Chapter Text
"The ER doesn't care about your feelings. That's what the roof is for."
— Dr. Jack Abbot, to no one in particular
The man had been forty-one. Firework mortar, the big ones from the Route 28 tents with names like ANNIHILATOR and FREEDOM'S FURY. He'd held it too long or the fuse had been short or both — the medics were still sorting it out when they wheeled him in with most of his right hand missing and a chunk of cardboard tube embedded in his throat.
Samira had been on him for forty minutes. Controlled the hemorrhage, packed and clamped, tourniqueted above the wrist. The throat was the problem — fragment behind the trachea she couldn't visualize, sats tanking no matter how much O2 they pushed. She tubed him, called for blood, started massive transfusion, paged ENT twice.
ENT never came. Surgery with another firework case upstairs.
CODE BLUE — TRAUMA BAY 2
18:14 — Cardiac arrest. CPR initiated. Epinephrine 1mg IV push.
18:21 — No change. Sodium bicarbonate administered.
18:29 — Asystole. No shockable rhythm.
18:32 — Time of death called by Dr. Robinavitch.
Eighteen minutes. Compressions, epi, bicarb, flatline. Nothing.
Robby called it.
Then Robby turned to her — still pulling off his gloves, already half-facing Langdon — and said, "Mohan, you should've gotten ENT down here instead of trying to manage that airway solo. We'll talk about it."
In front of Langdon. In front of Dana. In front of two nursing students whose names she didn't know.
She hadn't said anything back. She'd stood there with the man's blood drying in the creases of her knuckles and nodded.
Nodded. Like a fucking dog.
Exam Room B was closed, had been since Dana dropped the census after four. Samira sat on the gurney with her elbows on her knees, her forehead in her palms, trying to get her breathing under control. She couldn't go to the break room because Langdon was in there eating a sandwich like nothing happened. Couldn't go to the bathroom because every nurse on the floor apparently had to pee simultaneously. Couldn't go home because her shift didn't end for another hour and she refused to give Robby the satisfaction of saying she left early.
So she sat in the dark and thought about how she got here. Four years of undergrad. Four years of med school. Three years of residency. Eleven years of work to end up in a dark exam room trying not to cry because a man who's supposed to be her mentor told her she killed a patient by being too slow. Again. Too slow, Mohan. Too methodical. This is emergency medicine, not a chess game.
Collins would've said something. Collins always had — calm, firm, the kind of quiet authority that made Robby actually shut up and listen. But Collins was gone. Nobody talked about why. And the backup Samira used to have had walked out the door with her.
She hadn't even been wrong. That was the stone in her chest. ENT was paged and ENT didn't come and she managed the airway because no one else was going to. The man died because a mortar tube to the throat at close range kills you. Some injuries are just fatal. She knew that. Robby knew that.
But Robby had looked at her like she'd missed something obvious, and moved on.
She pulled out her phone. No messages. Nobody checking on her, nobody noticing she'd vanished from the floor. She went to work, she studied, she picked up extra shifts, she called her mother in Tamil every Sunday, she took care of everyone and did everything right and more — and for some fucking reason she still felt like unwanted goods. The last item on the shelf nobody reaches for.
The door opened.
Jack Abbot in the hallway light, jacket on, coffee in hand, hair still damp at the temples from a recent shower. Night shift. Early, because he was always early — compulsive military habit that hadn't shaken loose.
He looked at her. Blood on her scrubs, tear tracks on her face, sitting alone in the dark.
"Who killed your dog?" he said.
Her jaw tightened. "Get out."
Jack leaned against the doorframe and sipped his coffee.
"I said get out, Abbot."
"Heard you." He didn't move. His eyes adjusted, scanning her face, her hands, the blood. "Bad one?"
"I don't want to talk about it."
"Okay." Another sip. Still didn't leave.
"Are you just going to stand there?"
"It's my exam room."
"It's communal."
"It's on the night shift floor and my shift starts in eight minutes." One-shoulder shrug. "My exam room."
She pressed her palms into her eyes. "Firework mortar to the throat. ENT was in surgery, I managed the airway myself. Ran the code for eighteen minutes. He died. Robby told me I should've gotten ENT down faster. In front of everyone."
"Were they paged?"
"Twice."
"And they were in surgery."
"Yes."
"So what were you supposed to do, drag them out mid-procedure?"
"Apparently."
Jack clicked his tongue. That sound — aimed at interns, broken equipment, the vending machine on three. His processing noise for things that annoyed him below the threshold of a full response.
"Robby's wrong," he said.
"I know he's wrong."
"Then what are you doing in here?"
It landed harder than she expected. Maybe harder than he meant. With Jack it was impossible to tell.
"I'm regrouping."
"You're hiding in a dark room feeling sorry for yourself because Robby hurt your feelings."
"Fuck you, Abbot."
"I'm not being a dick. I'm saying you're too good for this." He set his coffee down. "Sitting in the dark, crying over a case you couldn't have saved. That's not you."
"You don't know what's me."
"Three years. I have some idea." He leaned back against the counter, arms crossed. "Robby gave you shit publicly. That's a problem and I get why you're pissed. But the patient — that wasn't on you. You know it. I know it. Even Robby knows it, he just doesn't have the decency to say so."
She wiped her face with the back of her hand. Angry, embarrassed, exhausted. "You know what's fucked up? I go to work. I study. I pick up extra shifts. I call my mom every week. I do everything right and more and I still—" Her voice caught. She shoved through it. "I still feel like unwanted goods. Like I'm just here because nobody's gotten around to replacing me yet."
Jack laughed.
Not cruel — startled, like she'd said something so far from his reality that his brain short-circuited. A single huff through his nose, shaking his head.
"Unwanted goods," he repeated.
"Robby fucking hates me. He's never once given me feedback in private. Langdon gets pulled aside, I get corrected in front of the room." She picked at a dried blood spot on her scrub pants. "Santos is doing fine on her own. Mel is — Mel. Collins left without saying goodbye. Nobody needs me here, Jack. I could disappear tomorrow and the department would run exactly the same."
"I need you."
She scoffed. Loud, rude, dismissive — the kind of sound she'd never make in the ER because she was always, always professional. But she was sitting in the dark with a dead man's blood on her clothes and she was done being polished.
"I'm serious," Jack said. Same flat delivery, but he'd uncrossed his arms. "Night shift runs better when you're on it. You catch things other people miss because you actually take the time to look. I trust your judgment more than anyone else in this department. Including Robby."
"You're just saying that because I'm crying."
"I don't say things because people are crying. Ask anyone. Dana told me my bedside manner is like getting hugged by a filing cabinet."
Samira almost smiled.
Jack shrugged off his jacket. Hung it on the chair. Rolled his sleeves up, the tendons in his forearms shifting, the scar tissue on his left where the prosthetic met skin.
"You want to know what's actually fucked up?" he said.
"What?"
"I think about your mouth."
She blinked. "What?"
"That fucking mouth, Mohan." He said it like he was reporting a lab result. Flat, factual. "Smart and sassy and never shuts up. Been wondering how it'd look wrapped around my cock."
Silence. A monitor beeped somewhere down the hall. A firework popped outside, muffled by the building.
Samira stared at him. Her mouth was open, which was maybe a first. Jack Abbot — night shift attending, combat veteran, the most emotionally closed-off man in western Pennsylvania — had just told her he thought about her mouth on his dick. In his regular voice.
"You—"
"You can report me. Probably should."
"I'm not going to report you."
"Might be the smart move."
"Jack, shut up." She was on her feet. Her heart was hammering and her face was hot and underneath the shock, something was uncurling low in her belly. She'd felt it before — night shifts when the ER emptied out and it was just them, when he'd lean close and she could smell his cologne through the antiseptic. She'd buried it every time. Locked drawer, thrown key.
Key was apparently still in the lock.
"How long?" she asked.
"How long what?"
"How long have you been thinking about it?"
He rubbed the back of his neck. "Long enough that I should probably bring it up with my therapist."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one you're getting."
She crossed the space between them in three steps. He didn't flinch, didn't step back — just watched her come with those steady dark eyes. Close enough to see the grey in his stubble, the freckles on his nose, his throat moving when he swallowed.
"You can't just say that and then—"
"Just did."
"—expect me to—"
"I don't expect anything. I'm just tired of pretending I don't look at you." He was looking at her mouth again, his focus dropping, his jaw tightening. "Go home, Mohan. Get some sleep. Forget I said anything."
"I don't want to go home."
"Samira."
"I don't want to go home and I don't want to forget you said it."
She kissed him. Both hands fisting his scrub top, pulling him down. Messy and off-center and she tasted coffee and he grunted — low, surprised — his hands catching her waist like reflex. Like muscle memory rehearsed without his brain's sign-off.
She pulled back. His eyes were dark, his breathing different.
"Okay," he said. "Okay."
He kissed her back. Harder. His hand slid to the back of her neck, fingers in her hair, tilting her head. His tongue found hers and she moaned against his mouth — raw, needy — and his grip on her hip tightened, pulling her flush against him.
She could feel him through the scrubs. Hard already, the thick ridge of his cock pressing against her belly, and knowing that — Jack Abbot, hard, because of her — made her head swim.
"Lock the door," she breathed.
He reached behind her without breaking the kiss, flipped the latch. The click echoed.
She pulled his scrub top over his head. Lean, solid, freckled across the shoulders. Hair on his chest going grey. That thick scar along his left side. Built from decades of use, not vanity. Her palms pressed flat against his chest and he was warm — radiating heat — and she could feel his heart going fast under her hand.
"Your turn," he said, and pulled her top off. She was in a plain black sports bra, blood still on her forearms. He looked at her. Not quickly, not politely. Her collarbone, the slope of her shoulders, the swell of her breasts against the fabric. He unclasped the bra from behind — quick, deft — and it dropped.
Her nipples tightened in the cool air. He looked at her tits like a man seeing water after a long walk and his jaw worked and his cock twitched against her hip.
"Jesus," he said.
"Eloquent."
"Shut up." He ducked his head and his mouth closed over her left nipple, tongue flat and hot, and she gasped so hard her hand flew to the back of his skull. He sucked — gentle first, testing, then harder, his teeth grazing the stiff peak — and a bolt of heat shot straight from her breast to her cunt, so direct that her hips rolled forward against his thigh without her permission.
He hummed against her skin and moved to the other one, his mouth trailing wet across her sternum while his hand kept working the first, squeezing, his thumb rubbing slow circles over the nipple he'd left swollen and shining with spit. Cool air hitting wet skin on one side, his hot mouth on the other — she squirmed against him, her fingers tightening in his hair.
"Jack—"
The vibration of his voice traveled through her breast tissue. He bit down gently, just enough to sting, and she whimpered — actually whimpered — and felt his cock jerk against her thigh.
He kissed her again, walking her backward until her knees caught the gurney. His hands found her waistband, pulled — scrub pants and underwear together — and she stepped out, kicked off her sneakers. Naked in a hospital exam room.
She tugged his waistband. "These too."
"Bossy."
"You said you liked my mouth. My mouth is telling you to take off your pants."
He pushed his scrubs down and his cock sprang free and her brain went offline.
Thick. That was the first thing — thick enough that she recalculated several assumptions about what was going to fit where. Curved slightly upward, flushed a dark angry red, a heavy vein running the length of the underside. The head was swollen, the slit shining, and as she watched, his cock twitched and a bead of precome welled up and rolled slowly down the crown.
"You're staring, Mohan."
"I'm assessing."
She dropped to her knees. Cold tile, lemon disinfectant, her kneecaps grinding against industrial flooring. She looked up at him and watched his expression crack open.
"You don't have to—"
"You said you wondered what it'd look like." She wrapped her hand around the base and he pulsed in her grip, hot and impossibly hard, the skin shifting over the rigid core of him. Her fingers didn't close. "So watch."
She kissed the tip. Soft, closed-mouth, almost tender, and his exhale came out shaky. Then she opened her mouth and licked the slit, slow, tasting salt and clean skin and that faintly bitter tang of precome, and his hand flew to the side of her head, fingers threading into her hair.
"Fuck," he breathed.
She took him in. Her lips stretched around the width of him, her jaw already aching from the girth, her tongue pressing flat along the underside where that thick vein throbbed against her. Heavy in her mouth, dense and hot, the taste deepening as she worked more of him in — musk and salt and something underneath that was just him. She got halfway before the head bumped the back of her throat and she paused, breathing through her nose, her eyes watering, her mouth so full she could feel her pulse in her stretched lips.
"You look—" His voice had gone to gravel. His fingers tightened in her hair. "God, Samira."
She pulled back, lips dragging along every inch of him, feeling the ridge of his head catch against her lower lip before she pushed forward again. Her throat opened and he slid in another inch, thick and blunt against the soft tissue, and she fought the gag, swallowed around him.
She found a rhythm. Slow and wet, her fist working the base in time with her mouth, her tongue pressing and curling against the underside on every upstroke. The sounds were filthy — thick, slick, spit pooling at the corners of her mouth and sliding down his shaft — and the small room amplified every wet pop and drag.
"That mouth," he groaned, his head tipping back against the cabinet, the tendons in his neck pulled tight. "I fucking knew it. Knew you'd be—" He hissed when she hollowed her cheeks and sucked hard, the pressure making his thighs shake. "Just like that, jesus christ."
She hummed around his cock and his hips bucked, shoving another inch into her throat. She gagged, spit flooding her mouth, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes, but she didn't pull off. She swallowed and took it and felt his hand tremble in her hair.
"You know what kills me?" He was talking — really talking, eyes half-shut, voice loose and wrecked. "You argue with me about everything. Treatment plans, discharge protocols, which cafeteria coffee is better — you fight me on every single thing." His hips moved in shallow involuntary thrusts, his cock sliding in and out of her mouth. "And now you're on your knees with my dick in your mouth and you're still looking up at me like you're about to tell me I'm wrong about something."
She pulled off with a wet pop, spit stringing from her lip to his cockhead. "You are wrong about most things."
"Get back on my dick."
She laughed against his hip and he laughed too, low and breathless, his fingers going gentle in her hair for a moment before tightening, guiding her back.
She took him deeper, her throat relaxing, her nose nearly brushing the coarse hair at his base. The weight of his cock against her tongue, so deep it triggered another gag she breathed through, made her cunt throb in time with her pulse.
"I'm not gonna last if you keep—" He hissed through his teeth when she swallowed around him. "Shit. Samira. I'm serious."
She pulled off, stroking him fast with her fist, slick with spit, twisting on the upstroke. "Do you want me to stop?"
"I want you up here."
"Maybe I'm not done."
"Mohan."
"Abbot."
He looked down at her — lips swollen, chin wet, tears on her cheeks from deepthroating him, eyes bright and defiant — and something shifted past hunger.
"You're gonna ruin me," he said.
"Good." She stood, knees stiff, and he grabbed her hips and lifted her onto the gurney. His body slotted between her thighs before she finished settling, his cock pressed hot and wet against her inner leg, and his mouth was on hers, groaning at the taste of himself on her tongue.
His hand slid between her legs and his fingers dragged through her folds and she felt his whole body react — breath catching, cock twitching against her thigh.
"You're soaking," he said against her mouth. "You're dripping, Samira."
"Don't sound so—" The sentence evaporated because he'd pushed two fingers inside her and the stretch, even just his fingers, was enough to make her back arch off the gurney. Wide and blunt, spreading her open, the friction of them dragging against her walls sending sparks up through her pelvis. She grabbed his shoulders, nails biting in, a moan spilling out before she could catch it.
He crooked his fingers — pressed up, searching — and found the spot that made her vision flash. Her whole body jolted, thighs clamping around his wrist, her cunt squeezing his fingers so tight she could feel her own pulse around him.
"There?" he asked. Calm. Clinical. Like he was confirming a diagnosis while knuckle-deep inside her.
"Yes — fuck, yes, right there, don't—"
"Wasn't going anywhere." He set a pace — steady, precise, his fingers curling and pressing on every inward thrust while his thumb found her clit and circled it in tight slick passes. Reading her body the way he read monitors — adjusting when she gasped, easing off when she went quiet, building the pressure until she was shaking and gripping the gurney rails.
She could hear herself — hear how wet she was, the slick sound of his fingers moving inside her filling the room — and her face burned even as her hips chased his hand.
"Jack, I'm going to—"
"Already?" That ghost of a smirk.
"Fuck you, I've been—" She cut herself off.
"Been what?" He leaned closer, his mouth at her ear, fingers never stopping. "Tell me."
"Thinking about this," she admitted, voice cracking. "For a long time."
Something in his body shifted. His fingers paused for half a second — then resumed, harder, and his thumb pressed down on her clit and she broke. Her orgasm crashed through her, her cunt clenching around his fingers in rhythmic pulses, her legs locking, her mouth open against his shoulder. She shook and came apart and he worked her through it, his free arm around her back keeping her upright while aftershocks rolled through her.
She was still twitching when he pulled his fingers out. He brought them to his mouth and sucked them clean while he watched her, eyes half-closed.
"You taste good," he said. Like he was telling her the weather. "Thought you should know."
He reached for his jacket. Wallet. Foil packet. Tore it open with his teeth, rolled the condom on with one efficient stroke.
"Lie back."
She did. The gurney paper crinkled. Jack stepped between her legs, one hand spreading her thigh, the other guiding himself. The blunt head of his cock nudged against her entrance, parting her folds, and even through the latex the heat of him was startling, thick and insistent against the slick swollen opening of her.
"Breathe, Mohan."
"I know how to—"
He pushed in.
Her mouth fell open and nothing came out. The head alone was enough to steal her air — wide and blunt, prying her open, her body resisting for a long stretched-out second before yielding with a give she felt in her spine. The rim of his cockhead dragged past her entrance and the sudden thickness inside her made her grab the gurney rails, knuckles white, thighs trembling.
"Talk to me," he said through his teeth, jaw clenched, body rigid with the effort of not slamming forward. "Tell me you're good."
"I'm—" She breathed, felt her walls flutter and clench around the first few inches. He was stretching her in a way she felt up through her belly, a deep aching fullness right on the line between too much and not enough. "More. Give me more."
He fed her another inch. Slow, controlled, his eyes on her face. She could feel the thick vein on his underside dragging against her front wall, the slight upward curve pressing into exactly the right angle, and she moaned — low, involuntary — and his grip on her thigh tightened.
"You're tight," he said, his voice barely holding. "Samira, you're so — I can feel you squeezing me, you're clenching every time I—"
"Don't stop." She wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled, and the last two inches sank in all at once, his hips meeting hers, his cock bottoming out. The impact punched a sound out of both of them — her, a sharp cry; him, a groan from his chest like something being torn loose.
Full. So full it registered as pressure behind her navel, in her lower back, in her teeth. Every inch of him — the width spreading her walls taut, the head pressing against the deepest part of her, the coarse hair at his base grinding against her swollen clit. Her body pulsed around him in involuntary contractions, adjusting, and each one made his jaw go slack.
"Oh god," she whispered.
"Still breathing?"
"Barely."
He pulled back — slow, the drag of his cock against her walls making her toes curl and her back arch — and thrust in hard. The gurney screeched. They froze.
"Shit." He locked the wheels with his foot. "Now."
The first real thrust rearranged her. He drove in deep, hips snapping forward with a force that jolted her whole body up the gurney, the angle perfect — his cock dragging along her front wall, the thick head hitting that spot, and she cried out before she could stop herself.
"Like that?" Low, rough, his hands pulling her hips to meet each thrust. "That the spot?"
"Yes — fuck, yes, right—"
He did it again. And again. Long deep strokes she felt in her ribcage, his cock pulling nearly all the way out — the wide head stretching her entrance, her body gripping him, trying to keep him — before slamming back in to the hilt. Each thrust pushed a sound out of her, something between a moan and a sob, and the wet slap of his hips against her thighs was loud enough that anyone passing the door would know exactly what was happening.
"Three years of you arguing with me about everything," he said against her neck, his rhythm brutal and steady, his cock hammering into her, "and now you're taking my cock and making those sounds and I swear to god, Mohan—" He groaned when she clenched around him, her walls gripping him tight enough that she could feel his cock throb inside her. "You feel incredible, you have no idea how tight you—"
"Harder," she gasped, nails digging into his back, dragging down, and he gave it to her harder. His grip shifted, hauling her ass to the edge of the gurney, changing the angle until the head of his cock was ramming directly into her g-spot on every inward stroke.
She was loud. Every thrust punched a moan out of her closer to a scream than anything else and Jack clamped his hand over her mouth, firm, immediate, his palm sealing her sounds against his skin.
"Hear yourself?" he said, low and rough in her ear, hips never breaking rhythm. "The whole department's gonna know. Dana's gonna know. Donnie's gonna know." His hand pressed tighter when she moaned behind it. "Is that what you want? You want them hearing you scream while I fuck you in their exam room?"
She shook her head but her cunt clenched around him so hard he groaned, his rhythm stuttering. "Liar," he breathed, and she could feel him smiling against her ear. "Your pussy just told on you."
He took his hand off her mouth and replaced it with his own, kissing her deep and messy while his cock pounded into her. She could feel every ridge of him inside her, the thick vein dragging against her walls, the head battering that swollen spot, and she was close — the pressure building behind a wall about to blow.
"Jack, I'm gonna—"
"Yeah." He reached between them, found her clit with his thumb, rubbed in fast tight circles while his cock drove into her at a pace that had the gurney creaking and rattling against the locked wheels. "I can feel it, you're getting tighter — come on, Samira, give it to me, let me feel you come on my cock—"
She shattered. Her orgasm hit in a white-hot surge that locked every muscle, her cunt clamping down on him in hard rhythmic contractions she felt all the way up through her belly. Her legs seized around his waist, her nails scored red lines down his back. She buried her face in his neck and screamed against his skin and he fucked her through it, gritting his teeth, thrusts turning ragged as her walls milked his cock.
"Fuck, fuck, I'm gonna—" His voice broke. His rhythm collapsed, hips jerking, his cock swelling inside her — she could feel it, actually feel him getting thicker, harder, his shaft pulsing against her walls. "Samira, I need—"
He pulled out. The sudden emptiness made her gasp, her cunt clenching around nothing, and she was off the gurney before she fully thought about it, sliding to her knees on the cold tile. She grabbed his cock — slick with her, flushed dark — and stripped the condom off and took him into her mouth in one motion.
"Oh fuck—" Both hands in her hair, fingers tangling, gripping. His cock was coated in her — tangy and musky on her tongue underneath the fading taste of latex — and she sucked him deep, her tongue swirling over the swollen head, pressing into the leaking slit.
She could feel how close he was. His cock throbbing in her mouth, rock-hard and pulsing, the thick vein jumping against her tongue. His thighs shaking, his stomach clenched, breathing in short harsh bursts.
"Samira, I'm — if you don't pull off I'm going to come in your—"
She sucked harder. Hollowed her cheeks, took him deep, her throat working around the head, her hand stroking the base fast and tight. She looked up at him through wet lashes and watched his face and the composure she'd watched for three years came apart — mouth open, brow creased, eyes squeezing shut as his whole body went rigid.
He came with a sound like something breaking. His cock swelled on her tongue and pulsed — hard, rhythmic — the first rope of cum hitting the back of her throat, thick and warm and bitter-salt. She swallowed around him and he jerked, another pulse flooding her mouth, and another, his fists tight in her hair, his hips twitching forward in helpless little thrusts while he emptied himself onto her tongue.
"Samira—" Her name came out wrecked. "Fuck, Samira, your mouth, your fucking—"
She swallowed everything. Worked him through the aftershocks with soft slow sucks until his cock stopped twitching and his hands went from gripping to cradling. She pulled off slowly, lips dragging, a string of spit and cum connecting her bottom lip to the head of his cock for a second before it snapped.
She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and looked up at him.
Jack looked wrecked. Chest heaving, thighs trembling, hands still in her hair. He blinked down at her like he was trying to remember what year it was.
"That answer your question?" she asked. Her voice was hoarse.
"What question?"
"About my mouth."
He stared. Then he laughed — real, surprised, rough — and his thumb traced her swollen lower lip.
"Yeah," he said. "Question answered."
He helped her up. Her knees were red and aching, her legs liquid, her body sore in specific places she'd inventory later. He handed her things — scrub top, pants, bra — in the order she'd need them. They dressed quietly. Not awkward. Charged, still humming.
Jack picked up his coffee. Sipped. Made a face. Cold.
"Mohan."
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Don't make it weird. Don't tell me we need to talk. Don't say get some sleep."
"I was gonna say you've got a hickey forming on your neck and you should probably cover that before Dana sees it."
Her hand flew to her throat. Jack's mouth did the almost-smirk.
"I'll talk to Robby," he said. "About the feedback thing. It's been a problem."
She looked at him. Under the hallway light bleeding through the frosted window, he looked the same as always — steady, weathered, dry. But the flush was still fading from his neck. His scrub top was inside out.
"Your shirt's on backwards," she said.
He looked down. "Shit."
She watched him fix it. The muscles in his back, the way he moved. Ten minutes ago her mouth had been on his cock and his hands had been in her hair and he'd said her name like a man drowning.
"Happy Fourth, Mohan," he said from the doorway.
"Happy Fourth, Abbot."
He walked into the corridor. The door swung shut.
Samira stood in the quiet room, tasting him on the back of her tongue. Her body ached — her knees, her thighs, the deep tenderness between her legs where he'd stretched her open and filled her completely. Outside, another firework cracked over the city, dull and distant.
She pulled out her phone. One new message from a number she didn't have saved.
For the record, you're not unwanted goods. Not even close. — J
She saved the contact, pocketed her phone, and walked into the hallway with her collar pulled high and a bruise blooming underneath that she could still feel the shape of his mouth in.