Chapter 13: Collared Breakfast
The smell of coffee was the second thing she noticed. The first was the weight, solid and warm, of his arm draped possessively over her waist, and the insistent pressure of his morning erection nestled in the cleft of her ass. The collar was still there, a cool band of leather against her throat, its lock a tiny, unyielding heart against her pulse. She didn’t move, just let the reality of it—of him, of what they’d done on that tower—seep into her bones with the pale morning light.
“Good morning, my property.”
His voice was a sleep-roughened rumble against the back of her neck. The words should have chilled her. Instead, a flush of heat spread from her core, liquid and shamefully welcome. He shifted, his big hand sliding from her waist to her hip, gripping and turning her onto her stomach in one fluid motion. The sheets were cool against her flushed skin. He settled his weight over her thighs, not quite crushing, but undeniable.
She felt the warm, wet swipe of his tongue up the length of her spine, making her shiver. Then his hands were on her ass, kneading the sore muscles, spreading her cheeks apart. The air touched her, cool on the most intimate part of her. She whimpered into the pillow.
“Still tender,” he murmured, his breath hot. “Good.”
His tongue wasn’t asking. It was a flat, broad stroke over her asshole, a deliberate, filthy claiming. She cried out, her fingers twisting in the sheets. It was obscene, more intimate than anything she’d ever known, and it unraveled her completely. He licked and probed, a slow, relentless preparation, until she was shaking, pushing back against his mouth, a wordless plea for more.
“Jason,” she gasped.
“Hammer,” he corrected, his voice dark. “Here, like this, I’m Hammer. Your Hammer. And you’re my good girl, taking what I give you.”
He shifted again, his body moving up hers. She heard the tear of a foil packet, the brief rustle. Then the blunt, wide head of his cock was pressing, not where she was wet and throbbing, but against that now-slicked, tight ring of muscle.
“This,” he growled, pushing forward with a steady, inexorable pressure. “This is mine now, too.”
The stretch was breathtaking, a white-hot fullness that stole the air from her lungs. She screamed, a short, sharp sound muffled by the pillow. He didn’t stop, feeding himself into her inch by torturous inch, his body a cage over hers, one hand fisted in her hair, holding her head down.
“Fuck, Brittany… so tight. Taking me so deep in your pretty little ass.”
He was fully seated, a burning, impossible fullness. He stayed there, letting her body clench and spasm around him, letting her get used to the invasion. Then he began to move. Short, sharp strokes at first, each one punching a ragged moan from her throat. The pain spiraled, twisted, bloomed into a devastating pleasure that radiated out from her center. He fucked her ass with a brutal, rhythmic precision, his hips pistoning, his balls slapping against her soaked cunt with every drive forward.
“I love you,” he grunted, the words raw and guttural, torn from him with each thrust. “Fuck, I love you. Gonna breed you. Gonna fill this sweet cunt until it overflows. Make you carry me inside you.”
His words were a catalyst. The orgasm ripped through her with violent, silent intensity, her body clamping down on him in waves of paralyzing pleasure. He felt it, snarled in triumph, and his pace became frantic, losing its measured control.
In the chaotic, sweaty aftermath, as he pulled out and disposed of the condom, then gathered her shaking body back against his chest, a question floated up from the depths of her spent mind. The city was waking up outside his loft windows, the ordinary world moving on. But here, in this bed that smelled of sex and him, with this collar locked around her neck, nothing was ordinary.
She traced the scars on his forearm, the ones he’d told her about under the stars. “Hammer?”
“Hmm?”
His voice was drowsy, satiated. His hand stroked her hair.
She swallowed, the leather band rubbing her throat. “Last night… on the tower. And just now. The things you know how to do.” She paused, gathering courage. “Have you ever… done this for another woman? Been this for someone else?”
The hand in her hair stilled.
The silence that followed was different. It wasn’t the comfortable quiet of afterglow. It was a vacuum, pulling all the warmth from the room. She felt his chest rise and fall in a long, controlled breath beneath her cheek.
“No.”
The word was final, a stone dropped into still water.
He shifted, moving her with him until he was on his back and she was sprawled partly on top of him. He looked at the ceiling, his jaw tight. “I’ve had women. I’ve fucked women. Hard, soft, every way in between.” His eyes, when they finally cut to hers, were stormy. “But I have never, not once, brought a woman to my tower. I have never put my collar on anyone. I have never wanted to own someone, to care for someone, to fucking worship someone like this. I have never loved anyone while I was buried inside them. And I have never,” he said, his voice dropping to a rough whisper, “felt like my fucking soul was leaving my body just because I made someone come.”
He brought a hand up, his thumb brushing over the leather at her throat. “This isn’t a game I play, Brittany. It’s a need. My need. And it’s only ever been for you. Even when you didn’t know it.”
The raw honesty in his words was more exposing than any physical act. He had watched her, wanted her, built this entire secret world around his obsession. It was terrifying. It was the most profound thing she’d ever heard.
She didn’t speak. Instead, she pushed herself up, swung a leg over his hips, and settled down onto him, taking him deep into her still-sensitive, aching heat. She leaned forward, her hands on his chest, the collar dangling between them. She kissed him, slow and deep, pouring every ounce of her surrender into it.
“Then show me more,” she whispered against his lips, and began to move.
Her hips found a slow, grinding rhythm, taking him so deep each time she sank down that his breath hitched. The morning light caught the sweat already beading on his chest, and her own sweat made her skin slide against his. She watched his face, the way his eyes darkened, the muscle in his jaw feathering as he let her set the pace, his big hands coming to rest on her thighs.
“Tell me,” she breathed, rising up until only the head of his cock remained inside her, then dropping down hard, making him groan. “You said you fucked other women. Hard, soft. While you were… what? Watching me from your tower? Thinking about me while you were inside them?”
His hands tightened on her. “Brittany.”
“No.” She leaned forward, bracing her hands on the pillow by his head, the collar brushing his chin. Her movement changed the angle, and she gasped as he touched something breathtakingly deep. “I need to know. If this is real. If I’m real to you, and not just… the finale of some fantasy you’ve been writing in your head. Did you come on their faces? Did you make them call you Hammer?”
A raw sound tore from his throat. He bucked upward, seizing control, driving into her with a sudden, brutal thrust that stole her air. “Yes. And yes. Whatever they wanted, whatever would get me off and get them gone. Fast and rough in a supply closet. Slow in a bed that meant nothing.” He flipped her onto her back with a strength that left her dizzy, looming over her, pinning her wrists above her head. His cock plunged back into her wet heat, a relentless, punishing rhythm. “I’d fuck them until I couldn’t think, and it never worked. I’d still see you. Your laugh from across the ER. The way you’d bite your lip when you were starting an IV.”
His words were a confession spat into the space between them, each one punctuated by a drive of his hips. She felt owned, unraveled, her legs wrapped around his back, heels digging into his ass.
“I’d make them scream,” he snarled, his breath hot on her mouth. “And I’d wish it was your scream. I’d come down some stranger’s throat and hate myself because her mouth wasn’t yours.” He released her wrists, his hand sliding between their bodies, his thumb finding her clit, rubbing rough, urgent circles. “Is that what you want to hear? That I tried to fuck you out of my system with anyone who’d let me? That I used them, and it made me feel like a hollowed-out piece of shit, and I’d do it all again because the only other choice was to touch you and ruin everything?”
Her climax approached like a train, inevitable, terrifying. His words were filthy, heartbreaking, and they lit her up inside. “Yes,” she sobbed, her back arching. “God, yes.”
“I loved you so much it felt like a disease,” he whispered, his forehead dropping to hers, his rhythm faltering into something deeper, more deliberate. “And I didn’t get to have you. So I took everything else. It was all just… noise. To drown out the sound of your voice in my head.”
The admission shattered her final barrier. Her orgasm detonated, a silent, wide-eyed burst before the waves hit, convulsing through her, milking his cock inside her. He cursed, a long, low stream of filth, and followed her over, his body locking, his release pumping into her in hot, endless pulses.
He collapsed, careful to keep his weight on his elbows, his face buried in her neck. They lay there, slick and spent, the only sound their ragged breathing syncing slowly.
The city’s morning murmur seeped in. A distant siren, the hum of traffic. Normal life. Her fingers traced the short hair at the nape of his neck. The leather collar felt less like a restraint and more like an anchor.
“It wasn’t noise,” she said quietly, her voice hoarse.
He lifted his head, his eyes searching hers.
“What happened on the tower. What happens here.” She brought her hand up, touched his cheek. “This isn’t you getting to have me. This is me choosing you. The whole fucked-up, obsessive, beautiful mess of you. Your silence, your noise. All of it.”
He captured her hand, kissed her palm, a gesture so tender it made her throat ache. He didn’t speak for a long time, just looked at her as the sun climbed higher, painting the room in gold.
Finally, he shifted, pulling out of her gently, rolling onto his side to face her. He traced the line of the collar with a single finger. “The fantasy was having you. The reality is keeping you. And I don’t know how to do that without breaking it. Without breaking us.”
She turned into him, fitting her body against his, feeling the solid, reassuring beat of his heart. “So we’ll learn. Together.”
He held her tighter, and for the first time, she felt a slight tremor in his arms. Not desire. Fear. The most dangerous man she’d ever met was terrified of losing the one thing he’d finally allowed himself to touch.
The coffee was forgotten, growing cold on the counter. The world outside kept turning. In the quiet loft, they held onto each other, two broken pieces slotting together, sharp edges and all.