Page 71 of The Atom Between Us

He thrust harder, slamming me into the tile. The pain went molten, pleasure and agony twisted together, a fiery storm of sensation. I moaned, low and guttural, then clamped my teeth on his shoulder again, biting until I tasted blood.

He laughed, a wild, broken sound “You’re fucking insane.”

“Takes one to know one,” I panted, squeezing him tighter, a vice of flesh and blood.

He rammed into me, once, twice, again, every thrust driving the air from my lungs. My hands roamed his back, mapped every scar, every ridge of bone, a landscape of pain and pleasure. I wanted to hate him, but I didn’t. Not in this moment. In this moment, he was mine, a storm of sensation and emotion, a primal force of nature.

He was hitting that spot inside me with every thrust, the one that made stars burst behind my eyelids and set my nerve endings alight. I could feel the pleasure building, coiling tighter and tighter in my core like a spring ready to snap.

He must have sensed how close I was because he increased his pace even more, slamming into me so hard the tile cracked beneath us.

My orgasm hit me like a freight train, crashing through me with the force of a tidal wave. I convulsed beneath him, back arching off the floor as every muscle seized up tight. He followed me over the edge a second later, shuddering, head thrown back, muscles locked so tight I thought he’d break, a statue of ecstasy carved from living flesh. I watched his face, catalogued every twitch, every beat, a symphony of release and surrender. He collapsed onto me, breath hot on my neck, body shaking, a storm subsiding into calm.

I held him there, hands on his shoulders, refusing to let go.

When he finally rolled off, I stayed on the floor, staring up at the water-stained ceiling.

We didn’t speak.

There was nothing left to say.

The next few minutes were the longest of my life. We lay there, side by side on the tile, barely touching, the cold water pummeling us from above. My pulse slowly decelerated from sprint to canter. The adrenaline drained, leaving only the heavy sediment of what we’d done.

Kang was first to move. He pushed himself up, elbows popping, and stood over me with that old Authority posture—upright, composed, already slipping back into the mask. The scars on his chest looked less fierce now, just pale bands against the dark wet of his skin. He didn’t look at me. Not even once.

He went to the locker partition, found his torn shirt, and shrugged it on with careful, efficient motions. Then he picked up the dead guard’s discarded jacket, wiped the blood from his knuckles, and methodically zipped it up over his own wounds. He could have been dressing for a patrol, for a debrief, for anything but what had just happened.

I watched him, half expecting him to say something. Anything.

He didn’t.

I tried to stand but my legs refused at first, still jelly from the fight and the fucking. When I finally made it to my feet, I wobbled, caught the edge of the shower for support. I was naked, bruised, smeared with drying blood. My knees were red and raw from the tile, my wrists ringed in purple handprints. I could still feel the shape of his hands on my body, ghost pressure in the places where he’d gripped me hardest.

I didn’t want to think about what that meant.

My jumpsuit was where I’d left it, slumped on the plastic bench. I picked it up, shook off the splinters of broken tile, and pulled it on over damp skin. The zipper stuck at the collarbone, but I forced it anyway, teeth clenched. My hands shook. Not from cold, not anymore.

I wrapped my arms around myself and slid down the wall until I was sitting, legs pulled to my chest, head tucked low.

“This was a mistake,” I whispered. The words tasted like chlorine and defeat.

Kang looked up, face blank. “I know.”

We sat in silence, nothing left but the noise of the pipes and the slow drip of water from the ceiling. It felt like the world should have changed, but nothing had. The shower was still cold, still stinking, still haunted by the ghosts of everyone who’d ever come through. The bruises on my body would heal, but the rest wouldn’t.

After a minute, Kang started moving again. He walked the room, scanning the floor for evidence—shards of broken tile, drops of blood, anything that would mark what had happened here. He used the dead guard’s shirt to wipe away the worst of it, careful and precise. He even went so far as to straighten the puddles with his boot, erasing the outline of two bodies where we’d lain.

Watching him do it hurt more than I expected.

He didn’t look at me while he worked. Just kept his head down, focused on the task, Authority mode set to maximum. When he was done, he went to the door, hand on the latch, and stood there for a long time, not moving.

“Don’t tell anyone,” he said, voice flat.

“Who would believe me?” I spat.

He glanced back, face carved from ice. “Doesn’t matter. They’d still make you pay for it.”

I almost laughed. “They already have.”