Chapter Eighteen: Release

Marissa gasped when Daniel shifted, it was just a slight change in angle, but it lit her up like a struck match. His hips met hers in a rhythm that felt instinctive, inevitable. She arched beneath him, the sudden pleasure pulling a raw, unfiltered “Fuck” from her lips.

She hadn’t expected this.

Not just the pleasure, though that was undeniable, but the way he moved. With purpose, yes, but not ego. There was nothing careless about it. Nothing rushed. He wasn’t just fucking her. He was listening.

For someone who’d always assumed men were more interested in their own pleasure, she’d expected a certain bluntness. She wasn’t a misandrist. Just a realist. She’d spent years believing no man could make her body feel this way, like it was being read, not just touched.

But then Daniel found her neck with his mouth, lips dragging along the sensitive skin just beneath her ear, and she gasped again, softer this time. Her legs wrapped around his waist in response, anchoring him there, claiming the moment for herself.

“God,” she murmured, fingers gripping his back, nails tracing lines into his skin, not to mark, but to remind. I’m here. This is mine, too.

Daniel groaned low in his throat, his voice pressed into her shoulder like a secret. And they moved together, not just in sync, but in trust.

She felt the weight of him, thick, hot, and pulsing, pressing against the most intimate part of her, and she gasped, not from pain, but from the sheer intensity of it. She whispered again his ear, “Come on, Reyes,” she whispered against his ear, her voice low, taunting.

Daniel’s grip on her tightened.

“That all you got?”

His jaw clenched. “You really want to test me right now?” His voice was low, steady, but there was something beneath it.

Marissa smirked, tilting her head back against the pillow.

Daniel groaned, low and primal, and his fingers dug deeper into her hips, his restraint unraveling by the second.

Then he moved.

Not wild. Not thoughtless. But deliberate. Deeper. Slower. Each thrust met with the rise of her hips, her thighs tight around him, guiding him, challenging him.

The rhythm shifted less patient now, more primal. Each motion a punctuation, a wordless exchange written in sweat and gasps. She met him stroke for stroke, never yielding, never timid. This wasn’t her being claimed. This was her claiming back something that had been stolen.

Her hands gripped his back again, nails dragging down his spine, her voice catching in her throat as she whispered, “There. Right there.” A command. A reward.

“Daniel,” she said a moment later giving up a gift. He was so good he had her moaning out his name for her.

Marissa’s body arched, tensed, her breath stuttering as the waves built. She was close again. She didn’t need to say it—Daniel felt it in the way her legs trembled around him, in the way her nails pressed into his shoulders.

“Don’t you fucking stop,” she rasped into his neck.

“I won’t,” he swore, his voice breaking. “I’ve got you.”

And he did.

Marissa came with a sharp cry, her body pulsing around him, clutching and drawing him deeper as if her body refused to let go. Holding onto his cock as if she refused to let it go. She wanted this. A stupid crazy decision all things considered.

The intensity of her release undid him. Daniel followed with a strangled groan, the kind that sounded more like surrender than climax. He pressed into her, trembling, and then slowly collapsed, his arms catching himself just in time to keep from crushing her.

Marissa stared up at the ceiling, her chest rising and falling in slow, steady waves. Her skin still tingled, her muscles deliciously sore, her body humming with aftershocks.

“Wow,” she breathed. It wasn’t performative—it was stunned, raw, hoarse from moaning and from truth. “That was… wow.”

Daniel let out a low, contented chuckle beside her. He turned his head to look at her, his curls damp with sweat, his eyes heavy-lidded but alert. “You okay?”

She nodded, her lips curving into a lazy, satisfied smile. “Yeah,” she murmured. “Better than okay.”

He sighed, his laugh vibrating deep in his chest as he rolled onto his back beside her, one arm flung over his eyes. “Well, that’s good. I wasn’t emotionally prepared to ruin a lesbian’s night.”

Marissa snorted, the sound equal parts amusement and disbelief. “You’re such a dork.”

“Hey, I’m ****,” he said, peeking at her with a crooked grin.

There was a beat of silence. Not awkward. Not tense. Just… warm. Shared.

Then Marissa turned her head toward him, her smirk blooming again. “I still can’t believe you didn’t use a condom.”

Daniel groaned into his arm. “We were emotional and naked and you were already pulling me into your lap, what was I supposed to do? Ask for a CVS run mid-thrust?”

She snickered. “You eat pussy like a dream but your sex-ed game is real shaky.”

He tilted his head toward her, mock-wounded. “I’m deeply offended.”

“Well,” she said, stretching slowly, luxuriating in the feeling of the sheets against her bare skin, “you should be. You’ve got a lot to make up for.”

Daniel smirked. “I’m sure I can find some.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Some what?”

“Condoms.”

“Oh?” Her voice dropped into a teasing lilt. “You think you’re getting a second shot at me?”

He didn’t answer right away. He just looked at her. Not cocky. Not presumptuous. Just honest.

“I’d be lucky if I did.”

And for a moment, her smirk softened into something else, “We’ll see,” she said, almost under her breath. “Let me catch my breath first.”