, I can feel it in the core of my goddamn balls. She looks like the personification of ripe, fertile lust.

I’ve never wanted to fuck a person more than I do at this exact moment, to make a baby in that taut belly, so the whole world knows what I can do.

Her thigh shifts against my cock and I lay a heavy hand on it, stilling her. Green eyes blink open wider, mouth parting. “Oh, are you…?”

I look away. “No.”

In my periphery, I see her glance down, lip trapped between her teeth. “Are you sure? Because…”

“No,” I snap. “It’s fucking biology. Nothing else.”

“Lex.” She rolls into me, putting those tits inches below my face. “Can’t we at least try?”

Try?

The thought is infuriating. Every goddamn deposit I make, I’ve got this girl writhing and moaning, desperate for a dick I can’t give her. Each time I have to pull away, frayed and useless, is the most emasculating, humiliating moment of my existence. That night after Pace’s fight, looking into her eyes and knowing how much she wanted it–wondering if she was wishing Wicker’s cock was mine–plays in my head on repeat.

Father thinks he has to punish me for my poor performance, but the truth is, nothing he does could hold a candle to this frenetic conflict of needing something I’m too broken and impotent to take.

So when she inches down to brush her lips against my jaw, I twitch, eyes falling closed. When she rocks against my hip, her thigh dragging heavily against my cock, I clench my fists. And when her mouth stutters upward, seeking mine, I’m powerless to stop it.

It’s soft and sweet, her lips coaxing on mine as they pinch and pull. The warmth of her breath mingles with the scent of her perfume–roses, always roses–and for a split second, I hate everything she represents.

But I still open to her.

I still reach up to cup her cheek as she licks out to taste me, letting my tongue delve into the slick heat of her mouth. I still tug at her hair and clutch at her thigh when she rolls to straddle me, rocking my hips up into her.

She tastes warm and ready, her tits are a shock of heat against my chest, and I’m powerless against the urge to hold them in my palms, indulging in the soft weight of them as she releases this small, quiet, needy sound.

It’d be so much easier if she didn’t want me.