Anti-Hero (Wild Heart Ranch Book 4)

I wake in the same position I fell asleep: face up, with an adorable man hugging my side. I squeeze my eyes shut, afraid of what I might see with Ant in my arms. My brain has spent the last few weeks recategorizing him from practically infantile to beautiful to lover, and now that I’ve had him, I can’t unhave him.

The visual of his tiny body riding my cock, taking all of me…fuck. My imagination has nothing on reality.

“Hey,” he says, looking at me, half-smiling with a half-bitten lip. Still an adult man, I note with a relieved breath.

More importantly, I’m no longer shell-shocked by these feelings. They’re too familiar. Like a previously unrecognized friend taking off a mask.

“Hey,” I say, gingerly squeezing his ass. “How’s everything down there feeling?”

His cheeks color and he nuzzles his face into the side of my pec. “Good,” he answers, his voice muffled.

This shyness, while adorable, confirms what I observed last night. Ant had something going on behind his eyes at several points. A calculation. A comparison. An insecurity to be worked through. His brain was working overtime to make him feel safe. I’m grateful he still feels good about everything, and I hope one of these days he can fully relax into being with me.

Gently, I turn him on his back and settle between his thighs. By way of an answer, I place a soft kiss on his lips, then deepen it. He pushes me back with a laugh. “Ugh. Morning breath!”

Grinning, I drag him off the bed and hoist him over my shoulder as I walk to the bathroom. The reflection of Ant’s pert brown ass and muscled thighs in the mirror is…yeah, I like that. I tilt him toward me and take a nip out of his cheek.

“Yeouch!” he shouts, laughing as he pummels my back.

One-handed, I unzip my Dopp kit and grab my toothbrush and paste. It’s a little fiddly to do one-handed, but I finally get the toothpaste on the toothbrush and get enough water on it to brush my teeth.

“I need to brush my teeth too, you know.”

“Gimme a second,” I say through a foamy mouth.

I keep brushing with one hand while running the fingers of the other up and down the sensitive cleft of his ass. I grip him tight to rinse, loving how his hardened cock has smeared precum against my bare shoulder.

Hopper’s bathroom has pretty granite countertops, so I set his naked bum on the counter.

“Oh my God, so cold!” Ant yelps. “Why do you fucking hate me?”

I spit and rinse, then push my way between his thighs, stretching them wide as I skate my fingertips along his jawline. He raises his eyes to mine.

“You know very well I don’t hate you.”

Color suffuses his neck and chest, which I enjoy more than I should. Dragging over his little zippered bag, I pull out his toothbrush and toothpaste. After spreading the paste on the brush, I run it under water and hand it to him.

He narrows his eyes at me but plays along. As he starts brushing his teeth, I rub a hand up and down one of his thighs while licking my palm. His sparkling eyes widen and he nearly chokes on his toothbrush when I grab his cock and start polishing the head.

“Last night was unexpected,” I say, pausing to again spit in my hand. “I mean that as a good thing. You’ve been trying to tell me something for a while now, haven’t you? Nod if I’m on the right track.”

Ant’s eyes glaze and his toothbrushing slows as he nods off-kilter.

“I thought so. You’re not a little boy. You haven’t been for a long time, have you?”

He looks off to the side and shakes his head, then resumes brushing his teeth while I resume stroking and polishing.

Burying my nose in his sleep-mussed hair, I rasp, “You’re a grown man with grown desires and a recovery path that’s none of my fucking business.”

He leans to the side and spits his toothpaste into the sink. I fill the glass of water and hand it to him before resuming my care of his cock. Hitching, he swishes and spits, then wipes the back of his arm across his lips.

I take the glass from him and set it on the counter, and his rapidly rising and falling chest catches my attention. His whole body, really, catches my attention, and I’m grateful that I’m finally in the right headspace to appreciate all of it without all the self-flagellation.

“And you’re really good at killing bad guys,” I tack on as I tighten my grip.

Ant nods, silently rolling his hips into my hand.

“So while we’re on this road trip, I think the safest and possibly the most fun option is for us to continue fucking each other, yes?”

And then, if you like, we’ll just keep fucking each other when we get home…

He whimpers, nodding as he supports himself on his hands and drops his head back.

Removing my hands from his body, I place them on either side of his, dipping in for a quick taste of his collarbone. From there, I drag my nose up to his ear, unable to stop the possessiveness I feel for him.

“If I’m fucking you, you’re not fucking anyone else. Also, while I have no desire for kink outside of the bedroom, when we’re in bed together, you’re mine.”

I know it’s a fucked-up thing to demand, but he inhales sharply, nodding, wordlessly confirming that he knows exactly what I mean.

“You can revoke this arrangement at any time and without explanation. Even if I’m buried so deep inside you that you can taste me. Understood?”

“Yes,” he breathes out, and as demanding as I can be, knowing that he’s here of his own will is everything.

“You’ve fucked with my chill for so long—”

Shaking his head, he cuts me off. “I wasn’t doing anything to fuck with you. I was just taking care of myself.”

I hold my finger to his plush lips, so delicate in comparison.

“I know. The fact you don’t need me is what makes this hot for me.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Oh. Now that I’ve gotten my own head out of my ass and my life back in balance, I can go back to being calm. Everywhere but in bed.”

“Because in bed, I’m yours.”

“Yes. That work for you?”

“Fuck yes,” he breathes out with a side-to-side hip roll.

“Good. Anders get to you in his round of testing last week?”

Ant nods.

“Same. I’m negative across the board. Any issue with me fucking you raw?”

“No. I don’t think so.”

I push his hair out of his eyes. “What does I don’t think so mean?”

He clears his throat. “How much do you want to know about my background?”

“You can tell me anything,” I say, as I’ve said before. Hoping that’s true.

His eyes tell me he trusts me.

“The only guys who didn’t use condoms were breaking the rules. If they broke that rule, the other rules usually didn’t mean much to them either,” he says, holding up his hand.

I’m confused by the gesture until Ant wiggles his pinkie. It bends out, just the tiniest bit—enough to know it was broken and not properly reset. I take his small hand in mine and kiss his palm, then kiss the bend of his pinkie.

I am going to fucking murder the man who did this to him.

“Is this guy on the list?”

“Yep.”

“Where is he?”

“Minneapolis—St. Paul area. There’s a ring of business owners and a madam to take care of when we get there.”

“Mm. When do we hit the Twin Cities?”

“We’re gonna hit Philadelphia first and then—”

I wrinkle my nose and shake my head. “Absolutely not. We’re going to Minnesota next.”

His murder-grin brightens his face as he inhales sharply. “Yeah?”

I lean in again. “The only one allowed to put a mark on you is me, and only with your permission.”

“You have it,” he says way too quickly.

“What kinds of marks do you think you’d like?”

“I don’t know. A hickey, maybe something with your teeth? I like the bruises you left from holding my hips so tight last night.”

“Anything you don’t want to do? Anything you don’t like?”

His eyes widen and another calculation flits behind his eyes. I doubt he’s ever been asked about his own hard limits before.

I lift my chin. “Nothing you say here will be wrong. You can tell me.”

“Oh, um…” He looks off to the side. “Uh, definitely no choking, and don’t make me pretend to gag on your cock. I don’t have a gag reflex, and I hate pretending of any kind.”

His look of disdain would be adorable if we weren’t talking about something so important.

I lean in, stealing his gaze. “Ant, if you pretend to like something, even a little? This all ends. Don’t bat your eyes at me or give me those pretty little looks that go straight to my fucking cock if they don’t mean anything. You hear me?”

His eyes widen and he nods.

“Okay, then. What else?”

Seeing that I’m sincere, he relaxes into the question, even as he juts out his chin.

“No role-play or feminization. Like, at all. No little play.”

“Is it okay that I like how tiny you are?”

“Very okay. There’s a big difference between liking that I’m a smaller person and wanting to pretend I’m underage. That’s not okay for me.”

“Got it. What else, my petite one?” I ask, kissing his nose.

He smiles for a moment before he goes serious again.

“No bodily waste. No…uh. No blindfolds. No multiples. I don’t like being outnumbered. Or tied up.”

All of these are completely reasonable, but it’s still difficult to neutralize my face. Those are all solid noes because they’re all things he was made to do.

“Anything else?”

He scowls. “Ugh. And no rimming. Ever.”

Ah, damn.

“You don’t like rimming?”

Ant shivers. “Guys are gross.”

Because, of course, he was never on the receiving end.

“What about me rimming you? Like, if I wanted you to sit on my face—would that be okay?”

The flush on his chest tells me he likes the idea, but the way he chews his thumbnail reveals his uncertainty. “Would you really want to do that to me?” he asks in a whisper.

I trace his collarbones with my fingertips. “I would love to do that to you. However, I do have some standards of cleanliness around rimming.”

Ant slides off the counter and stalks past me to the shower, turning on the water.

“Whatcha doin’?” I ask, approaching him from behind, letting my hands drift around to his chest so I can pull him against me.

He turns in the circle of my arms and gives me his best duh look. “Well, now I kinda want to sit on your face, and since you have standards of cleanliness…” He gestures to the shower, the expression in his pretty eyes pure filth.

I look down my nose at him and raise a single brow, loving the challenge in his eyes. “Yes, but who’s in charge?”

Ant’s answering grin, so like the mischief I saw in him last night, makes me doubt my answer. I narrow my eyes. “Hm.”

“Yes?” he asks, his grin broadening.

“Last night—did you pull up Luca’s site to make me jealous?”

Ant drags his finger across his bottom lip. “I would never.”

My jaw drops. I’ve been had.

That is not a complaint.

“Oh, you’re gonna pay for that,” I say, carefully running my fingers through his hair and grabbing it by the root.

He closes his eyes and leans into the pull. Bending toward his ear, I whisper, “Tell me again…who’s in charge?”

“You are,” he says, all light and airy.

God, was he always this perfect for me?

I run my nose along Ant’s delicate jawline. “There you go. If you want me to dial it down—”

He shakes his head, his eyes finding mine.

“Good. You can say no to anything at any time,” I remind him.

“I know,” he tosses back, sassy but breathless.

Grabbing a small douche bulb from my Dopp kit, I hand it to him. “Prepare yourself. Thoroughly. And don’t touch your cock.”

The cock in question arches toward his belly button, drooling a bit of precum at the command in my voice.

“Do I want to know why a big, toppy asshole has one of those packed in his travel kit?” he asks, humor glinting in his eyes.

I raise my brow. “I told you. I have standards.” My eyes fall to his hands, and I tut, batting away his tricky little fingers. “I said stop touching your cock. That’s mine now.”

He pouts, sticking out that plump lower lip of his. “You’re mean.”

I run my fingers up his belly and over his sternum. “Oh, but I can be so nice to you…if you do what I tell you to.”

“Yes, sir,” he snarks, turning back toward the shower.

Before he takes a single step, I grab his shoulder and spin him to face me. Going toe to toe with him, I stare down, loving how he has to tilt his chin all the way up to meet my eyes.

His smallness stirs something fucked up and primal in me, and now that he’s given me permission to enjoy our size difference, I’m going to stop denying myself the pleasure. I have a feeling he enjoys our differences just as much, if the way he gulps as his eyes climb up my body is any indication.

“No honorifics. Also, this bratty thing you’ve got going won’t work on me. Out of the bedroom, you’re your own man. But right now? You’re mine, and I don’t need your sass.”

Ant bites the tip of his finger. “I can live with that.”

With a troublemaker grin, his delicate fingers reach toward my cock. Slowly, carefully, he twists my foreskin over the head, enough to bring me to half-hard, but not enough to go further. I slip my thumb into his mouth, and he begins sucking. My cock jerks at his continued, delicate touch.

He sucks harder, adjusting his hold so his thumb strokes my sensitive frenulum while his fingers continue manipulating the skin. Just as I’m starting to feel like the world’s biggest fidget toy, a grin blooms across his full lips, and he pumps his hand up and down my length. Firm enough to feel, soft enough to not drag on the soft dry skin.

There it is again: his small hand can barely circle my hard-on, scratching something vital in my brain as the steam builds around us.

Finally, I pull back. “Get clean for me and join me on the bed when you’re ready.”

He nods and kisses my chest before disappearing into the shower.