Page 23 of Until You Break
He stayed inside, hand still on my cock, milking me through aftershocks. His lips brushed my ear. “Good boy. You took it all.”
I trembled, ruined, forehead pressed to the table. His praise burned worse than his teeth, and still my spent body warmed under it.
When he finally pulled free, hot slick dripped down my thighs. He caught it with his fingers, smeared it across my ass, marking me filthy. “Mine.” He spread my cheeks and watched it slide, obscene, and only then did he let the breath he was holding go.
He didn’t leave me wrecked there. He pulled me up, half-guided, half-dragged me toward the bathroom. His hands were gentler than his mouth, steady on my hips, a grip that promised he wouldn’t let me fall even if he’d been the one to make my knees useless.
Steam filled the shower fast, tile fogging. He pressed me against the wall, turned the spray on warm, and let it beat down until the bite left my skin. The water hissed, the world narrowed to heat and the echo of our breath.
I stood trembling under the spray while he soaped my skin, his touch still possessive, but slower now.
He washed the mess from my thighs with his palms, slid lather over my calves, my knees, the ache of my hips, wiped my chest in long, unhurried strokes, then dragged his palm down my cock just once more, not to arouse, just to remind.
He tipped my chin under the spray and rinsed my mouth with water from his palm like communion.
Then his mouth pressed lazy kisses into my shoulder, my neck, the damp curl of my hair.
He turned me, kissed my cheekbone, the corner of my mouth, the bruise his fingers had made along my jaw, and then kissed me slow and unhurried.
Not to take. To claim, yes—but softer. I hated how my chest ached for it and leaned in anyway.
The steam wrapped us close, heat blurring everything into haze.
He rested his forehead against mine for a beat like he was catching his breath on the edge of me.
His hand never left my waist; even when he reached for the soap again, his thumb stayed at my hip, idling small circles as if his touch had forgotten how to stop.
When he was finished, he wrapped a towel around my waist and hauled me back to bed.
Soft music drifted from the corner speaker, low and steady, a bass line like a slow heartbeat, strings that never demanded.
The bed was wide, the sheets dark, cool and smooth against my overheated skin; the pillows held a faint trace of his cologne and smoke.
Lamps glowed amber instead of harsh light, turning the room into warm shadow.
The window was cracked open. From the garden below, a rosemary breeze ghosted in, carrying the last salt thread of the sea.
He slid in behind me, chest pressed to my back, arm heavy around my waist, his leg hooked over mine to keep me close.
He tugged the sheet up, then the light blanket, tucking me under with an absent-minded care that felt older than either of us.
His breath warmed the curve of my neck, steady as the music.
For once, I didn’t fight. Orgasm still hummed through me, sweet and heavy. The ache between my legs pulsed, but I let the warmth carry me. My muscles unwound one by one. The room smelled like soap and heat and him. His heartbeat thudded slow against my spine; I matched it without meaning to.
His mouth brushed my ear again, voice low, final. “Look how beautiful you are when you’ve given yourself over to me.”
I shuddered. He smiled into my skin.
“Every inch of you belongs to me, and you know it.” His hand spread against my stomach, firm, grounding. “Sleep, piccolino. Even your dreams answer to me.”
He kissed the hinge of my jaw, unnecessary, indulgent, then settled. The sheet whispered when I shifted. His hand tightened a fraction when I tried to turn; not a warning, just a reminder that he wanted me where I was.
“They’ll never touch you,” he added softly. “They’ll only ever see what I’ve already claimed.”
I stayed. Not surrender. Not defeat. Just rest. And for one brief, impossible moment, I let myself have it,warmth, weight, music, the soft drag of breath. Satisfaction rolled through me like a tide turning.
Sleep almost had me when the sound from the roof came back, shouts, fists, the crack of one on glass. Not in my ears but in my chest, echoes I couldn’t scrub out. I squeezed my eyes shut.
Damiano’s breath brushed my hair, his voice steady but edged with pride.
“You wanted answers? That terrace tonight—that’s ours.
Blood keeps the numbers clean, keeps men afraid to cheat, keeps money flowing back into our hands.
They come for the spectacle, but they stay because it’s the only place that matters. That’s the Bellandi way.”
His thumb pressed harder at my hip, claiming. “And tonight you stood there with me. You held the cash, you placed the bet. My husband. My mark on the game. Every man saw it. Every dollar they lost made me richer because of you.”
His mouth ghosted my ear, heat and teeth. “Earned your answers tonight. Tomorrow, you’ll earn more on your knees.”
The words curled in my chest heavier than the arm he kept across me. I shut my eyes, but the warmth didn’t stop the noise from replaying anyway. The roar of the crowd, the smear of blood, the crack of bone on glass. I carried it with me into sleep.