Page 21 of Wrong Squad, Right Mess

Still, he didn’t don the mask again. Instead, he blinked, shuddering hard, and when he opened his eyes again, they were almost fully purple.

If they were purple all the way through, without a speck of any other color, it would have meant corruption. Instead, tiny swirls of his natural color broke through, just glimpses here and there that said he was still rational.

“You see? This is why I don’t show it, because people don’t care for it.” He closed his eyes as though the hide it again, but I cupped his cheek and pulled him down, making him bend his neck so I could reach his lips.

I gave him a quick kiss, one meant to put him off balance, before I spoke. “Don’t hide it.”

I expected him to pull away, to call me a fool, to laugh and play it all off as a joke. He liked to do that, after all, to act as though none of this really mattered to him, as though he found nothing important.

Instead, a switch flipped inside him, like he’d gone from calm to frantic in the span of a heartbeat. He kissed me with a passion I’d never felt from him, a need I doubted he showed many—maybe none.

He crowded me, cupping his hand behind my neck, holding me against him as he deepened the kiss. He hid nothing, none of the aggression, the need, his strength, the sharp corruption that seemed as much a part of him as his snark and his manipulation. His tongue slid against mine, less of a tease and more of a claim.

It almost felt as though he wanted me to understand the real him, like he hoped to scare me off.

Too bad for him. I hadn’t told him to stop hiding without knowing exactly what I was in for, what to expect.

He reached for my pants, then pulled away just long enough to remove them. His hungry gaze moved over me, taking in each detail as though committing it to memory. He undid his own pants with one hand, his other spreading my thighs around his hips.

I glanced to the side, and he leaned forward, catching my chin to force my eyes back to his. “Don’t think about anyone else. I share you every day, but right now? Right now I want you all to myself, so don’t focus on anyone or anything else. I don’t care if a monster breaks in, I don’t care if Ingram walks in and starts eating you out—don’t you dare look away from me.” Possessiveness filled his words, like a need so deep he didn’t know how to handle it.

Had anyone ever wanted me this way before? Not just because someone needed something from me, but for me, as a person?

I doubted it, and the feeling of it intoxicated me, made me want to fall just as far into the same madness that consumed him.

I lost myself in his gaze, the purple not as terrifying as it had been the first time I’d seen it. Back in the bathroom, what felt like a lifetime ago, when I’d seen this side of him, it had horrified me. I’d seen him the same as Corsa, as a monster, as someone just moments from breaking. He’d epitomized my fears.

So what had changed? Was it just time? Or something more? Something deeper?

Whatever it was, I no longer saw him through that lens. I saw past the danger he posed—maybe because I acknowledged the danger I posed, as well—to the man beneath it all, the one constantly struggling to stay afloat, to protect those around him, knowing the system itself was set against them all. That struggle shone clearly in the tense smile he often wore, the weight of all the responsibilities he carried, and yet despite that, he’d never once mistreated me.

He still risked himself for civilians, still gave all he could to his squad, to me.

I lifted my hips in a desperate plea.

“You got cut off earlier, so have you just been suffering since then?” He rolled his hips, grinding his bare cock against my underwear. It teased me, the pre-cum making the fabric wet—or maybe that was my own cunt. “Fuck, you smell so good. How is that possible, huh? How can you smell like home, like heaven, like everything I’ve ever dreamed of and wanted? To think you walked your tight ass into our office spouting things like ‘no touching’ and we ended up here?” His chuckle made my cheeks heat, but I couldn’t deny anything he said.

“You weren’t all about me either,” I reminded him, the words broken and breathless.

“You’re right. You were a means to an end—nothing else. Fuck, I wasn’t even sure you weren’t sent by the Guild to screw with us. I saw you there, looking perfect, like this test for us, and damn it, I knew we’d fail it.”

“Now, though?”

“Oh, you’re a test, and we’ve failed, but it’s one of the few things I’m just fine coming out a loser for. Now, I’d love to take my time with you, but we aren’t exactly in a place for that, so are you going to keep being good for me, Blizzard, and let me fuck you like we both want?”

There really was only one answer to that, so I nodded.

He reached between us, slipped my underwear to the side, and plunged his cock deep into me in a single punishing thrust. It stung, the stretching so intense, so fast, that I whimpered at the sudden fullness. Even still, I clung to him tighter, wrapping one of my legs around him, hooking my heel on his thigh to keep him from escaping.

He fucked me hard, bringing his lips back to mine, and I gave in to him. I dug my fingers into the muscles of his back, the proof of just how strong this man was.

I’d seen firsthand as he tore through monsters that would have slaughtered countless civilians, yet in that moment, all the strength belonged to me. I guided him at the same time—as though I could have resisted that. Our closeness, the pleasure, all of it meant I automatically accepted his corruption, pulling what had accumulated inside him into me.

It reminded me that no matter how strong he was, how powerful, at the end of the day it was me who kept him alive. Without a guide, he’d have nothing, wouldn’t survive more than a few months.

It was a heady feeling, the fact that he relied on me. For the first time, I felt powerful. Not just an after-thought, not someone trying to survive a world meant for others, not a pawn.

Instead, I truly understood what they’d all tried to tell me, that I had power of my own, that I was vital, that I had a place in the world that couldn’t be taken away.