“I still want you to mark me,” I admitted.
“Vi-“ he started.
I tried to hush him, bring my hands to his mouth, but the belt stopped me. “Please get the razor. I promise I don’t need much.”
He looked skeptical, but on unsteady legs, he disappeared into the bathroom for a moment before returning with the small razor, sitting next to me on the bed.
“Just something little,” I asked. “A few small cuts. Please. I know…”
He cut himself, slicing across his pec and wincing. Then, before I could ask him to do the same to me, he did. The razor pressed in under my breast, cutting shallow and stinging.
“I won’t do anything to you I haven’t done to myself first,” he said, his eyes hard.
And with the flavor of his cum still on my tongue, I watched him continue, huffing and hissing every time he cut a new slice into me. But they weren’t new. I realized when I looked down that he was reopening old wounds, replacing their meaning, their origin. And each time, every single time, he matched it on his own body. Only shallow, superficial, but powerful. Emotion heated behind my eyes.
“There,” he said, when we were both a mess of red slices and dripping blood. “I’m finished.”
Tears streamed down my face, the urge to touch him myself overwhelming me. He seemed to realize this, because he chucked the razor on the bedside table and leaned over, freeing me from the belt.
Right away, my arms wrapped around his neck and I tugged him closer, clambering so we were switched, him sitting, me straddling him. My arms ached, but it wasn’t bad, just a soft reminder that they’d been held up above my head for almost too long.
It was urgent. It was so damn urgent. I kissed him, muttering my thank yous, crying and whimpering as his hands moved between us, stroking at the wounds he’d made, mixing our shared blood between us.
I played with his blood, swirling patterns across his abs and his pecs, putting my fingerprints on his arms, his cheeks. As I did, I rocked my hips, needing the friction, the fire, and when his cock hardened back up between us, it took nothing at all for him to lift me up and settle me down on it.
“Oh my god,” I cried as he stretched me, filling me up with absolute perfection. Sex with him was magic, not a thing of dominance, submission and hatred, but beauty, love and tender touches. It was us telling us how deep our feelings ran, not trying to belittle or subdue.
In that moment, I was so grateful my first time had been with him, that Rafe was a middle part, not the bookends, not my beginning or my end.
I writhed on top of Theo, rocking my body and leaning back, watching as we both made those patterns out of blood, swirling it all together, moving it around until our entire torsos were painted red.
“You’re so beautiful,” he muttered, his hands on my nipples, pinching and painting.
“You feel incredible,” I said, losing my breath as I picked up my pace, still deep in that urgency, that desperation.
I came a second before he did, this orgasm softer, deeper, more rolling, making my eyes flutter shut and my head fall forward onto his shoulder. He held me, taking over the rhythm to reach his own end, arms wrapped tight around my torso to keep us pressed together, his face buried in my hair. As his cock pulsed inside me, I realized I didn’t want to let it go.
“Can we sleep like this?” I asked, only half joking. But being so, so content connected this way. The blood was sticky between us, making our skin gluey and tacky.
He chuckled, kissed my shoulder. “Hang on,” he muttered, then repositioned us, shuffling, so we were lying down before twisting me so my back was pressed against his chest. His cock, softer now, but semi-hard, remained inside me.
“No guarantees he makes it the whole night, but I don’t want to be apart from you either.”
As he settled with his arms around me, his face returned in my hair. I drifted to sleep almost immediately, and every dark thing was so damn far away.
Nine
Violet
WhenIlookedinthe mirror now, it was with fresh eyes. Not those of someone studying potential lumps of fat or pimples, nor a young girl concerned about what her mother might think, that the way her stomach curved out a little meant she would have to starve for three days.
The slices on my body, replaced by Theo, matching the raw wounds painted across his body now too, looked beautiful. They weren’t imperfections; they were victory. Cleaned up in the daylight, I saw each one for what it was, how meticulously he’d connected us, sliced us up as a mirror image and barreled over what Rafael had tried to do.
The canvas of my body no longer belonged to my husband.
Each and every day I spent with Theo was healing. Even when he marred my skin afresh, it soothed, replaced pain with love.
I ran my finger over the weeping cut under my boob, a few ribs down, just visible under the weight of my bra-less chest. It was straight across, trying to crust over and failing when I picked at it. I wanted it there, a painful, sharp reminder that I wasn’t with Rafael anymore. That I was with Theo. I was myself.
