Chapter 9: Forbidden Relief
The name ‘Eli’ hung in the kitchen like a bad smell. Cas had withdrawn into a silence so complete it felt like a physical wall. He’d spent the next day fencing, the rhythmic thwack of the post driver hitting like a heartbeat of pure aggression. Sera had watched from the window of the guest house, feeling like an intruder. The sinkhole was one thing. This brother was another.
She tried to work, to sketch menu ideas, but the numbers bled into visions of Cas’s face as he read that text. Hollow. Resigned. It scared her more than his anger ever had.
He avoided her all evening. She heard the shower run in the main house, the pipes groaning. Night fell, thick and starless. The farm felt like it was holding its breath.
In his room, Cas stood at the window, a towel slung low on his hips. Water dripped from his hair onto the scars and ink that mapped his back—a chaos of patterns he never explained. The tension wasn’t just in his mind anymore; it was a hard, aching line in his groin, a persistent throb that had haunted him since dawn. He’d caught her scent on his own skin from the ripped flannel and it had been enough. All day, the denim of his work jeans had been a rough, torturous prison.
“Fuck it,” he muttered to the empty room.
He tossed the towel, lay back on the indigo sheets, and grabbed his phone from the nightstand. He pulled up a site, something anonymous and hardcore. He needed the noise, the visual static, anything to overwrite the silence and the feeling of Sera’s body squeezing him dry. He found a video, turned the volume low, and let the graphic images fill the screen. Two faceless people going at it with a brutal, meaningless efficiency.
His hand wrapped around his erection, already fully hard. He gave himself a few rough, preliminary strokes, his eyes glued to the screen, trying to lose himself in the fake moans and the gloss of sweat on skin that wasn't hers. It wasn’t working. He thought of her mouth.
The door opened with the softest click.
He didn’t move, didn’t look away from the phone. He knew it was her. Only she moved that quietly when she wanted to.
Sera stood in the doorway, backlit by the hall’s weak light. She’d changed into a simple black tank top and cotton shorts. Her hair was a wild dark cloud. She saw the phone in his hand, the pale light illuminating the stark concentration on his face, the movement of his arm. She heard the tinny, illicit sounds.
A hot, sharp jealousy lanced through her, followed immediately by a darker, more possessive pull. He was hers to break. Her to touch.
She closed the door. The lock engaged with a solid thunk. He finally glanced over, his green eyes glittering in the dark, challenging her.
“Get out, Sera.”
“No.”
She walked to the bed. He didn’t stop stroking himself, his pace deliberate, almost defiant. The vulgar sounds from the phone filled the space between them. On screen, a woman was on her knees.
Sera looked from the screen to his face, then down to his hand moving on his cock. The sight was unbearably erotic. “You’re thinking about her?” she asked, her voice low.
“I’m not thinking at all,” he grunted, his thumb smearing the moisture beading at his tip.
“Liar.” She climbed onto the bed, moving with a slow, predatory grace. “You’re thinking about my mouth.”
He held her gaze, his strokes slowing. A dare.
She reached out and took the phone from his loose grip. She didn’t turn it off. Instead, she placed it on the pillow beside his head, the video still playing, casting its sickly glow on the side of his face. “Watch it,” she commanded softly.
Then she moved down his body. The scent of his soap, of him, filled her senses. She nudged his hand away. It was hot and heavy in her grasp. She leaned close, her breath ghosting over the sensitive head. “You want this filthy mouth, Cas?”
A low growl rattled in his chest. His hand fisted in her hair, not guiding, just holding. Claiming.
She opened her lips and took him in, slow and deep, until the back of her throat fluttered against him. His hips jerked off the bed. A raw, guttural “Fuck!” ripped from him. She pulled back, swirling her tongue around the swollen head, tasting the salt-bitter pre-come, then plunged down again, taking him deeper. She set a ruthless rhythm, one hand working the thick base, the other cupping and rolling his balls, feeling them tighten.
His breathing turned into ragged pants. He kept his head turned, his eyes on the phone, but she could see his pupils were blown wide, unfocused. The sounds from the device were just noise now. The real thing was here, wet and voracious.
“You like that?” she murmured, pulling off with a lewd pop. “You like watching that while I suck your fucking dick?”
“Yes,” he hissed, his voice strained.
“Tell me what you see.”
“A—a blonde. Taking it deep.”
Sera engulfed him again, her throat working, taking him all. She hummed, and the vibration made his whole body seize. “She’s not me,” Sera said when she came up for air, a string of saliva connecting her lip to his shining flesh. “She’ll never make you feel like this.” She dove back down, her technique turning sloppy and desperate, all hungry lips and dragging teeth.
His grip in her hair tightened, forcing the pace. He was thrusting up into the wet, hot clamp of her mouth now, fucking it. “Gonna come,” he warned, his voice cracking.
She didn’t let up. She took him deeper, urging him on with a choked sound of her own.
With a shout that was half curse, half surrender, he erupted. She took the first violent pulse, the hot, bitter flood hitting the back of her throat. She swallowed convulsively, milking him with her lips and hand as he shook beneath her, his heels digging into the mattress, his free hand clawing at the sheet.
When he finally went still, spent, she slowly released him. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, then reached over and locked his phone, plunging the room into near-darkness. The only light came from the moon now, silvering the edges of the bed.
For a long time, there was only the sound of their breathing. The farm was silent outside. Eli was out there somewhere, a phantom in the night.
Cas’s hand, still tangled in her hair, gentled. He tugged, guiding her up his body until she lay beside him. He turned onto his side to face her. In the gloom, his eyes searched hers.
“Why did you do that?” he asked, his voice rough.
“Because you’re trying to hide,” she said, touching his stubbled jaw. “In your work. In that phone. You’re trying to hide from him, and you’re trying to hide from me.”
He was silent. He didn’t deny it.
“He’s at the motel in town,” Cas said finally, the words dragged out of him. “The Sunrise. Said he’ll be by tomorrow to ‘talk sense.’” The way he said it made ‘talk sense’ sound like a threat.
“So we’ll be here,” Sera said, her fingers tracing the hard line of his shoulder.
“We?” He sounded genuinely perplexed.
“You’re not alone in this, Cas. Not anymore.”
He looked at her, and for a fleeting second, the stone façade crumbled. She saw the raw, unvarnished fear there, the weight of a history she didn’t understand. Then he pulled her into him, wrapping himself around her so tightly it was almost suffocating. He buried his face in her neck.
“Don’t make promises,” he murmured against her skin, the vibration sinking into her bones. “This place… it breaks promises.”
She held him just as tightly, listening to the wind pick up outside, rustling through the dry corn. It sounded like whispering. She didn’t make the promise aloud. She just held on, in the dark, waiting for the sun to bring the fight to their door.