No, You Hang Up

by A.J. Merlin

I’m not sorry about the mess. See you soon, little bunny P.S. I’ll kill your neighbor if she knocks on your damn door one more time. P.P.S. Mi-da-zo-lam

“Because I’m a paramedic, and I know my way around sedatives.” That brings me up short. I stop tripping around my living room, instead staring at him with a perplexed expression that causes him to stop as well. “What?” Hux asks, confusion in his voice. “Paramedic?” I repeat. “Like, an EMT? Like, rides in an ambulance, saving people?”

“So good for me, you know that? Fuck, maybe God finally loves me for something, or I’ve pleased the devil enough for him to have sent you to me. You were made for me, weren’t you? Made to be fucked like I own you.”

“No, you don’t even get to look at her. If you do, I’ll cut out your eyes and feed them to you, little boy.”

“I’d make them hurt for you. Over and over, until you were satisfied and they would never doubt you again, even in hell.” My stomach twists hard, and I swear I almost go to my knees on my floor. But he holds me up, and I grab onto his elbows to steady myself. “I’d make them burn just for you. Until they knew that you’d never lied, and they were so wrong for doubting you.”

“Because I’m going to fucking ruin every inch of you, inside and out, for anyone other than me.”

“Yeah, you’re sort of stuck with me.” “For how long?” I tug harder on his soft hair when he bites down, but that only seems to make him nip a little harder as his tongue darts out to taste my skin. “Forever.”

“You’re stuck with me for the rest of our unnatural lives. And if you ever flirt with anyone else or let another boy touch you”—he nudges the back of my neck with his lips—“I’ll take it as an invitation to skin them alive while you watch.”

“Because you’re mine. And I like to believe you were always going to be mine. Whether it was going to be like this, or chained up in my basement until I could convince you to like me.”