She could smell the scent of stale smoke before he even walked through the door, even though she had kept the windows closed and locked while the fire he was fighting raged on. She couldn’t stand the smell of the smoke, knowing he was out there in the middle of it, couldn’t listen to the sirens thinking that she’d see the flashing lights pulling into their driveway to tell her he was dead.

 

When he opened the front door, bathed in the pale light of the street lamp, he brought with him the sharp smell of smoke, heavy in the air and on his clothes. He wouldn’t have showered, knowing every minute he spent away from her after a fire was a minute she spent wondering if he had survived.

 

Her back stiffened as she laid eyes on him, inhaled the scent that clung to him like a second skin. He dropped the bag that was slung over his shoulder, stepped inside and closed the door. They stood motionless in the dark for several moments before he reached out and switched on the small table lamp. She blinked against the light.

 

He wore a dark t-shirt printed with the number of his Ladder, a pair of loose pants. He also wore dark smudges of soot on his face and arms. There was a fresh cut on the bicep of his right arm. Instinctively she stepped forward, releasing her arms from around herself so she could trail pale, spotless fingers around the cut.

 

He reached for her when she didn’t speak. She knew his hands would be filthy, that the soot and grime would ruin the silk of her negligee. She didn’t care. She lifted her face to him and he found her lips, so hungry for her she was sure he would swallow her whole; he tasted of fire.

 

“I thought it would be tonight…” she murmured as he ran his thick hands up her body with a fever that made her think he had forgotten what she felt like.

 

“For a few minutes,” he murmured, bringing a finger up to caress her lips, “I thought it would be too.”

 

He kissed her again, harder this time, his stubble bruising her chin, his hands framing her face, engulfing it.

 

“It was bad?” she whispered. It was rhetorical; she had known by the sirens and billowing smoke that it had been a nightmare.

 

“Shh,” he hushed, dragging his hands over her shoulders, peeling away the straps of her negligee. His mouth followed his hands as the garment slipped off her shoulders, exposed her breasts to him; she was sure he was kissing the dark smudges of soot that his hands would leave as they trailed over her body.

 

“Jesus, you’re so perfect,” he murmured, bending to kiss the valley between her breasts, caress each nipple with his tongue, ignite her skin with the heat he seemed to channel from each fire.

 

He let the negligee drop to the floor with a whisper and she stood naked before him in the yellow glow of the lamp. Her pale skin was flawless, so unlike his own, hardened and so often covered with the remnants of fire that he was sure the black was tattooed into his skin.

 

She let him stare at her, knowing he needed to reconnect more than she did, that seeing her after a fire, skin unscathed and flawless, it reminded him that he still had this to come home too, that this place wasn’t blackened by the devil he fought night after night.

 

He trailed blackened finger tips around the curve of one breast. She swayed against the light touch, her eyes slipped closed. He watched his fingers, then her face, gauging her reaction. When he trailed his thick fingers to the valley between her breasts she made a small noise and her back arched towards him, offering.

 

He brought his free hand up, weighed her breasts in them before scraping his thumbs across their hard nipples. She whimpered in submission, her hands came up to his arms, nails pinching his skin, urging him on. He knew to be gentle, as the calluses on his palms could easily mark her skin, so he was extra careful around her nipples.

 

He dragged his thumbs over the hardened peaks again and her lips parted, her warm breath coming in short gasps.

 

His cock was hard in his pants, desperate to be inside of her. His body quivered as she dropped one hand from his arm, let her hand graze the bulge in his pants.

 

“You don’t have to be slow,” she murmured, sensing the tension within him. “I like when you don’t hold back.” She rubbed him through his pants, cupping his balls and running her palm up the length of his shaft. “Just take me, baby,” she wrapped her fist around the head of his cock. “Make it real.”

 

He was strung taut as a bow, her words plucking at him, making his body tune into hers and his cock throb with anticipation.

 

He dropped onto his knees in front of her, getting her hands away from his cock so he could speak. He placed his hands on the inside of her knees, applied pressure, and she spread her legs for him, offering him the view of her swollen cunt that he was looking for.

 

He sucked in a breath, sure he would never get tired of seeing her arousal, her sex swollen pink, wet and slick. Her hands came to rest in his hair, assuring her balance as he brought one hand up to spread her sex. He watched her exposed and swollen clit throb, inhaled as her scent reached him. He shifted and brought his tongue to her slit, licked tentatively at the soft wetness he found there. His free hand, still resting against her knee, felt her legs shudder as they willed to collapse when her brain registered nothing but pleasure.

 

“I don’t like hurting you,” he murmured, taking his mouth away from her to speak. He flicked his tongue against her clit, knowing it would make an answer or protest from her difficult.

 

Her body jerked and a cry that could have been angry or complimentary shuddered across her lips. He worked his mouth against her cunt, spreading her wider with his fingers and letting his tongue work it’s way inside of her.

 

“You don’t hurt me,” she managed to gasp as her hands held his mouth to her and her hips undulated of their own accord.

 

He thought of the mornings after, the red welts on her skin from his thick stubble, the thick calluses on his hands leaving marks on her thighs and those sweet breasts. Sometimes she drove him wild, pushed him over the edge with nothing more than a whimper or a flex of her hips. He could get rough but she was always submissive to the way he pinned her arms over her head or the animalistic way he took her from behind. She never protested, but when he saw her naked body marked in the morning light from his hands he felt guilty.

 

Without warning she wrenched his mouth away from her pussy and collapsed to her knees in front of him. Her fingers dug into his shirt and wrenched it over his head with hard jerk. She drove her nails into his chest, just above his nipples, and made him suck in a breath.

 

“I’m not a pane of glass,” she breathed on his lips, flexed those nails into his skin. “You should know that by now.” She kissed him hard, tasted herself on his lips, in his mouth. “You’re not the first guy to play rough with me.” She whispered.

 

He grabbed her wrists and put his weight into her, pinning her to the cold ceramic tile. She had a challenging look on her face as her breasts heaved and she bent her knees up, presenting herself in a perfectly fuckable position.

 

“You rile me up,” he murmured, his eyes trailing down her body to stare at her cunt, presented to him between her spread thighs.

 

“Purposely,” she said, her lips twitching into a smile.

 

He stared at her in silence for several moments. She shifted and he released her wrists, sat back on his ankles. She pushed herself up onto her hands so her face was level with his.

 

“Does it help if I ask you to fuck me?”

 

The question didn’t sound wrong on her lips, it wouldn’t be the first time she had asked him to fuck her.

 

She scooted closer to him so her naked sex pressed against the thick bulge in his pants; he could feel her heat. “Does it help if I tell you how I want it?” She brought one hand up to rake through his hair, caress the nape of his neck.

 

“I like it when you’re rough, baby. I’d tell you if I didn’t. It’s more real, then. And after tonight, I need real.”

 

When he didn’t speak she kissed him once then shifted away, pushed herself to her feet. He watched her walk away, watched the switch of her naked hips. He waited a moment, surprised his hard-on was still raging, then followed her to the bedroom.

 

She was just sitting down on the end of the bed when he reached the doorway. She lifted her gaze to his, then cocked her head in invitation, spread her legs again. He shifted off the doorframe and approached her. Her hands came up to the waist of his pants when he stopped in front of her. Without hesitation she tugged them down, freeing his cock. It twitched, having her lips in such close proximity.

 

“I don’t mind being your outlet,” she murmured before wrapping her lips around his cock. His hands came into her hair as she throated him deeply before pulling back. She squeezed his balls once and then scooted back, his cock popping from between her lips, slick and shiny with her saliva. “Just stop making me wait for it.”

 

He kicked off his pants and crawled onto the bed with her, settling on his knees between her legs; he could feel her saliva drying on his cock and it was driving him mad. “Turn around,” he said firmly, watched her eyes darken before she complied. When she was positioned enticingly on her hands and knees in front of him, she threw her hair over one shoulder and turned her head to look at him.

 

“You know why I like you like this?” He asked her quietly as he brought one hand to her sex, teasing the slick folds before plunging a finger inside. He inhaled sharply at the sound of his finger squelching in and out.

 

“Why?” Her voice shook with arousal as she automatically dropped to her elbows to deepen the penetration.

 

“Because you take me deeper,” he added another digit. “I know you like it like this, even if you don’t ask me to fuck you this way very often.” She moaned her agreement.

 

When the head of his cock replaced his fingers she whimpered with satisfaction and took him easily.

 

His first thrust brought a groan from her lips as she took him deep. Her fingers curled into the pillow as she struggled for control, mesmerized by the way his body worked against her own. She could feel the muscles of her body go tense, her eyes unfocussed as he worked her body in a way no man ever had.

 

“I want to see you,” she murmured shakily, her face nearly buried in the pillow. He grunted, irritated, but complied by pulling out and flipping her onto her back. Her knees bent back, offering as he filled his palms with her tits, teased the nipples with his calloused thumbs.

 

He leaned over her and entered her sharply, coaxing an erotic cry from her lips as her back arched off the bed, her hands came up to his back. Her nails dug into thick muscle as he picked up a rhythm, hard and steady.

 

Their breath mingled as he brought one hand up to grip the headboard and throw more power behind his thrusts. “Mmm, yes, baby. I love that,” she murmured, took his lower lip between her teeth and bit gently. Inspired, he kissed her hard, feeling her mouth give in to his.  She melted into him, let his body drive into hers with relentless force.

 

The wood of the headboard snapped against the wall, the sound mingling with her strangled cries and his labored breathing. “Oh yes, baby, right there… just… there.” She threw her head back, exposing the smooth line of her throat which beckoned his lips. He nipped at her neck as he felt her body shudder beneath him, could almost see her mind shut down as the orgasm took her.

 

Her hands slipped from his back and she lay spread beneath him, powerless in the aftermath of her orgasm. He didn’t relent, thrusting into her slick pussy with all the strength he had left in him.

 

He no longer smelled the smoke or burning plastic, he could only smell her. There were no more screams, no more crying mothers, only her quiet murmurs and gasps. She could make him forget, and that, more than the sex, was what was important.

 

When he came, burying his cock deep inside of her, she banded her legs around his waist and held him there. His forehead resting on her shoulder he breathed her in, made sure he would never forget her scent.

 

“Never stop coming home,” she murmured, and he made sure he would never forget how her voice sounded when they were in bed together.