I reach down, swipe two fingers through the drops of Hongjoong’s cum cooling on the edge of the couch cushion, and bring them to my mouth. I hold his gaze as I lick them clean, dragging my tongue deliberately, tasting the salt and musk of him on my tongue, and I watch his expression shift as I do it.
“I’ve never made anyone cum just from eating me out before,” I say, dropping my voice low and husky as I pull my fingers free. “You must have really missed me.”
Hongjoong’s eyes go dark. His jaw tightens and a dangerous look flickers across his face, he curses under his breath before he moves. I don’t even have time to react before his hands are on my hips, flipping me with that startling alpha strength, and suddenly my face is shoved into the couch cushions and my ass is hiked up in the air behind me, my knees barely finding purchase on the leather, the blunt head of his cock pressing against my hole for one split second before he plunges in from behind in a single driving thrust that buries him to the root.
I keen into the cushions, my spine arching as the stretch burns through me, perfect and overwhelming, his cock so deep I can feel it in my gut. Hongjoong grips the back of the couch with one hand for leverage, his other hand pressing down between my shoulder blades to pin me flat, and he starts to pound into me with a single-minded ferocity that tells me he’s done being patient. The wet slap of skin against skin fills the room, punctuated by my muffled cries into the cushions and the low grunts Hongjoong makes with each thrust as he drives into me over and over, and I claw at the leather and take it because that’s all I can do, all I want to do, my body opening up for him.
Sometime later, after we’ve migrated from the couch to the hallway wall where Hongjoong pinned me with my legs around his waist, and then finally to the bedroom where he bent me over the footboard and fucked me until my knees buckled, I’m lying face down in Hongjoong’s sheets with my cheek pressed into the pillow, groggy and half-asleep, every muscle in my body used up and aching in a deep, pleasant, thoroughly wrung-out way that only comes from being taken apart over the course of several hours.
I feel Hongjoong’s fingers trail lazily between my cheeks, his fingertips brushing my swollen rim with a featherlight touch that still makes me flinch, and I groan and wave a hand behind me in surrender.
“No more,” I mumble into the pillow. “I really can’t.”
Hongjoong’s lips press against my shoulder, his fingertip circles my puffy rim with a gentleness that’s almost mindless with curiosity. “Your hole does feel pretty swollen,” he murmurs against my skin, pressing just enough to make me clench.
I reach back and shove his hand away. “I’ll be surprised if it can even close again after taking your monster cock all night.” I make a disgusted sound and push my face deeper into the pillow. “I need to shower. I’m covered in dried cum and slick, I feel disgusting.”
I start to push myself up onto my elbows as Hongjoong chuckles behind me, but the moment I engage my core my lower back seizes in a vicious spasm that locks every muscle from my hips to my ribs. I cry out, hunching forward and clutching at the base of my spine with both hands, my face contorting as the pain shoots through the old familiar fault lines in my lumbar. It’s the kind of spasm that steals your breath, the kind that makes your vision go spotty at the edges while you wait for the muscles to release.
Hongjoong sits up behind me, all traces of amusement gone from his voice. He pulls the covers away from my back and leans over me, his hand finding my chin and tilting my face toward him so he can see the pain pinched tight in my expression.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, and his other hand is already feeling along my lower back and sides with careful fingers, pressing gently into the muscle on either side of my spine. “Did I actually hurt you earlier? Yoonjae, tell me what’s—”
“It’s not you,” I manage, breathing through the spasm in slow controlled exhales the way I taught myself to years ago. The muscle releases in increments, the sharp edge of the pain dulling to a deep throb that settles into my bones. I push myself up slowly, my back twitching with the effort, and groan as I rub at the ache that’s lodged itself in the base of my spine where it always does.
When I look back over my shoulder Hongjoong is still watching me with undisguised concern, his brow furrowed and his mouth set in a hard line. He hasn’t moved his hand from my back.
“It’s really fine,” I say, trying to sound dismissive. “I ache sometimes. I’ve got a lot of old injuries that didn’t heal right and they act up when I push myself too hard. It’s no big deal, it comes with the territory.”
His frown deepens. “What does that mean?”
I shrug one shoulder and immediately regret it when the movement sends another twinge through my lower back. “My body’s just taken a lot of abuse over the years. Obviously.”
This only seems to make him more upset. His jaw tightens and a hard look settles behind his eyes. “What abuse?”
I cringe slightly, realizing I’m going to have to spell it out for him because the look on his face tells me he’s not going to let this go until I do. “Hongjoong, you don’t need me to explain this to you.” But the hard set of his mouth says otherwise, so I exhaleand say it flatly, without inflection, the way I’ve learned to talk about these things so they don’t touch me on the way out. “You know how it is in this business. Alphas rent me. They don’t buy. And alphas who have no intention of claiming an omega have no incentive to use him gently.” I drop my eyes to the blank expanse of the sheets. “Most of them only cared about my ass and used it until it stopped being pleasing to them. They didn’t care if it hurt or caused damage. If something tore, or if I couldn’t walk right the next day, that wasn’t their problem. They’d already gotten what they paid for.”
Hongjoong flinches visibly. His reaction travels through his shoulders and down into his hands where they ball into fists on the sheets. I can see the anger building in him, the way his nostrils flare and his breathing goes shallow and controlled, and I know him well enough even after all these years to recognize that he’s fighting the urge to say something he can’t take back.
I meet his eyes steadily. “I don’t need your pity. This is my job. It’s one of the only jobs omegas can have on their own and it’s how I’ve survived the last decade and a half. I’m not ashamed of it, and I’m not ashamed of myself.”
“I don’t pity you,” Hongjoong says, his voice is calm but there’s a current running underneath it that I raises the hair on my arms. “And I agree, I don’t look down on rut companions. It’s a necessary service for alphas who aren’t bonded.” He pauses, and when he continues his voice drops lower, harder. “But just because they’re paid doesn’t mean alphas should treat omegas like shit. It doesn’t give them the right to use your body like it’s disposable.”
I look away then, my jaw working, because the way he says it unravels a bit of my stony defenses. Somewhere that years of enduring this job have worn the skin thin enough that even a careful touch can bruise. I blink hard and swallow against the sting building behind my eyes, refusing to let it surface.
“It’s behind me now anyway,” I say quietly, and I mean it. “I’ll probably retire after this contract.”
Hongjoong is quiet for a moment. Then he gets up.
Before I can ask what he’s doing or stop him, he’s sliding one arm under my knees and the other behind my back and lifting me off the bed like I weigh nothing at all. My arms go around his neck on instinct, my back protesting the shift in position with a dull flare that I grit my teeth through.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“We’re taking a bath,” he says plainly, and carries me out of the bedroom and down the hall to the bathroom.
The bathroom is enormous, the tub easily fits four if needed. Hongjoong sets me down on the heated tile floor while he draws the bath, testing the temperature with his wrist before adjusting the taps, adding something from a bottle on the ledge that makes the water go slightly milky and fragrant. When he’s satisfied he lifts me again, one arm hooked under my knees, and lowers me into the water with a care that makes my throat tight.
The heat hits my aching muscles and I hiss, then groan as the tension starts to bleed out of my back and thighs, the hot water working into the knotted tissue along my spine and loosening things that have been clenched for hours. I sink lower until the water reaches my collarbones and let my head tip back against the rim of the tub, my eyes falling shut.
