Page 60 of Dose

“You are not going.”

“Watch me present the case.”

“Some choices are stupid.”

“Still mine.” Her hands curl at her sides. “You helped me remember that I could choose. You do not own the ability.”

“I own nothing about you except what you give me.” My voice drops. “And I want everything.”

“Wanting is not the same as having.”

We stand less than a foot apart, both breathing too hard.

She fists the front of my shirt and kisses me.

It is angry, open-mouthed, and immediate. I kiss her back just as hard, my right hand closing around her waist.

Then I stop.

Our mouths remain close enough that her breath strikes mine.

“Is this yes,” I ask, “or another argument?”

“Both.” Her eyes are wet and furious. “Use the good arm. And do not imagine this settles Phoenix.”

“It settles nothing.”

She pushes me backward onto the bed.

I let her, keeping the injured shoulder supported and the left arm out of the work. She climbs over me, opens my trousers, and guides my right hand between her thighs. When she is ready, she lowers herself onto me with the same furious precision she brings to a disputed formula.

There is nothing gentle in it. There is also nothing unclear.

She sets the pace. My right hand grips her hip hard enough to leave evidence, and she answers by dragging my hair until pain sparks across my scalp. Every time I try to take control, she presses me back and reminds me with her body that this is not surrender.

“Mine,” I say through my teeth.

“Chosen,” she corrects, and rides me harder.

The word follows me over the edge.

Afterward, she lies against my right side, one hand spread over my chest. My arm locks around her waist. The argument remains exactly where we left it.

“Sixty-three children,” she says.

“I know.”

“I can see the dosing patterns. I signed their deviation reviews without ever seeing their faces.”

I pull her closer.

“Sitting here with that knowledge is its own kind of torture,” she says.

“If I lost you, I don’t know who I would become.” I stare at the ceiling. “I don’t trust that man.”

She turns until her forehead rests against mine.

“I hate this,” she whispers.