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Alex let his secrets slip tonight, and as much as I want to know more—know everything—there’s only ever so much I’ll understand from his words. The rest has always been unspoken between us.

He helps me lift his shirt over his head until the thick muscles of his arms and chest are on full display. Only then do I trace the scars over their full length. They go farther than I thought, extending all the way up his left arm to his neck, webbing halfway across his pec .

I trace my fingers over them, and his back stiffens, but he doesn’t stop me. He watches me draw my fingers over his heart. I flatten my palm against it, freezing when I see the seven perfectly stacked scars carved into his chest on the other side.

“You’re a legacy?”

That can’t be right.

Alex was sent to Montgomery during his third trial.

How could he have all seven marks? How could he be a legacy in the fraternity that, as far as everyone knows, mutilated his body and left him in a psychiatric ward to rot?

“You have all seven marks.” I trace my fingers over them.

They’re perfectly healed, which means he must have had them for a while.

“I do,” is all he says as he lifts me up and does a one-eighty, until he’s the one pinning me to his bed.

Alex strips my shirt, kissing the path from my belly button to my breast. Taking my nipple between his teeth and teasing me with a delicious tug. The way this man claims me—owns me—erases everything else from existence.

He nips at my skin.

Everything about Alex is sharp, but I press myself to the edge of his blade and let him see the truth my blood offers.

Slowly, he moves down between my breasts, kissing my ribs as he tugs my shorts and underwear off. Stripping me completely until I’m wearing nothing except the knife strapped to my leg. I wait for him to strip me of that, too, but he doesn’t.

He kneels on the bed between my legs and admires me spread out for him. “You’re fucking stunning. You’re everything. ”

My entire body blushes at the compliment. Not a ploy to lure me into his web, but a confession. He sees me.

I lift enough to grab his shoulder and pull his lips to mine. “So are you.”

His kiss sears. His lips brand my soul. So much more than lips, his entire body rocks over me. Lapping like waves against my skin. I grab his jaw, barely holding on, but with our bare chests pressed together, it snaps his attention back to the reality of the situation.

He grabs my wrists, pinning them overhead.

I frown. “Why don’t you let me touch you when we’re like this?”

He let me explore him through our entire conversation, but the second we get more intimate, he finds ways to shut me out.

“Because you don’t know what your touch does to me, my angel.” His tongue skates over my lower lip to distract me.

“What does my touch do to you?” My eyelashes flutter closed as he plants kisses along my throat.

“It makes me feel things I’m not allowed.”

“Good?”

“Alive.” He lifts, meeting my gaze.

“And feeling alive is a bad thing?”

“It’s harder than dying most of the time.”

Does Alex wish he were dead? Or does he really just think that it would be easier than this?

“Don’t worry,” he whispers, brushing a kiss over the apple of my cheek. “I’ll survive living for you.”

It’s a strange way to put it. One I don’t know if I should take as a good thing or a bad thing.

All I know is that, when it comes to him, it all circles back to me for one reason or another.

And I’d like to know why, but I’m too distracted by his hips grinding between my legs.

By his hand gripping my wrists overhead.

By his other hand working his jeans to release his hard cock as he settles it against me.

“Let go of my hands and let me make you feel alive, Alex.” I brush a kiss on his lips. “Trust me. Please.”

There’s every chance he’ll pull away entirely. He might even pick me up and kick me out of his room like he did that night at Montgomery. But I refuse to have only parts of him when he demands every bite.

Alex releases my wrists, and when I plant my hands on his chest, he flinches like I’ve burned him. But he doesn’t stop me. He doesn’t break my stare as he thrusts deep. His hips meet mine, with his jeans still around his thighs, and he fills me with every inch.

But I need more.

The air in his lungs.

His fears.

His limits.

I wrap myself around him and pull our bodies flush, forcing the kiss that makes me whole. He sucks my lower lip between his teeth, and I’m unraveling. Addicted. The world is nothing but dust, and we are the depths of darkness in the night sky.

In his hands, I’m alive, not just living. And it’s downright terrifying.

I need it all from this man.

Another kiss. A tender caress. A pinch on my breast. My ass.

Alex fucks me deep and sure, and I’m somehow both lost and found. He’s all I feel and all I understand.

Like he senses my desperation, he lifts with me in his arms and flips us so he’s on his back and I’m straddling him.

Clawing at him. Sinking my teeth into his lower lip while he digs his fingers into my thighs.

The growl that rips from his chest is wild, encouraging my every movement.

I ride his cock, swiveling, demanding he feel as out of control as his touch makes me.

I drag him to the edge with teeth and nails. My hands roam, my lips wander. Kissing his jaw, his neck. Whispers of touch as his teeth sink so deep into my shoulder, he nearly breaks skin.

We’re hanging by a thin thread, one tug away from free-falling. And when he drags his tongue up the center of my throat, that’s it.

I shatter.

My back arches, and my nails dig into his chest. He watches me ride him, clenching his teeth so hard the veins in his neck pop. Each time I lift, he shoves me harshly back down over his cock.

And when my head tips back and my insides splinter, Alex is the one grabbing for more. He shoots to sitting so he can wrap his arms around me. He shoves me down on him, and we’re whole.

We’re infinite.

We’re the Earth splitting. The mountains climbing. Lava erupting.

Breaking apart until we forge into one.