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And there it is—the real reason he’s so ashamed. He sees his pleasure as a betrayal to me and to himself. But I understand because just as I have questioned my empathy toward Alek, Sara explained why we find pleasure in pain.
“Because when you have so little, something small means so much, and in our case, that something small is kindness. Like a starving dog, waiting under the table to get thrown a scrap, we are thankful when we are shown any kind of mercy.”
And that is why Saint was able to find pleasure.
Oscar tortured him, broke him, and the small scrap of compassion was the only thing Saint could hold onto to stop himself from succumbing to the darkness for good.
“It’s okay,” I assure him, running my fingertips over his soft beard. “There is nothing for you to be ashamed of.”
Saint sighs, riddled with so much emotion. “I wanted to fight him, but I didn’t.” And I know why that is. He made a deal with Oscar to be submissive on the proviso that I was safe. “But in the end, he drugged me anyway. I was too…uptight, he said.”
I close my eyes, sickened.
“He spoke of you, and when he removed this”—I watch in awe as he reaches into his back pocket and produces my necklace—“something happened. He held it out to me, and all I could smell, all I could feel was you. I recalled our meeting, not knowing how you would change my world forever. I remembered how you fought every chance you got, regardless of the consequences. And I realized I didn’t remember when I fell in love with you because I feel like I’ve loved you my whole life.”
My heart constricts because how can I not be touched by his words.
“Before I knew what was happening, I was…responding because I was thinking of you.” He shrinks from my touch, ashamed.
“You were drugged and manipulated, Saint. You can’t be blamed for your actions.”
“Stop making excuses for me!” he cries, allowing angry tears to sear down his cheeks. “I should have been stronger. You deserve someone better than me; someone who isn’t weak. Someone who didn’t fucking kidnap you!”
He attempts to stand, but I refuse to allow Oscar’s depravities to win. I latch onto his wrist, and before he has a chance to speak, I place his hand over my tattoo. “I don’t want anyone else. I want you.”
The warmth from his touch sends my body into overdrive, and everything clenches and prickles in awareness.
“It’s always been you,” I confess, squeezing his hand over my flank.
Saint hisses as he gently removes our hands from my side so he’s able to take a closer look at my tattoo. When he sees his name inked onto my skin, he blossoms before my eyes. But his self-hatred won’t let go without a fight. “Why? Why would you taint yourself with my name?”
My beautifully wounded man, how he underestimates his worth. It’s time he sees it. It’s time he realizes that he is all I want. Now and forever.
Pressing us chest to chest, I wrap my hand around the back of his neck and confess, “I love you for the man that you are. Not the man you think you should be.”
His lips part, but I am done talking. I smash my mouth to his, claiming it, claiminghimas mine. I’m frightened he will push me away, but he doesn’t. He kisses me back without apology as we both hungrily paw at one another, unable to keep up with the frantic rhythm. His long hair feels like heaven under my fingers as I thread my hands through it and pull hard.
A grunt leaves him, but the pain spurs him on. We need this. We need to feel this heartfelt promise after being surrounded by nothing but deceit.
He wraps his large hand around my waist, drawing me even closer to him as he devours my mouth with an insatiable appetite. I can barely keep up with the intensity because his actions are unapologetic and full of desperate yearning.
Our tongues duel, fighting for control, but in the end, he wins. Kissing suddenly isn’t enough, and he flips me onto my back, his heavy weight crushing me with absolute perfection. I am engulfed in his smell, his heat, but I want more. So much more.
I tug at the hem of his T-shirt, demanding I want it off, and Saint complies as he reaches over his head and tears it off from the back of his collar. We separate for a nanosecond before he’s back, kissing the ever-living fuck out of me.
His bare chest pressed to mine is a heady aphrodisiac, and the sting of his barbell only heightens the longing pulsating through me. His delicious hard-on pushes into me, and I smother my moan by biting his tongue.
He grunts, rolling his hips, and the friction of his pants has me seeing stars. “Take them off,” I half beg between his kisses.
My plea has him slowing.
He presses his forehead to mine, inhaling deeply, as he caresses my nose with his. “Are you sure?”
I never really had many expectations to what my first time would be like. But being here now, with Saint, I know that regardless of any scenario I could have imagined, nothing would ever compare to this. There are no words to express the emotions running through me because giving myself to him is the most natural thing in the world. He is as much a part of me as I am of myself.
He mistakes my silence as uncertainty. “We don’t have—”
But I cut him off. No more don’ts.
