He tries. Fails. Tries again, voice cracking on every syllable. “I’m yours—Rafe—I’m yours—please don’t stop—”
“I won’t.” I grab his hips, grind in deep, voice low and ruined. “I’m not stopping. I’m not leaving. I’m not letting anything in your head but me.”
His thighs shake. His breath stutters. His whole body tightens around me—pulling, begging, claiming me right back.
“Come,” I growl, pounding into him with punishing rhythm. “Come on me. Come because of me. And then I’ll erase the rest.”
He breaks open with astrangled cry—body locking tight, cock spilling hot and messy across the sheets, sobbing my name into the mattress like a prayer carved into flesh.
I come seconds later, buried deep inside him, holding him so tight he couldn’t fall apart even if the world tried to tear him open again.
He’s gone boneless in my arms, breath ragged and wet, back slick against my chest as I hold him through the aftershocks. His muscles twitch around me once. Then again. And I think—I think it’s time.
So I start to pull out—slow, careful—every inch dragging from the heat of him like I’m peeling us apart cell by cell. But then I hear it. Small. Barely a breath.
“No…”
It stops me cold—not from fear, not from guilt, but from knowing. Knowing exactly what he’s asking for. What he’s still chasing. What he still needs to bleed the ghosts out completely.
I don’t move. Not for a breath. Then I reach for the tape roll still on the nightstand—matte black, familiar weight. I grab it without looking, fingers curling around the edge as I hook my other hand into his hair and pull, tilting his head back just enough to see his eyes.
Julian gasps as I drag him upright—off the mattress, off the collapse, onto his knees and into me, back flush to my chest, his thighs still splayed open over mine. His neck arches, throat bared, breath catching. He doesn’t fight it. He gives it. All of it.
I wrap the tape around his throat—once, twice, three full rotations—tight, just enough to hold without choking. “You’re mine, little halo,” I growl into his ear, teeth grazing the damp skin behind it. “Do you hear me? And I don’t share with ghosts.”
His breath breaks on a fractured gasp. His head drops back slowly onto my shoulder—exhausted, willing—and he presses himself down onto me again, sinking onto my cock, onto the stretch, onto the ache like he needs it to stay whole, like the pain is the only thing left that can make the world quiet.
“Fuck…” I hiss, arms tightening around him, free hand bracing hard on his thigh to keep him steady. He rocks back against me—just once, just enough—and my vision blurs for a heartbeat. He’s still open. Still slick. Still taking every inch like it’s the only thing anchoring him here.
Then I hear it. “You feel like home…” A whine.
It hits me harder than the moans ever did. Harder than the screams, harder than Ezio’s smirk or Nathan’s voice or the tape still looping in the dark. Because no one has ever saidthat to me—not here, not in this place, not when I’m like this: full of rage, full of blood, full of him.
I freeze—just for a second—like the word sucker-punched the breath right out of me. Then I move. One arm locks around his waist, dragging him tighter against me like I could absorb him whole if I tried. The other brushes up—slow, shaking—to push the sweat-damp hair off his face.
He’s a mess: flushed, damp, wrecked beyond recognition. But he’s mine. And I’m going to hold him until he believes it with every ruined, holy piece of himself.
I reach for the remote without loosening my hold on him, my hand sliding blind across the sheets until my fingers close around the cold metal. Julian shudders at the movement, that trembling aftermath that always rips through him when he’s given me everything and then some. I raise the remote and point it toward the screen.
The tape cuts off mid-moan. Silence hits the room like a mercy.
He exhales—small, fragile, breaking on the edges. His shoulders loosen under my arm, his throat softening under the band of tape. His body sinks into mine, a slow collapse, as if the world finally stopped trying to tear him apart.
I don’t pull out. I don’t even shift. I guide him down instead, slow and sure, lowering us both to the mattress with the care of a man holding something irreplaceable. Julian’s body folds with me, pliant, trusting, letting me position him exactly where I want him. Back to my chest. Ass still full of me. Neck wrapped in tape like a collar. Heart beating against my ribs like it’s trying to burn its way into my hand.
I slide one arm under his head, letting his cheek press into the crook of my bicep. He melts there—completely—like his bones finally remember what safety feels like. My other arm drapes over his thigh, holding him open, holding him close. His skin is hot where my hand lands. Damp with sweat. Trembling from the aftershocks.
He sighs, breath catching on the tail end of it, and pushes back just slightly—barely an inch, just enough to feel the drag inside him, to remind himself he isn’t empty.
I tighten my grip around his thigh. “Easy,” I murmur against the damp curls at his temple. “You’ve taken enough for one night.”
He hums—soft, wrecked, almost content—but his body doesn’t stop clinging. Doesn’t stop searching. Doesn’t stop needing. Every breath he takes shivers through both of us, like he’s rewiring himself against me, cell by cell.
My hand drifts up to his chest, fingers spreading over his sternum, steadying his breathing. I feel every inhale. Every tremor. Every echo of fear still trying to claw its way out.
My eyes flick to the nightstand. That fucking gun is getting moved. Hidden. Locked away so deep not even Finn’s nosy little chaos-gremlin fingers could find it. Julian won’t reach for steel in the dark again. If he needs grounding, he reaches for me.
Always me.
