“H-h-h-how did you get out?” I whisper.

“One of the girls let me go,” he snorts. “Can you believe it? She was forced to suck my dick every day for at least a few weeks, but she managed to get that key and let me go. It wasn’t easy to get out, but I did it. So there it is, Cricket. You know all of me now...”

His voice breaks at the end, and I lift my eyes to meet his. His beautiful aqua orbs are glassy and red, and his jaw is tight. He’s waiting for me to say something, and probably to run and be disgusted. How can I be? It’s no different to a woman being raped. How could I ever find him repulsive? It wasn’t his fault. He endured one of the worst things a human can endure.

Slowly, on wobbly legs, I walk toward him, stopping when we’re nearly chest to chest.

“It changes nothing for me,” I whisper, reaching up, and grazing my fingertips over his cheek. He shudders, and closes his eyes. “I love you, Axel Wraithe. That hasn’t changed.”

His eyes pop open, and his lips part slightly. “How the fuck can you love me? After everything I’ve done to you, you should hate me, Cricket.”

“Hate and love are powerful emotions, equally the same. If I have to pick one, I’m going to go with love.”

He reaches up, and cups my cheek. Then he drops his head and his lips graze over mine. Before I can say a word, he reaches down and scoops me up into his arms, carrying me up the stairs. He takes me into the bathroom, and sets me on my feet.

I stare in full appreciation as he slowly strips out of his drenched clothes. When he’s naked before me, I smile. That view will never get old. I remove my clothes quicker than lightning, and then I step forward, placing my hands on his chest.

“Once you go here, Cricket, you can’t go back. If you accept this, all of me, then I’m never lettin’ you go.”

His voice is serious, his tone determined. I smile up at him.

“I say, bring it on.”

He grins, and then swings the shower door open and shoves me into it. The moment the water runs over our bodies, and we press ourselves together, I know I don’t want to wait. I don’t want foreplay, I don’t want roaming fingers—I just want him inside me. Hard and fast. Right now. As if reading my mind, Axel spins me around and presses my chest against the shower wall. His hand runs down my back, and around the front to my pussy. He cups it.

I can feel his cock pressing against my ass, and his lips grazing my ear. I make a happy sound, and push my ass back into him. He growls, and lowers his body just slightly, before driving upward and sliding into me with one swift thrust. I cry out, tensing right away at the tiny sting of pain that radiates through my body. That’s soon replaced with pleasure as Axel begins to slide in and out of me.

“Always wanted you like this. Pressed against a wall, with nowhere to go,” he rasps into my ear.

“Maniac.” I giggle, but it’s cut off with a moan as he tilts his hips, hitting that sweet spot.

“You’re goin’ to come for me, at least twice.”

“Didn’t think you could hold out that long,” I grate out between clenched teeth as I try to stop myself from screaming.

He reaches around and pinches my nipple for my comment. “We’ll see,” he murmurs.

He slides his hand down, still thrusting, and finds my clit. I groan, “That’s unfair.”

He chuckles into my ear, and nips at my lobe. “Life’s unfair, baby. Get used to it.”

I whimper, and curl backward as sparks of pleasure find their way to the surface. I want to come already, and there’s no holding back.

I scream as Axel pinches my clit, and the first wave of pleasure racks my body. He grunts, and lets me ride it out before spinning me around, and reaching down for my legs. A moment later, I’m jacked up on his body, my legs wrapped firmly around his waist. He gently lowers me, not moving his eyes from mine, and he fills me again.

“Number two is coming right up,” he husks, placing a hand on the wall beside my head.

I tilt my head, opening my mouth, and closing it over his bicep. He grumbles, and I bite down, hard. He hisses, and drops his head down to my neck, clamping his own mouth onto my skin.

I cry out, snaking my tongue out, and licking the spot I bit. He chuckles again, and pulls his head back, causing me to turn my head. The minute I do, he closes his lips over mine, and we lock ourselves into a kiss so deep and beautiful, it has my skin prickling.

It’s a kiss of love.

He thrusts his hips so gently, so slowly, that my release is hanging on the edge, causing my entire body to tense. I want to go over, but at the same time I just want him to keep fucking me like this, nice and slow. He wrenches his mouth away from mine, and his eyes are filled with lust. “I’m goin’ to come, baby, you need to join me,” he rasps.

“Fuck me harder, then,” I groan.

His eyes flare, and he begins moving his hips faster, harder, driving into me with such force that my head bumps back onto the tiled wall. I come within three pumps, and I scream out my release, crying out his name, and clenching around him. He throws his head back a minute later, and a ragged cry escapes his throat as he explodes into me, pumping his release into my eager body.

“Holy shit,” I manage to whisper after five minutes of shuddering.

“Yeah, that about covers it,” he croaks into my ear.

He lets me go, and I slowly put my feet back onto the floor. My knees wobble, but I manage to hold myself up. Axel reaches for the soap, and fills his palm. We spend the next hour in the shower, washing each other, touching each other, and just being together for the first time without this wall between us.