Page 94 of Betray Me
Max moves to the window, peering out at the campus that glows softly under the ornate lampposts. “Or they wanted us to come back.”
The possibility sits uncomfortably between us, but exhaustion is winning over paranoia. We’ve been running for so long, sleeping in abandoned buildings and borrowed safe houses, always alert for threats that could materialize from any shadow. The simple luxury of a clean bed and locked door feels almost decadent.
“We should get some rest,” I say, though my body is wired with the kind of nervous energy that comes from finally stopping after months of constant motion. “Tomorrow we’ll need to figure out how to be students again.”
Max turns from the window, and in the soft light filtering through the curtains, he looks younger somehow. Less haunted. The sharp edges of constant vigilance have softened into something approaching the man he might have been if we’d met under different circumstances.
“Belle,” he says, my name carrying weight that has nothing to do with our current situation. “Are you okay? Really okay? After everything we’ve been through, after learning about the boat and Mrs. Harpsons’ family connection—”
“I’m tired,” I admit, surprised by how easily the honesty comes. “Tired of running, tired of looking over my shoulder, tired of feeling like we’re always one step behind people who’ve been planning our destruction since we were children.”
“But?”
“But for the first time, I feel like we might genuinely have a chance.” I move toward him, drawn by the familiar gravity that’s existed between us since our first desperate alliance in a federal safe house. “Mrs. Harpsons has resources, information, institutional power. If she’s really on our side—”
“And if she’s not?”
The question hangs between us, loaded with implications neither of us wants to voice. But as Max’s hands find my waist, as his familiar warmth chases away the lingering chill from our near-death experience on the water, I realize I don’t care about the possibilities anymore.
“Then we’ll figure it out together,” I say, reaching up to cup his face in my hands. “Max, whatever happens next, whatever traps we might be walking into—I need you to know that you’rethe only real thing in my life. Everything else is performance or survival or strategy. But this—us—this is mine.”
His response is a kiss that tastes like salt water and relief and the desperate joy of two people who’ve survived another impossible day. When he pulls back, his dark eyes search my face with the intensity I’ve come to associate with moments of profound honesty.
“I love you,” he says simply.
“I love you too,” I whisper back, and the words feel like coming home in ways that have nothing to do with familiar buildings or childhood memories.
Max gently sets me on the bed, following me down until his warm weight settles over me. The sheets smell like industrial detergent, but beneath that scent is something that brings my previous life rushing back. Lavender. Expensive French soap and high-thread-count sheets, designed to convey wealth and influence even as they mask the undercurrent of secrets and cruelty.
But as Max kisses me, as our clothes land in a discarded pile, as he guides himself toward my waiting entrance with the gentle urgency of two people who know each other’s bodies better than they know their own, all I can smell is him. His presence fills my senses, his physical proximity helping to distract me from the emotional tumult of returning to the island and aligning with the person who’s helped shape my destruction.
I gasp when his cock pushes into me, the familiar fullness bringing everything else into harsh focus. He stills, dark eyes scanning my expression for signs of pain or discomfort. “Is this okay?” he murmurs. “We can go slower—”
I cut him off with another kiss, arching up to meet him. “No, don’t stop. I need to feel you.”
The simple act of affirming consent, of acknowledging this decision is being made freely instead of negotiated or forced, awakens a different kind of desire. Gone is the young woman with repressed emotions and a taste for defiant violence. The woman Max sees now is someone who’s learning how to not only survive, but live.
I take control, urging him onto his back so I can straddle his hips and ride him at an agonizingly slow pace. He fills me perfectly, hitting every vulnerable part of me with intentional precision. As the pace increases, as the desperation rises, I realize it isn’t just about bodies. It’s about power, about how every act of intimacy defines and redefines who we are in relationship to each other.
It’s about choice. This is ours.
“Belle.” His voice catches, his hips rising to meet mine in a perfect rhythm. “Jesus, Belle, I’m going to come.”
There’s no condom, no separate pleasure, or postcoital separation. He spills inside me with a cry, body shuddering, holding me so tight I can’t tell where his pulse ends and mine begins.
It’s the warmth he fills me with from within that replaces the last traces of hypothermia. An intimacy that’s more than physical or sexual, and yet also both of those things at the same time.
His cock pulses and throbs and twitches inside me as we cling together, shuddering and panting. He starts to pull out,but I hold him close, not ready to separate. I want to stay like this forever, stretched open with him and already becoming wet again with fresh arousal.
He groans, the sound a mix of satisfaction and impatience. We’re on borrowed time, aware that an entire university is waiting for us tomorrow morning, but craving this simple physicality. I roll my hips, grinding into him, and moan as he grows hard again, each stroke dragging a desperate sound from deep inside me.
Max grabs my hair, twisting his fingers into the wild mess and tugging hard, the slight edge of pain mixed with the perfect pressure of his cock stretching me the most intoxicating combination I can imagine.
“Come here,” he growls, wrapping an arm around my lower back and expertly flipping us so I’m beneath him and he’s towering above me. “Wrap your legs around my back.”
I obey instantly, shivering as the way his words command me sparks a burning ache low in my belly. I raise my hips to him, searching his eyes with need that my verbalizations can’t express. He closes a fist around the base of his dick, then rubs the head up and down my slickness, prodding at my taut, swollen clit.
I shiver against his firm touches. He thumbs me slowly, then presses hard with his fingertips. He doesn’t stop, but circles in quick, slow strokes. My breath catches, and my stomach twitches with a wave of tightness that has nothing to do with nausea.
