The Man Who Loved Wicked :
A Short Story

the man who loved Wicked

Chapter 1

Phoenix

 

“I want another baby,” I said, striking without giving myself time to overthink, without giving myself time to tuck this need into the tiny, neat compartment it’d been festering in for some time now. Caleb was getting older, and neither of us were getting any younger, the latter of which would not be the right thing to say to Bash, not with the mood he’d been in lately. 

 

Sebastian eyed me over the rim of his glasses to where I stood in the doorway of his study. When I didn’t curl in on myself or backtrack under the heft of his gaze, he tore his specs off, tossing them onto the thick pile of exams he’d been grading, rubbing his eyes before beckoning me to him. 

 

I pushed off the door jamb and ambled over, hopping onto his desk once he’d slid his chair back to make room for me. He sighed, scooting in and wrapping his arms around my waist, and I threaded my hands through his thick hair. “I don’t have enough of you to spare, Phoenix. It’s all I can do to get a morsel of your time when Caleb is here—or not here.” 

 

As if on cue, my phone rang from somewhere in the distance. Sebastian gripped me tighter when I attempted to stand with the intention to race for it. “You’re horrible at setting boundaries. Another child and I’d have to resort to tying you up and tossing you into my trunk just to get some time alone with you.” 

 

“I might like being kidnapped by you,” I said, cupping his cheeks and dropping a kiss on his forehead. 

 

“No,” he said with remorse, getting back to my reason for being there. “I’m too selfish to give you what you want, Phoenix. Plus we’re both so busy as it is.” 

 

“Caleb wants a sibling—”

 

“So let his mother…” He trailed off with a curse directed inward. “I’m sorry.” The apology wasn’t for me, but for Emily, who deserved one whether she was there to receive it or not. She couldn’t have any more children. Caleb was a miracle that shouldn’t have happened to begin with. And sure, she could have gone the surrogate route, like I had more than once suggested we do, but if he wasn’t going to point that out, then neither would I. Because it wasn’t only about what Caleb wanted. I wanted a baby under our roof. I wanted a baby who would be ours. 

 

“Phoenix, I hate not giving you what you want—”

 

“So give it to me then. Danny and Jules already agreed.” My best friend and his wife were heaven-sent. Jules hadn’t hesitated to offer her help when I’d mentioned wanting another kid, even though she and Danny had been about to have their own when the conversation had come up. 

 

“I can’t, Phoenix,” he stressed tersely, before exhaling and pressing his lips to my frown, lingering there when I refused to open up for him. He flopped back in his chair. “My grandfather is gone. I can’t lose anything else right now. I can’t lose you. Please.”  

 

I nodded, understanding where his fear came from. For decades, everything Sebastian had obtained by choice had been taken from him by force. By his father, or his need to please his father. It’d taken love and a deep dive into his past to rid him of his irrational need to sink his claws into me as if something or someone would try to rip me away. 

 

And now, losing his grandfather, who he’d only re-established a relationship with right before Caleb was born, had set Sebastian back some years. Set us back some years. It rattled his newfound notion that he deserved happiness, a belief that had taken space and therapy to obtain, leaving me to weather the storm of his relapse. 

 

Not to mention the midlife crises I suspected he was at the beginning stages of. Sebastian and I were passionate and never needed an excuse to have our hands on each other, but there’d been an edge and a desperation to our lovemaking lately that hadn’t been there before. It was like he had something to prove to me, but even more to himself. 

 

“I love you, Bash,” I said. 

 

“And my love for you has no end,” he whispered. I smiled down at him as he hauled me onto his lap.

 

I’d just gotten his shirt off—our kiss turning needy and primal as he cleared his desk with a hand and slammed me onto it—when his cell phone rang. The ringtone was set to “A Father’s Love,” confirming the caller was Caleb. 

 

Sebastian drew back, his heated eyes searching around the mess we’d made to find his phone. Finally locating it on the floor beneath a folder, he answered in French, with a smile reserved solely for his son. “L’air que je respire,” he said warmly. The air that I breathe.

 

 Caleb was learning the language, and in turn began teaching an eager Sebastian. It was something just for them, and I was more than happy to stay out of it. Languages made my brain itch. 

 

From the dopey grin on his face, and the tent deflating in his pants, I knew our time had come and gone. I fetched my shirt from the back of his chair as he held the phone away from his ear, chuckling as an exuberant Caleb rambled on and on loudly.

 

“Yeah, he’s right here,” Sebastian said, but didn’t hand me the phone. “I’ll let him know. See you soon.” Sebastian hung up, slipping the phone onto the desk and buttoning into his shirt. 

 

“Well?” I nudged. “Are you going to tell me what had him so riled up and you so damn giddy?” I motioned toward the upward curve of his lips, unable to keep a lid on my own grin. 

 

“Caleb’s coming over to watch a French film. It’s a homework assignment.”

 

“What ever happened to just basic multiplication and division? He’s only in the third grade,” I complained. “I’ll get the popcorn—”

 

“Ah, that won’t be necessary,” he replied, adjusting his collar. “He told me to tell you this is just for us, because you don’t take French seriously.” He might as well have stuck his tongue out for all the childish preening he was doing. “His words, not mine,” he said, hands held up. 

 

I rolled my eyes before laughing and admitting, “I love seeing you like this. I love seeing your love for him.” There’s room for more, I wanted to say. There’s room in your heart for more.

 

“For once I get to be the favorite.” He lowered his head to mine. “And fair warning, I plan on rubbing it in all week.”  

“Thanks for the heads-up,” I said, stealing a kiss just as the doorbell rang unnecessarily, and the front door went careening into the wall behind it. “Our new neighbor is here,” I said. Emily and Caleb had always lived close by, but when the house next door went on the market, we suggested Emily snatch it up. I loved how we’d been able to blend our family from the start, always putting Caleb and his needs first. She and my mother had even become close friends, and her husband and Sebastian barbecued over beers often in the summers.  

 

“Make yourself scarce,” Sebastian said into my lips before playfully tapping my ass, and then dashing for the hall to greet our kid. 

 

I straightened Sebastian’s paperwork, then passed the kitchen on my way to the bedroom, trading a conspiratorial wink with Caleb, and thinking back on our conversation from the previous day.

 

“Dad’s sad,” he’d said. “He misses Great-Grandpa.”

 

“We all do,” I’d said, wrapping my arms around him. He nodded solemnly into my chest. ”What do you think we can do to cheer him up?” 

 

“I don’t know.” He’d shrugged, peering up at me with navy blue eyes that were identical to his father’s. “We could make him a cake?” 

 

“We could, but I think he’d like some quality time with you even more.” 

 

“Oh! We can watch Le Chat et la Souris together.” 

 

I’d had no clue what that was, but it sounded like a great plan and I’d said so.

 

I left them to their fun, showered, and cozied up in bed with a good book. The sun hadn’t fully set yet, but I’d been working on meeting my thesis deadline while also teaching three classes this semester, not to mention how active Sebastian had been lately.

 

I must have drifted to sleep at some point, because I woke to the feel of Sebastian prying the book from under my cheek. 

 

“That imprint is going to be there for a while,” he said, smoothing his fingers over my face from where he sat near my bedside. 

 

I snickered drowsily. “How was the movie?” 

 

“Turns out his teacher left it up to the class to choose the film they wanted to watch. Something about trust building and learning to make appropriate choices,” he said wryly.

 

“Uh-oh, was it at least rated PG?” 

 

“Yes, at least. He fell asleep near the end. I carried him home and got him tucked into bed.” A beat of silence passed, and his amused smirk faded. “I got home from work earlier and you weren’t here. I wanted you here. I wanted you.” 

“Sebastian,” I whispered, running a finger over his lips. This insatiable need of his to have me in his sights, to have me in his office, in our kitchen, in our bed… It needed more structure, more rationality; it needed to make sense for how our life was set up now. 

 

Pulling over to the side of the road on our way home from work so he could fuck me from the back seat because he couldn’t make the short drive home, while fun, wasn’t coming from a healthy place. It needed to be addressed before becoming problematic. 

 

He’d showered, and I sifted my hands through his wet hair, paying special attention to the graying edges. A drop of water sluiced past his temple, thinning before being absorbed by his stubble. Would he ever not be sexy? 

 

“I know,” he said. “I made an appointment with Dr. Evans. He wants me on his couch tomorrow.” 

 

“Good,” I said, scooting over so he could draw up closer to me on the bed. 

 

Sebastian closed his eyes, leaning over me and covering his mouth and nose with my palm, breathing me in. “I’m sorry,” he said into my hand, his words vibrating down my arm. I skated my other hand along his bare chest, sending a shiver through him. 

He’d stoked a fire in the bedroom hearth, which told me he’d had no intentions of going to sleep anytime soon. I knew if I raised my head from the pillow, I’d see his journal and glasses resting on the small table next to his wingback chair that faced the fireplace. 

 

“What do you need?” I asked, the flames behind him a pale backdrop to the inferno already burning inside him. 

 

“You’re exhausted,” he said, brushing a stray curl off my forehead. 

 

“I’m never too tired for you.” I peeled the blanket off me, and his sharp intake of air as he surveyed my nudity caused my cock to thicken in the span of a heartbeat. 

 

“I’m sorry,” he said again, because he planned on fucking me, even knowing I’d had a long day and had an even longer one ahead of me. He would fuck me anyway, and he was sorry for it, but his need to possess me overruled his compassion, his good judgment, his own obvious exhaustion, and that knowledge was enough to make my now steel dick weep. 

 

“Don’t be sorry, Sebastian. Just fuck me.” I grabbed two fistfuls of his hair and roughly guided him down my body until his mouth hovered hungrily over my cock. He licked at my wet slit before nursing from the tip. “Fuck,” I gritted through clamped teeth, letting my legs fall open.  

 

He stood abruptly, causing my saliva-slicked crown to crash into my navel. Urgently, he kicked out of his bottoms, balls swinging with the action, then glared down at me, mouth glistening and slack, as he stroked his massive erection. 

 

My own mouth watered, and I wanted to leap up and take him as close to the rear of my throat as I could, because I’d never get him in all the way. But instead, I slithered to the center of the bed. I did so tentatively, coyly, maintaining that innocence Sebastian loved. The one that made him feel a little dirty for enjoying it, but a lot turned on. At twenty-seven, my features were still soft enough for me to pull it off. I had a feeling they’d forever be. 

 

“God, you’re so fucking sexy,” I whispered, shivering. 

 

Sebastian lost his stride at that, and a heartbreaking vulnerability clouded his eyes as his cheeks pinkened. “Yeah?” he asked. 

 

 “You only get better with age, Bash. Not a day goes by that I don’t give thanks for your body,” I said, because while his heart and his mind were the true work of art, it was the superficial beauty he needed to be reminded of right now. “I scroll through your pictures on my phone every time I have a break in my day. I jerk off when you’re not near, to thoughts of your big cock rolling in and out of me, making me whimper. It was like that in the beginning, and it’s an even more dire need now.” I tugged on my hair, spine arching off the bed. “Sometimes it feels like I might combust, like I might die from my craving for you. How does it feel to know you’re the only one who’s ever had me?” I opened my legs wider. “That you’re the only one who’s ever been here,” I said meaningfully, breathlessly, and his gaze flew to my hole. “And the only one who ever will?”

 

Sebastian swallowed, the hand on his cock at work again. “It makes me feel powerful,” he said, stepping closer to the bed. “Makes me feel like a king.” 

 

“You are a king, Sebastian. My king.”  

 

He groaned, and I didn’t fight the warm flush that stole over my face when I spread myself impossibly wider, knees drawn up while making small circles with my hips. Sebastian loved my shyness, which was a good thing because it was a side of me I could never fully shake. “Tell me how you want it,” he demanded, his voice giving way to a violent quiver, his fist so tight around his dick, pumping the purpled head so vigorously, it was a wonder he wasn’t in pain.

 

 He opened my nightstand drawer, fumbling the whole thing in search of lube, the contents spilling onto the floor. Bottle in hand, he poured a generous amount over his cock before handing it over to me. 

 

“I want it…” I faded off on a swallow, hesitating for his benefit and to slip a slicked pinky inside of me. “Hard. I want to feel you all week.” I tucked my bottom lip between my teeth as I slid the second smallest finger on my hand into my tight, resisting hole. I didn’t want to be too ready for him, even though there was no such thing. 

 

“Don’t take it easy on me, Sebastian. Don’t ask me if I’m okay. Don’t ask me if I can take more. Just give me all of it.” I peered at his dripping dick, entranced by the rhythm he’d built, the sound of his slickness as he worked himself over, every muscle in his broad body flexed and jolting from his efforts. “All of it.” 

 

“You’re not ready,” he panted when I removed my fingers instead of inserting a third. We’d had sex last night, but it wouldn’t matter. One day or one year without Sebastian’s cock in me yielded the same results. Each time was like the first time, and it’d take fucking myself open with my whole hand to be fully prepared for him. And maybe not even then. 

 

“I want to feel the burn,” I said bashfully. He released himself, breathing heavily and taking me in, lying there in the center of our king bed, writhing impatiently on top of the silk sheets. 

 

Precum tumbled down the angry length of him, and without warning, he snatched me by the ankle, hauled me to the edge of the bed before gripping me at the hips and lifting me completely off of it. 

 

I had just enough time to secure my legs around his back before he impaled me. “God!” My whole body seized, and we both stopped breathing. Sebastian grazed his nose against mine, his silent way of asking me for direction or permission. “I said not to ask.” I fisted his hair until he cursed from the sting of it. 

 

“I love you,” he growled. 

 

“Then fuck me. Now,” I ordered, all traces of innocence and feigned insecurity gone. 

Sebastian whipped me up and down his shaft while crashing into me like a wrecking ball, his hands digging into my hip bones hard enough to bruise. 

 

Our bodies grew sweaty from the fire, both external and within, and while it became difficult to cling to his sweaty skin, his hold on me never faltered. 

 

“Look at me,” he said, and I loosened my bite around his strong shoulder to meet his lust-filled gaze. My teeth battered my lip, cutting the skin and drawing a hiss from me. Sebastian’s tongue darted out to catch the drop of spilled blood.  

 

I felt his cock everywhere, as if it had spread wings inside of me, fluttering along every nerve with each lethal thrust upward. It took sheer will to keep my eyes open, to keep them steady on him, when all they wanted to do was roll and close. “Jesus, you’re beautiful like this.” 

 

“Li-like what?” I stuttered, clamping my teeth together to keep them from shattering on impact. My heels slipped on his lower back, and I dug them in harder. 

 

“Mouth plump and pink, cheeks rosy, eyes glazed over,” he said, groaning when I clenched around his hardness. I was so turned on by his words, by his description of me, and by my debased reflection in his eyes. 

 

My cock beat against my belly, my precum soaking my abs, and I needed to touch myself  badly. “I’d kill and die a thousand times just for this, Phoenix.”

 

I savagely attacked his lips, biting his tongue in my frenzy and drawing blood. Sebastian hefted me off his cock with a roar, leaving me gasping for air as he flung me onto the bed like my weight was insignificant in the face of his need to devour me. Crimson and spittle stained his lower lip. 

 

The slap of my hard, sensitive cock against my corded stomach stole my breath away as I bounced on the mattress, and my hole violently spasmed from the sudden loss of him. 

 

Bash was on me and in me before I could recover, the force of his reentry shooting me backward, my head hanging off the side of the bed as I cursed his name from the mix of pain and pleasure.

 

“No sleep for you tonight, Phoenix,” he said apologetically, fucking me like he wanted to break through the other side of me.

 

“O-okay,” I stammered, trying and failing to keep up with his pace. I raked my blunt nails down his back. “Touch me, please,” I begged, wondering if that would even be necessary because my dick was so primed and ready, my balls so tight and high that they were likely to explode on their own.

 

“No,” he whispered, eating up my whimper. He sank fully on top of me, his palm cupping the back of my skull, allowing me to relax my neck. Shaking free of his mouth, I kissed the tears stored at the crooks of his eyes, the salty beads sliding down my throat as more moisture built around his beautiful blue eyes. Overcome with emotion, his hips faltered.

 

 “I-I can’t—” he began. 

 

“Shhhh,” I whispered, taking charge and rebuilding the tempo. He quickly skimmed us lower on the bed, my ass never losing one inch of him in the process, his strides never breaking in his attempt to fuck me into oblivion.

 

 The firewood crackled as it burned its way to ash, and I wondered if my body would make it there first. The heat of the flames made us hotter and hornier, and tossed shadows off the ceiling. 

 

Over the course of the night, Sebastian fucked me with my knees pressed to my ears, perspiration pitching from the tip of his nose as he watched his dick plow in and out of me. The wet sounds coming from where we were joined was lewd. “You’re so pink, my love,” he crooned, his eyes wide with amazement as if mesmerized by the act of my hole accepting everything his fat cock had to give. “My mouth will be there next,” he vowed. 

 

He then flipped me over, fucking me on all fours, his fists planted into the mattress on either side of me, his body caging me in as his teeth fastened to where my neck and shoulder met, pinning me in place for the rough dicking. 

 

Sebastian fucked me until I orgasmed untouched, until I shouted I couldn’t take anymore.

 

“You can and you will,” he said, voice pulled tight as a strung bow as he breathed harshly at my ear. His pelvis slapped loudly against my ass, one, two, three times before he stilled, his teeth gnashing together as he poured into and onto me endlessly. 

 

Tapping his cock against my ass cheek to transfer the last bit of cum onto me, he then massaged his mess into my skin, kneading and spreading me. 

 

“Sebastian,” I pleaded, my arms giving out, my chest crashing to the bed as he caught what trickled down my trembling legs before gently stuffing it back inside of me. 

 

 He tugged me to the foot of the bed, my face dragging along the sheet. With my ass still in the air, I got to my forearms and lifted my heavy head sluggishly to gaze over my shoulder at him. Sebastian spread my cheeks apart again, his tongue darting over his lips as lowered to kneel on the carpeted floor. 

 

I cried out when said tongue met my sensitive flesh, and he proceeded to rim me so thoroughly I could no longer see or breathe straight. Sebastian sucked, licked, and ate me clean—as promised. 

 

The last thing I remembered, as my hands pillowed my cheek and I drifted off to sleep, was him reentering me as he whispered from above, “Sleep now, my love. I’ve got it from here.”   

 

Chapter 2

Phoenix

 

The following day, Sebastian and I took Caleb over to Danny and Jules’s house for a play date with their neighbor's son. They were classmates, and while we hung out on their enclosed back patio, the boys ran back and forth between the adjoining backyards. 

 

It was the first time we visited since their daughter, Olivia, had arrived. We’d visited the hospital after Jules gave birth but wanted to give them a few weeks to adjust to having a newborn in the house before barging over.  

 

Caleb and Scott ran and dove onto the mountain of fall leaves Danny had raked into two big piles in his backyard, tossing the autumn colored leaves into the air and whooping with excitement. 

 

“You’re so good with her,” Jules said from her chair adjacent to Danny’s as I paced with a sleepy Olivia on my chest, gently rubbing circles onto her back. She’d been crying hysterically when we showed up, and Jules and Danny both looked like they were at their wits’ end. 

 

“He was the same with Caleb,” Sebastian said, setting his drink down on the table separating them. I kissed her tiny head, inhaling that new baby scent as her breathing slowed, her drool seeping through the thin receiving blanket I’d placed between her and my chest. 

 

“Yeah, well, we’ve got a spare bedroom if you’re in the mood to do us a solid and move in,” Danny said, sweeping a hand through his too long hair. Neither of them looked like they’d gotten any sleep in days, and they could both use a shower too. 

 

Sebastian, whose chair I’d worked my way closer to, laid a possessive hand on my lower back in response to Danny’s offer. 

 

“Easy, tiger,” Danny joked, noticing Bash’s reaction. “You’d still get him on the weekends.” 

They all chuckled, and I would have too, but I had a sleeping baby in my arms, and I planned to keep her that way. I nudged my head toward the inside of the house, letting them know I’d go lay her down in the nursery. Jules nodded gratefully. 

 

I couldn’t bear to let go of her yet, so once inside, I sat on the rocker next to her crib and just held her, closing my eyes and imagining that she was mine, and that I’d get to do this every day and night. But Sebastian wasn’t ready, and it broke my heart to think he never would be. 

 

After too much time had passed, and the threat of a search party coming to look for me became a real possibility, I placed her in her pink, canopy crib and backed out of the nursery. 

 

At the patio doors, I took a deep breath, converted my frown to a smile, and rejoined my husband and friends. 

 

Sebastian immediately turned as if he’d sensed my approach, and when I was close enough, he took my hand, drawing me down to the seat pushed close to his. 

 

He leaned into me, cupping my face and running his nose along my hairline then ear. “I missed you,” he said, pulling back, taking his time to memorize my features. He didn’t forget that we weren’t alone. He never forgot. He just didn’t care. Sebastian would take time out of any conversation he was having, with whomever he was having it with, to love and dote on me. It was once embarrassing, because people would gawk until he was done with me, but I grew used to it. Craved it, even. 

 

“You two are so clingy,” Jules said dreamily before shooting Danny a look that asked why he didn’t treat her that way.

 

Danny shook his head at us. “You two are bad for my marriage,” he said. That set off a round of laughs from all of us before Bash excused himself to the restroom. 

 

Jules waited until he was out of earshot to lean into the table and ask, “Have you talked to him again?” 

 

“He won’t agree,” I said, knowing she was referring to her willingness to be our surrogate, even after just having a baby of her own. I thought back to the day she’d made the offer. 

 

“I enjoy pregnancy,” she’d said. “I know not everyone gets to experience it, so I don’t take it for granted. And we love you, Phoenix. Let us do this for you guys.”  

 

“Why not?” she asked, shaking me from the flashback, but I stayed quiet. It wasn’t something I could quickly get into while Bash was off taking a piss. 

“Because he’s obsessed with you and doesn’t want to share you with one other person,” she concluded on her own, then side-eyed Danny again. 

 

He sighed, scowling at me. “Moving forward, this house is a no PDA zone for you two,” he said.

 

“I personally think it’s romantic,” Jules said, swooning hard. “The way he stares at you—”

 

“Is creepy,” Danny cut in. “He watches him like he wants to eat him.” 

 

It was true, I thought. And chances were Sebastian did want to eat me every time he glanced my way. The feeling was mutual, though. Over six years later and we still couldn’t get enough of each other's company. We were inexplicably codependent and wouldn’t change a thing. 

 

“Is that what you want?” Danny asked her, ignorant to the heat rising in me, to my need to seek Sebastian out and have him bend me over their bathroom sink. “You want me to eat you?” 

 

“Well…” Jules started, a wicked smirk sliding into place. 

Danny swiftly realized what he’d asked and gasped, scandalized. “Not in front of the children,” he admonished, even though Caleb and Scott were having too much fun to pay attention to our adult conversation. 

 

Jules wacked him in the arm, and he grabbed her into a headlock, giving her a quick noogie before kissing the pain away and releasing her. My shoulders shook in amusement as she righted her mop of auburn hair. 

 

Their relationship was more playful than ours. Sebastian and I were intense, opposing atoms drawn to each other, and every word Sebastian uttered to me dripped with sensual intent. 

 

A low whine came through the baby monitor sitting on the table, and we all froze. “Is she waking up already?” Jules asked in a hushed but terrified tone. 

 

“I’ll check on her,” I said, feeling bad for them. Jules held a hand up as I pushed up from my seat. 

 

“Wait a minute,” she said, and we all listened carefully, Danny and I exchanging a look, and it was clear we weren’t hearing whatever she was. And then I heard it, Sebastian’s voice in the nursery. He must have heard her after he was done in the bathroom. I gingerly lowered to my seat as Danny and Jules inched to the edges of their seats, eyeing the monitor like it was a ticking time bomb.  

 

“Coucou jolie petit bébé,” Sebastian crooned, and Olivia’s restless cries calmed. There was rustling over the connection as if he’d picked her up. “Do you know how lucky you are?” he whispered to her. “You have two parents who love you dearly, and your mother is a gem. And although the hairy ogre could use a bath and a shave, I suppose he’s a good person too.” 

 

Jules laughed into her hand while Danny gave the throat slitting gesture to the hand held monitor before sniffing his armpits. 

 

Sebastian quieted, and Olivia grew cranky again. “It’s okay,” he said, and she cooed. “I’m still here.” 

 

I was reminded of how patient he used to be with Caleb whenever he was sick and irritable as a baby. He never once became frustrated or overwhelmed. He’d just hold him and talk to him until he calmed down. 

 

Sebastian exhaled, and I could picture him sitting in the rocker, contemplating life as he stared down on her as she lay nestled between his big palms. He’d gotten some of his best thinking done when gazing at Caleb.

 

 “He wants one just like you, you know,” he said, and I straightened from where I too perched at the edge of my seat. Jules’s eyes flew to mine. 

“Caleb took so much of our time—and I’m not complaining,” he said to her. “So don’t judge me. But even with Emily taking half the responsibility, Phoenix and I got lost somewhere throughout those early years. A big part of who we were to each other got lost. And really, when have we had the luxury of simply being together?” he asked her. Olivia made a chuffing sound in answer. 

 

Sebastian was right. He had been my new AP philosophy teacher when we met in my senior year of high school, and then there was Emily—who he'd been unhappily married to. Our relationship at the time was one big forbidden secret shrouded in terror of being caught.

 He’d also accepted a position at Denwin University for the following fall, so he was my professor once I started my freshman year there, again posing another challenge and need for us to be apart. And even once the universe aligned so that we could be together, there was beautiful baby Caleb, who we loved dearly and would never regret. But there had always been something more important than us to deal with, to put first, even if we made it a point to never neglect each other. 

 

Caleb was more independent now, in some ways at least, allowing a little breathing room, but now we were also facing the results of Sebastian’s grief over losing his grandfather, and his silent battle with feeling like he was aging out of our relationship. The combination of it all had him clinging to me tighter, not wanting anything else to get between us. 

“My heart isn’t happy when he isn’t, Oliva,” he said in such a hushed tone, my head knocked into Danny’s as we both folded closer to the handheld monitor. 

 

“Ouch,” he mouthed, rubbing his forehead. 

 

“I am nothing without Phoenix. I can barely breathe when he isn’t in my arms or in my vicinity.” 

 

Across from me, Jules’s eyes watered. Or was it mine viewing her through an ocean of rising tides? 

 

“But I am even less than nothing when he isn’t happy,” Sebastian added. Olivia had gone completely quiet now. Either she was asleep, or was stuck in a Sebastian Wicked trance. It was hard to break free from those once ensnared. “Maybe having another one of you wouldn’t be so bad,” he said. “Fiona. I’ve always loved that name. Fiona would have his curly hair, and his inquisitive stare, and his rosy cheeks. And then I would have the pleasure of loving two of him. That wouldn’t be so bad, would it?” It was all crickets from Olivia’s side. 

 

Sebastian began singing the same lullaby to her that he’d sing to Caleb to get him to sleep. It was a song about a boy and his love for the sun. Bash would often call me his ray of sunshine. 

 

The three of us were a mess by the time the song ended, and flailing fools trying to clean our faces and look cool by the time Sebastian’s footsteps sounded in our direction.

 

“Yeah, so that’s why crocodiles hate peanut oil,” Danny said, like a full-fledged moron. 

 

“That’s what you come up with?” Jules muttered under her breath at him, rolling her eyes. 

 

Turned out we didn’t need a cover story, didn’t need to pretend we were busy not listening in on his conversation with their daughter, because Sebastian wasn’t focused on anything but getting to me. 

 

I stood to meet his intensity, not sure what his intentions were, but knowing I had to brace for it. He kissed me hungrily, as if my essence was the nourishment he needed right then, right now. I fisted the back of his shirt as he crushed himself to me, opening and letting him have his way with my mouth because I was no match for him when he got like this. 

 

Danny cleared his throat, and the boys laughed and played in the distance, but none of it could override this moment with my husband. Nothing could break us when we were together like this. 

 

“I’m sorry,” Sebastian said, laying light kisses along my nose, cheeks, and closed eyelids. “I’m sorry.” 

 

“A man who admits when he’s wrong,” Jules said pointedly, drawing our attention to her. 

 

“Get out,” Danny deadpanned to me and Bash, nudging his head in the direction of Caleb. “Leave the boy here and go.” 

 

We laughed hysterically, Danny begrudgingly joining in after a beat. Sebastian pecked me on the lips, lingering closely, his breath brushing my mouth. “Can I take you home?” he asked. 

 

“Definitely,” I said. 

 

Once home, we all pitched in with dinner, then fell asleep tangled up in each other in front of the TV. I woke to the credits rolling on the movie we’d been watching, then shook Bash lightly before carefully lifting Caleb from the sofa and tucking him into his bed. 

 

Sebastian was no longer in the living room once I returned, and he wasn’t in our bedroom either. Figuring he may be in his study grading papers, I decided to take a hot shower. 

 

I felt him before I saw him. The buzz in my veins that told me he was close, the reckless pumping of my heart, and the shallow breathing that precipitated it. The anticipation of having my husband near, and what that may mean for me. It never got old. Our want and love for each other didn’t thin with time. If anything, it only got bigger. 

 

Strong hands splayed over my ass cheeks, palming them possessively, separating them roughly. I kept my head and eyes lowered, letting the spray of hot water beat down on me. The peaks and valleys of Sebastian's chest met my back, his pectorals brushing the nape of my neck, and I was reminded of how larger than life he was. How much he overwhelmed and overpowered me. I was reminded of how much I liked it. 

 

“You’re already clean,” he said, a little disappointed, and I smiled. 

 

“You took too long,” I said, my voice echoing in the large space. 

 

He hummed at the back of his throat, his finger skimming down my cleft. “That just means I need to get you dirty again.” His exploration halted when I stiffened and winced. “You’re sore,” he said, apologetically, and before he could work himself up into a guilt-frenzy, I spun, moving us so that he now stood under the showerhead, then I soaped him up with my hands, paying special attention to his curved cock.

 

 “We can’t,” he started, but I quieted him with a soapy finger to his lips. 

 

Once the suds were rinsed, I guided him to the marble shower bench in the back corner. “Sit,” I ordered, lowering to my haunches once he obeyed. 

“Fuck,” he swore, his head falling back as I palmed his hot, veiny cock. The human body was an amazing, mysterious thing, because I couldn’t for the life of me explain how I was able to accept him inside me time and time again. “One day, getting this immediate type of response from me won’t be easy,” he warned me sadly. “I’ll be old, and you’ll still be—”

I tightened my fist, shutting him up, and dragging it to the top of his cockhead before twisting just the way he liked. “Look at me,” I said tenderly, and his head fell forward. “This is not the most important part of you.” I stroked and twisted as I spoke. “Your hair, your body, your eyes… While I love them all, they are not the reason why I love you, Sebastian. I love you for your heart, your sharp mind, for the way you love me uninhibitedly, and the way you make me feel priceless and irreplaceable.” 

 

“Because you are, mon amour,” he said, speaking his nickname for me in French. 

 

“That,” I said passionately, cupping his balls with my other hand as he hiked a foot onto the bench to give me greater access. “That is why I love you, and that won’t change with time. Your heart will always be the same, and it will always be mine, and mine will always be yours. Please believe me, Bash,” I begged as he listened even as he began to move. He looked unsure, like he wanted so badly to believe me but his brain and his fear wouldn’t allow him to. 

Maybe the trick wasn’t to try and convince him that he wasn’t getting older, but to prove to him that he was still young. I’d have to come back to that thought later. Right then I was on fire as Sebastian’s large, naked body undulated before me. 

 

He dug his heel into the bench and used a hand to brace the wall next to him for added leverage as he rocked into my palm shamelessly. “Do something, Phoenix,” he breathed, and I could tell by the hitch in his words and the way his testicles fisted in my palm that he was close. 

 

Without build up or thought, I held his hip still as I took him as far into my mouth as humanly possible. I gagged repeatedly, which never failed to stroke his ego and raise the bar on his arousal, and by the time he erupted moments later, his cum shooting down my esophagus, tears stained my cheeks. “Get it all down, my love,” he said gravely, his ass clenched and raised off the seat as he held the back of my head while spilling down into me. I humped the air savagely, gagging and groaning, the tile bruising my knees. 

 

Sebastian’s fingers loosened in my hair, and I reared back, breathing heavily as his dick popped free of my mouth, a thick, milky white bead of cum slid languidly down his glistening tip. 

 

I fell to my ass, hands thrown out behind me to break my fall. My nostrils pumped wildly, additional tears fell from my eyes, and Sebastian was content to sit on his throne and watch me struggle for air at his feet. I was a mess. Sucking his cock always left me this way, which was of course why he loved it. 

 

“Breathtaking,” he whispered, his gaze moving from my feet, which were planted flat on the shower floor, to my spread legs, to my solid cock, and past my trembling arms and heaving chest all the way to my hooded eyes. “Come,” he said. “I want you to see what I see.” 

 

He helped me up, then led me by the hand over to the sink where he cleared the fog from the mirror with his forearm. I stared at myself as he ran his lips up and down the column of my neck. 

 

My sandy curls were wet and tight. My powder blue eyes were too bright, frantic even, and watery. Tear tracks rode my cheeks, cutting through the ruddy flush sitting just underneath the skin, and my lips were swollen, their hue closer to red than pink. I looked like innocent, erotic chaos. And when Sebastian stood tall to face me in the mirror with a loaded smirk, it was clear his role in this was the devil. My devil. 

 

He spit in his palm, never taking his eyes off me, and I gripped the edges of the sink and inched my legs further apart in preparation for his hands being on me. “Promise me this doesn’t change,” he said, coming in fast and hard on my cock, jerking me off with purpose. “Promise me your love for me won’t change if I give you what you want, Phoenix.” There was anger there. In his tone, in the way he was punishing my body so perfectly. I wasn’t sure what the anger was about until suddenly, it hit me. 

 

I’d been about to call it off, because what good would this endeavor be if he wasn’t excited about it. If he was pissed off about it. But then the hardness around his jaw softened, as if he knew where my thoughts were heading, and his eyes turned pleading, even as his hand worked me with the same enthusiastic tempo. Sebastian wasn’t angry, he was…scared. 

 

“I promise,” I said brokenly, and he closed his eyes, resting his mouth on the top of my head. “Fuck,” I bit out, opening my mouth in preparation to scream through my climax. 

 

Sebastian clasped his other hand over my lips, holding in my shout so I wouldn’t wake Caleb. I came into the bowl of the sink, splintering into tiny pieces. 

 

Afterward, I crumbled in his arms. He held me up with an arm across my chest, and I watched transfixed as he scooped my semen from the basin and licked his fingers clean. 

 

“Let’s go to bed, my love,” he said. “I need to hold you.” 

 

Sebastian dried me off and retook my hand, guiding me to our bed. He pulled the covers back before getting in and gesturing for me to follow. I used his outstretched arm as a pillow, and he hauled me impossibly closer to him, his flaccid cock pressed into my back, a leg thrown over my hip. 

I lay there, listening to his breathing slow to a whisper before I allowed sleep to take me, and right before I fully succumbed to the darkness, Sebastian spoke into my ear, “Yes, Phoenix,” he said softly. “My answer is yes.” 

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