[I was not going to write this. Then I did. Please enjoy.]
(Night. Still humid. They've both showered, but neither's really unwound.)
Emily dried her hair in rough, impatient strokes. The towel slapped against her back with every movement. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror -- pink-cheeked, damp at the temples, a little wild-eyed -- and looked away before she could think too hard about it.
Mark was already in bed, propped up against the pillows with his laptop glowing on his thighs. Some blog article. Some rabbit hole. His mouth was pursed in that way it always was when he was reading something he thought might make him smarter.
She climbed in next to him, the bed dipping. He didn't look up.
"What's so interesting?" she asked, tucking her knees up to her chest, hugging them without meaning to.
"Some article about the whole alpha/beta thing." He tilted the screen toward her -- The Myth of the Alpha Male: Why Power Isn't What You Think. "Apparently it's all crap. Wolves don't even work like that. It's just families."
Emily snorted. "No kidding."
He smiled, closed the laptop, set it on the nightstand with a soft thunk. "Kind of hilarious, right? Half the internet trying to figure out if they're 'alpha' enough to get laid. Turns out they just need... good parenting skills?"
She laughed -- a little too loudly, a little too brittle.
Mark caught it. His eyes softened. "You okay?"
She shrugged, pulling the covers higher. "Just tired. And maybe a little sick of all the -- " she waved a hand vaguely, searching for the word, " -- posing. All the pretending."
"Yeah," he said. "Makes you wonder what real power looks like, doesn't it?"
There was a note in his voice she wasn't used to. Something low and unguarded.
She leaned back against the headboard, feeling the coolness of the wood through her damp hair. "You think it's strength? Money? Looks?"
Mark hesitated. His hand toyed with a loose thread on the comforter. "I think... it's making someone feel something they can't explain."
Emily turned her head, looking at him. Really looking.
Something twisted low in her gut. She knew -- knew -- that he wasn't talking about himself.
"Like--" she started, but her voice cracked, and she had to start again. "Like how Antoine just walks into a room and everyone... feels it."
Mark nodded. His face was tight, but he wasn't looking away. "Exactly."
Silence ballooned between them. Thick, unspeakable.
She felt herself sliding down into something she hadn't meant to name. Into wanting things she hadn't dared even daydream about when she was younger and "good."
"You feel it too," she said quietly. Not accusing. Not surprised.
Mark's smile was small. Bitter. "Hard not to."
A beat. Two. The air between them felt wet somehow. Charged.
"I feel it," Emily whispered. Her heart kicked against her ribs like it was trying to escape.
Mark's hand slid up, almost automatically, resting on her knee under the covers. A comforting gesture that, somehow, felt like a white flag.
"I don't want to," she said.
"I know," he said.
Her throat was dry. Her skin was hot. She wanted -- fuck, she wanted --
"I don't think it's about being alpha," she said. "I think it's about...being willing to take. To have. Without asking."
Mark nodded again. His voice, when it came, was almost inaudible.
"Maybe that's what I can't do," he said. "Maybe that's what you need."
The words hit her like a slap and a caress at once. Her whole body shivered, treacherously, and she hated herself for it even as she craved more.
"I don't want to hurt you," she said.
"I don't want you to lie to yourself," he answered.
Her hand found his. Gripped it tightly.
They sat there, two bodies pressed side by side, each shaking with things they hadn't yet dared to confess aloud. Mark, aching to hold on. Emily, aching to let go.
She didn't say anything else that night.
Didn't need to.
Her thighs were slick under the covers. She could feel it -- the restless pulse of it -- the way her whole center ached, greedy and wet, just from talking about it. About Antoine. About taking, being taken, being seen.
Mark shifted beside her, the mattress groaning, and she caught the barest shape of him through the sheets -- the soft, familiar bulge of him, half-hard, clueless.
Her mouth was dry. Her skin was screaming.
She rolled over him without warning, one knee thrown across his lap, her cotton panties dragging wetly over his stomach. Mark sucked in a breath, startled -- "Em?" -- but she shut him up with her mouth on his, a kiss too deep, too needy to be mistaken for anything but what it was.
He didn't ask questions. He never did.
She shoved his boxers down just enough, pawing at him, at herself, her fingers clumsy with the urgency sparking in her blood. His cock was already swelling -- four inches, maybe a little more if she willed it -- but it wasn't enough. It would never be enough again. And still she needed it.
Needed him.
Needed someone.
She sank onto him in a messy, graceless shove, grinding herself down until he was buried in her heat. She didn't wait. Didn't pause. Rode him with short, desperate jerks, chasing the pressure building at the base of her spine like it was a fire she could only put out by burning through it.
Mark groaned under her, his hands gripping her hips, trying to guide her, soothe her -- but she batted him away, planted her palms on his chest, used him.
Her clit throbbed with every grind of her hips. Sweat slid down the valley of her back. The sheets tangled around her calves.
She didn't want tenderness. She didn't want love.
She wanted to cum.
And she did -- with a low, broken gasp, her nails clawing into his skin, her body wracked with wave after wave of blinding, furious pleasure.
Mark came too, shuddering helplessly under her, but she barely noticed.
By the time he tried to pull her down to cuddle, she was already turning away, sliding off him, curling into herself with the sheets twisted between her thighs, sticky and trembling and hollow.
Neither of them said a word.
The room stank of sex and something worse:
The knowledge that this was just the beginning.
Emily woke tangled in damp sheets, her thigh stuck to the mattress where they'd sweated through the night. Her body ached.
Not the pleasant kind.
The used-up, too-fast, not-right kind.
Mark was already up, moving around in the kitchen -- she could hear the faint clatter of a spoon against a ceramic mug, the soft hum of the fridge door opening and closing.
She pressed her palms against her eyes, hard, until the darkness exploded with starbursts.
It didn't help.
Memory wasn't in her eyes. It was everywhere -- in the sore clench of her thighs, the rawness between her legs, the way her heart stuttered when she thought about how she'd taken him last night. How she'd used him.
Not for him.
Not for them.
For the ghost of another man.
Her stomach turned. She rolled out of bed, her feet hitting the floorboards too hard, too loud. Her panties were still damp, sticky against her skin, and the smell of herself -- of sex, of need -- rose up when she stood.
She stripped them off in a vicious tug and threw them in the hamper.
Showered under water as hot as she could stand, scrubbing herself like she could wash the thoughts away.
It didn't work.
They clung.
Every memory was a knife:
The way her hips had snapped against Mark's, frantic, chasing her own pleasure.
The way she hadn't even tried to kiss him after.
The way she'd lain there afterward, hollow and burning, thinking about someone else's mouth. Someone else's hands.
She dried off mechanically, wrapped herself in her robe, padded into the kitchen barefoot.
Mark smiled at her -- small, cautious -- and slid a mug of coffee across the counter.
"Morning," he said, voice warm, easy.
She wanted to slap it out of his hands.
She wanted to scream How can you be so fucking nice to me after that?
She wanted to crawl back into bed and never get up again.
Instead, she wrapped her hands around the mug and forced herself to smile back.
"Morning."
Mark watched her over the rim of his own cup. His eyes were softer than she deserved. Curious. Maybe even a little... proud?
Like he liked that she'd lost control.
Like he wanted her like that -- messy, desperate, half-destroyed.
The thought made her stomach knot tighter.
She drank her coffee too fast. Burned the roof of her mouth. Deserved it.
He leaned against the counter, casual, one foot crossed over the other, and said, almost lightly, "You were wild last night."
Her cheeks burned. She stared into her mug like it had answers.
"I... I'm sorry," she muttered.
Mark laughed, a short, surprised sound. "Sorry? Why?"
Because it wasn't about you.
Because I wasn't thinking about you.
Because I used you like a fucking toy and it made me cum harder than I ever have in my life.
She shook her head, not trusting herself to speak.
Mark stepped closer, brushed a damp lock of hair off her forehead. His touch was feather-light. Reverent.
"You don't have to be sorry," he said softly. "I liked it."
Something in her twisted. Hard.
She forced herself to meet his eyes -- really meet them -- and saw it there.
The want.
The fear.
The permission.
She wanted to cry. She wanted to slap him. She wanted to fuck someone so hard it broke the world open.
Instead, she nodded. Smiled like a good wife. Finished her coffee.
And all the while, the guilt gnawed at her, a hot, needy little animal chewing holes in her chest.
Emily saw him by the produce section.
It was so stupidly normal it made her feel like she'd stepped into a bad dream -- Antoine, standing by a pyramid of avocados, squeezing one thoughtfully, his thumb pressing into the pebbled skin.
He was wearing a black t-shirt, faded jeans, and sunglasses pushed up onto his head. The casual look of someone who belonged anywhere.
Like the universe had invented him that morning just to fuck with her.
He hadn't seen her yet. She could have turned away, ducked down another aisle.
But she didn't.
She stood there, hands wrapped too tight around the handle of the shopping cart, and let herself look.
His body moved differently than other men's -- loose, like gravity owed him favors.
His arms flexed casually when he hefted a melon, checking the weight.
He frowned at a price tag, a little crease forming between his brows.
He smiled -- that low, lazy smile -- at some woman passing by, and Emily watched the woman's whole posture change. Chest out, hips cocked, unconsciously inviting.
Emily burned with it.
Jealousy?
Hunger?
Both?
Finally he noticed her.
His smile widened, easy, unbothered.
"Hey," Antoine said, just that, like they'd run into each other a dozen times before.
"Hey," Emily answered, her voice a little too bright, a little too sharp. Her heart hammered in her throat.
He glanced into her cart. "Stocking up?"
"Trying to," she said. "Mark eats like a teenage boy."
Antoine laughed. God, even that -- the sound of it -- curled in her gut like smoke.
"You doing okay?" he asked, not intrusive, just...there. Solid as hell.
"Yeah," she lied. "You?"
"Always."
Another smile. Another little tilt of his head. Like he was letting her off the hook without ever putting her on it.
And that was it.
No touch. No linger. No invitation.
Just two people talking about groceries under too-harsh fluorescent lights.
He turned away first, whistling under his breath as he strolled toward the frozen foods.
Emily stood there for a long moment, her fingers numb on the cart handle, before finally moving again.
Later that night
Mark was brushing his teeth when she mentioned it.
Casual, tossed out like she barely remembered.
"Saw Antoine at the store today."
He paused, toothbrush hanging out of his mouth. Spit and mint foam gathering at the corners of his lips.
