LOGINI woke to the feel of Rhys’s mouth on my neck.
It was still dark. Rain tapped steadily against the window. His body was warm and solid behind me, one heavy arm locked around my waist, the other hand already sliding under the hem of the oversized T-shirt I’d fallen asleep in. His fingers traced slow, deliberate circles on the bare skin of my stomach, then lower. “You’re awake,” he murmured against my ear, voice rough with sleep. “Yes.” “Good.” He rolled me onto my back and kissed me, deep, hungry, no hesitation. I opened for him immediately. The kiss turned filthy fast. His tongue swept into my mouth while his hand shoved the T-shirt up and off me in one motion. Cool air hit my skin. He pulled back just long enough to look at me, bare breasts, tight nipples, the way my chest rose and fell too fast, then closed his mouth over one peak and sucked hard. A broken sound left my throat. “That’s it,” he muttered against my skin. “Let me hear you.” He switched to the other breast, teeth grazing, tongue flicking, while his hand dragged down my stomach and pushed between my thighs. I was already wet. He groaned low when his fingers slid through the slickness. “Fuck, Sienna. Soaked already.” Two thick fingers pushed inside me without warning. I arched off the bed, moaning. He fucked me with them hard and precise, curling, stretching, the wet sound of it loud in the quiet room. His thumb found my clit and circled with ruthless pressure. Every thrust of his fingers pulled another helpless sound from me. “Rhys…” “I know.” He kissed me again, swallowing the next moan. “You’re going to come on my fingers first. Then you’re going to ride me until you can’t take it anymore.” The words sent a fresh pulse of heat straight through me. He added a third finger and fucked me deeper. The wet, filthy sound of it filled the room. My hips moved against his hand without permission. Pressure built fast and sharp. I came hard, sudden, crying out against his mouth while my body clenched around his fingers. He worked me through it until I was trembling, then pulled his hand free and brought the shiny fingers to my lips. “Clean them.” I did. I sucked my own taste off his skin while he watched, eyes dark, breathing heavier than before. When he pulled his hand away he shoved his own sleep pants down and freed himself, thick, hard, the head already slick with precum. He lay back against the pillows and looked at me. “Get on.” I climbed over him, straddling his hips. He gripped the base of his cock and held it steady while I sank down slowly, inch by inch, until he was buried to the hilt. The stretch pulled a long, broken moan from my throat. He was bigger than I’d expected, filling me so completely I had to stay still for a second just to breathe. Rhys’s hands locked on my hips. “Fuck. Look at you taking every inch.” I started to move. At first it was slow, rolling my hips, rising and falling in a steady rhythm while I braced my hands on his chest. The wet sound of his cock sliding in and out of me filled the room. Every time I sank down he exhaled like it cost him something. His fingers dug into my skin hard enough to bruise. “Faster,” he ordered, voice rough. I picked up the pace. Harder. Deeper. My breasts bounced with every downward stroke. Rhys thrust up to meet me, the slap of skin on skin growing louder, wetter. I moaned openly now, couldn’t stop the sounds pouring out of me. He groaned in answer, low and filthy, watching where our bodies joined. “That’s it. Ride me. Use my cock.” I did. I fucked myself on him harder, chasing the building pressure. Sweat slicked my skin. The wet, obscene sounds of sex filled every corner of the hotel room, skin slapping, my moans, his deep groans, the creak of the bed. He sat up suddenly, one arm banding around my waist, the other fisting in my hair, and kissed me like he was starving while he thrust up into me with short, powerful strokes. “Rhys…I’m close…” “Come. Now.” I shattered. The orgasm crashed through me hard enough that I cried out against his mouth, body clenching and pulsing around him. He groaned and kept thrusting through it, holding me tight, fucking me through every wave until I was shaking and oversensitive. He wasn’t finished. Rhys flipped us in one smooth motion, pinned me on my back, shoved my thighs wide, and drove back into me with a single hard thrust. The new angle punched a broken moan from my throat. He fucked me rough and deep, the wet slap of his hips against mine loud and relentless. One hand pinned both my wrists above my head. The other gripped my thigh and held me open. “Still so fucking wet,” he rasped against my mouth. “Taking me so well.” I moaned louder. Couldn’t help it. Every thrust dragged against every sensitive place inside me. The bed frame knocked softly against the wall. Wet sounds filled the room…filthy, continuous, the unmistakable noise of how soaked I was for him. He increased the pace. Harder. Faster. The headboard slammed. My moans turned into broken, high sounds. His groans grew rougher, more unrestrained. He dropped his head and sucked hard on my nipple while he fucked me, teeth scraping, and the dual sensation shoved me over the edge again. I came a second time, harder, crying out his name while my cunt clenched around him in waves. Rhys cursed and followed a moment later, burying himself as deep as he could go and pulsing inside me with a low, broken groan that sounded like it had been ripped out of him. We stayed locked together, both breathing hard, bodies slick with sweat. Eventually he eased out. I felt the warm slide of him leaving, the thick mess he’d left behind already starting to leak out of me. He looked down at it and made a dark, satisfied sound. Then he leaned in and kissed me…slower this time, deeper, almost tender after how rough he’d just been. “Still want me to leave?” he murmured against my mouth. I was still trembling. My body felt used and claimed and completely unwilling to pretend this had been a mistake. “No,” I whispered. “Stay.” Rhys pulled me against his chest, one heavy arm locking around my waist like he had no intention of letting go. Outside the rain kept falling. Inside the room, the only sounds left were our slowing breaths and the quiet, filthy knowledge that I had brought a stranger upstairs to prove a point, and ended up getting thoroughly, roughly, completely fucked instead. And I already wanted him to do it again.I was two-thirds of the way through a bottle of something amber and expensive when the door opened again.Jude stopped in the doorway. His eyes went from my face to the bottle in my hand and back.“I thought I told you to stop.”I lifted the bottle in a mock toast. “Welcome home.”He crossed the room in three strides, took the bottle from my fingers with firm pressure, and set it out of reach.“That’s enough.”He crouched in front of me so we were eye level. The concern in his face was worse than anger would have been.I looked at him, and the words I had never said finally pushed free.“I’m sorry.” The confession came out raw. “For all of it. The books in the mud, the notes, the way I made sure everyone laughed. I just… I wanted to feel like I belonged somewhere. Hurting you was the only thing that ever made the other kids stand next to me. That doesn’t make it better. I know that, but it’s the only reason I have.”Silence stretched.“I won’t forgive you.”He said.I reached out, took
The story spread like smoke under a closed door.By the third day every professional contact I had ever made seemed to know the photo. Clients cancelled, two freelance contracts dissolved with polite, final emails. A recruiter who had been warm last week suddenly had no openings. Tessa’s little network had done its work thoroughly. My name was now attached to “unstable,” “unprofessional,” and a looping image of me.I stopped answering the phone.That night I found myself on a bar stool in a place that smelled of old wood and cheaper whiskey than I usually drank. The lights were low. The music was something slow and forgettable. I ordered the first double without tasting it. The second went down easier, by the third the edges of the room had softened and the weight on my chest felt almost manageable.No one looked at me twice. The bartender kept the glasses coming and strangers talked around me like I was furniture. I was fine with that, being invisible felt safer than being seen.I di
Two days later the mark on my cheek had faded, but the memory of Jude Harlan’s eyes had not.I told myself it was nothing. A stupid accident and an ancient history that should have stayed buried. I went to work, answered emails and smiled through another client call that went nowhere. At night I lay awake replaying the exact second the iced tea left my hand and the way his voice had said my name.On Thursday evening my phone lit up with a calendar reminder I had almost forgotten: the soft launch for the new co-working space downtown. Free drinks, networking, the usual forced cheer. I almost stayed home. Then I remembered Tessa would almost certainly be there, still laughing about the coffee-bar video, and spite won.The space was all glass and concrete, already crowded when I arrived. String lights hung from the high ceiling. People clustered around low tables with wine glasses and forced laughter. I took a glass of sparkling water I did not want and found a corner near the windows wh
The day had already decided to hate me.I stepped off the curb into a puddle deep enough to soak my left shoe through to the sock. Rain streaked the windows of every café I passed. My phone battery sat at four percent. The client meeting that was supposed to save my week had ended with a polite smile and a firm “we’ll be going in another direction.” By the time I pushed into the crowded coffee bar on Mercer Street, my mood was a black, humming thing under my skin.I ordered the largest black coffee they had and claimed the last free stool at the high counter near the window. Steam rose from the cup. I wrapped both hands around it and closed my eyes for three full seconds, trying to borrow calm from the heat.Someone bumped my shoulder hard enough to jostle the cup. Hot liquid sloshed over the rim and burned the side of my hand.“Oops,” a voice sang behind me. Familiar in the worst way. “Didn’t see you there, princess.”I turned to see three women from the marketing team at my old firm
Six weeks felt longer than they should have.I kept the door open during every remaining office hour. I called on him in class only when the work demanded it. I graded his final portfolio with the same ruthless precision I gave everyone else and refused to let my eyes linger when he packed his things on the last day of the semester. He never pushed past the boundary I had drawn that rainy night in my apartment. He simply looked at me the way he always had, and left the room each time without a word that could be misread.Graduation was held under a white tent on the main lawn. The air smelled of cut grass and warm champagne. I stood near the edge of the faculty section in a dark dress and watched him cross the stage, receive his diploma, and shake the dean’s hand with the same quiet composure he had shown in every seminar. When his name was called I felt the old familiar pull low in my stomach and forced myself to clap like every other professor.The after-party spilled across the dep
The chair’s office smelled like old paper and the cheap coffee that always sat too long on the burner. I sat across from her with my spine straight and my hands folded in my lap while the memory of Ellis still buried inside me the night before sat like a second pulse under my skin.“There’s been a concern raised,” she said, glancing at a note on her desk. “About the amount of time one of your advanced students has been spending in your office after hours. Ellis Hart.”My face stayed neutral. Inside, everything went cold and sharp.“He’s revising a long piece,” I answered. “The work requires extended discussion. I’ve kept the door open whenever possible.”She studied me for a moment longer than was comfortable. “See that it stays that way. Perception matters, Mara. You’re new to the faculty, the last thing any of us needs is a complication.”I left with the warning sitting heavy in my chest. By the time I reached my office the sharp edges of fear had already started cutting into the wa







