“Mars” Hollaway (Pt2)💢

From the moment the trip started, Mars had been swallowing it. Every laugh. Every too-long glance. Every joke tossed her way like bait.

It started small. Another guy in the group offered to carry her bag. Mars’s jaw ticked, but he let it go. Then later at dinner, one of them leaned too close when he passed her a plate, hand brushing hers just a little too long. Mars’s fingers tightened on his fork until his knuckles whitened.

By the time the group got back to the Airbnb that night, Mars’s chest felt tight with everything he hadn’t said. He sat back in the corner, hoodie hood half-up, watching. Always watching.

But she was his problem, too. Because she was gorgeous when she laughed, and her laugh carried. Gorgeous when she leaned over the counter to grab a drink, shorts riding high on her thighs. Gorgeous when she ignored the dumb comments from their friends and just kept being herself, oblivious to the fact that Mars was memorizing every breath she took.

He tried. God, he tried to keep it down. To swallow it. But men wouldn’t stop fucking trying.

And then came the dare.

“Sit on his lap,” one of the guys laughed, pointing at Theo. “C’mon, it’s just a game.”

The group howled. She rolled her eyes, smiled like she was about to brush it off, but Mars didn’t laugh. His knuckles flexed on his knee, and his head tilted just a fraction, watching.

She didn’t move. But it was the comment after—the one that cracked him open.

“Forget lap-sitting,” someone else chimed in, grinning wickedly. “Seven minutes in heaven. Bet she’d have somebody begging. Hell, I’d eat her out myself if—”

The crack of Mars’s fist connecting with flesh cut the air.

The guy didn’t even finish the sentence. He stumbled back, lip split, and the room froze. No one had seen Mars move that fast before. No one expected him to swing.

The silence was thick. Heavy.

Mars’s chest heaved once, twice. He didn’t look at anyone else. He just turned and left, slamming the door so hard the walls rattled.

⸻

When he came back, it was worse.

The door swung open, and Mars stepped inside like a storm had followed him home. His hoodie was gone, his white t-shirt clinging damp to his chest, and his hands... his hands were split and raw, fresh bruises blooming across his knuckles. His eyes were glassy, glazed with liquor, but the focus in them was laser-sharp—locked on her.

The room fell quiet.

She sat stiff on the couch, caught in his stare.

“Mars,” one of the guys started carefully, “maybe you should—”

“Shut the fuck up.” His voice was low, raw, but steady.

He didn’t look at anyone else. Didn’t see them. Didn’t care. He only saw her.

He crossed the room in three strides, people instinctively shifting out of his way. She didn’t move, couldn’t breathe. He reached her, leaned down, and in one terrifyingly intimate motion, slid a hand around her throat—not squeezing, just there, the weight of his palm pressing heat into her skin, the pads of his fingers steady beneath her jaw.

Her breath caught.

“Upstairs.” His voice was a growl, whiskey-rough, vibrating low enough she felt it more than heard it.

Her lips parted, eyes wide. The whole room was staring now, shocked silent. For months they’d teased about the tension between the two of them, but no one had ever seen Mars like this. Bold. Possessive. Raw.

He leaned closer, forehead almost against hers, his thumb stroking slow across her pulse point like a warning. His breath hit her lips when he spoke again, softer, scarier:

“You heard me. Upstairs. Now.”

The air was thick with disbelief. Someone choked out a nervous laugh. Another muttered, “Holy shit.”

But she didn’t resist. Didn’t argue. She rose, his hand never leaving her throat as she stood. The way his body caged hers left no room for misunderstanding: he wasn’t asking.

Her friends’ wide-eyed shock followed them as Mars steered her toward the stairs, fingers firm on her jaw like he was afraid she’d vanish if he let go.

And maybe the most shocking part wasn’t that Mars snapped. It was that she followed.

---

Mars shoved the bedroom door shut with his shoulder, breath ragged, hands still trembling from the fight and the liquor. His busted lip was swollen, split just enough to bleed when he licked it. His fists were fucked—raw and bloody, skin peeled back in jagged places that stung when he touched her cheek.

“Damn it,” he muttered when she flinched at the sight of them. “Don’t look at that.”

But she couldn’t help it. His hands were the roadmap to the anger he’d carried all day. Hands that had knocked someone out, maybe worse. Hands that had gripped her throat downstairs in front of everybody.

He pressed her back against the wall, drunk heat radiating off him, his forehead dipping to hers. His voice was rough, slurred but sharp enough to cut:

“You don’t get it. I been biting my tongue all fuckin’ day. Every look. Every joke. Every time some lame thought they could play with you like I wasn’t right there.” His teeth grit hard, jaw flexing. “And then that lap shit? Talking about eating you out? Nah.”

His palm slid back to her throat, thumb stroking her pulse. He leaned in, voice a whisper sharp enough to scrape bone. “That’s why I mark you. That’s why I bruise your waist, why I bite. ‘Cause people only stop playing when they see I don’t.”

She trembled under his touch, heart hammering. She wanted to tell him to calm down, but his body was flush against hers now, heat and tension locking her still.

That’s when she felt it.

Hard. Cold. Pressing into her hip through his jeans.

She froze. Her gaze flicked to his waistband, then back to his face. “Mars,” she whispered, chest tightening. “What is that?”

He stilled too, reading the change in her tone. His eyes closed for a long beat. Then he sighed, jaw tight.

“Fuck.”

Slowly, carefully, he stepped back just enough and reached behind him. The black steel glinted under the dim lamp as he pulled the gun from his waistband, setting it down heavy on the dresser like it was nothing but still too much.

He didn’t look at her right away. He couldn’t. His busted lip twisted as he muttered, low and ashamed:

“You weren’t supposed to feel that. I don’t... I don’t like showing you that part of me.” He dragged a hand down his face, wincing when his torn knuckles scraped his jaw. “That’s for them. Not for you.”

Her chest rose and fell, breath uneven. “You walked in here with a gun on your hip, Mars. You expect me not to notice?”

“I expect you to know I’d never point it at you.” His eyes cut to hers, fierce even through the drunken glaze. “I’d put my body in front of it before I let it touch you. That’s the difference. That’s the side I don’t want you carrying on your back.”

He shoved the drawer open with his elbow, dropped the gun inside, and slammed it shut. His shoulders heaved once, twice, like he was trying to shake the whole world off his skin. Then he turned back to her, stepping close again, bruised hands cupping her face with almost reverent care.

“You see me,” he whispered, voice cracking. “You see too much. Even the parts I hate letting out.”

His thumb swiped across her lip, his eyes locked on her like she was the only thing tethering him to the room. “And you still want me here, even with all this shit leaking out of me. Tell me I’m wrong.”

She should’ve pushed him away. Should’ve told him that he was reckless, that the gun scared her, that the blood on his hands was too much. But the truth was louder than fear. Her hands slid to his chest, palms flat over his heart.

“You scare me,” she admitted. “But not because I think you’d hurt me. Because I know I want you even with all this. And that makes me just as bad as you.”

His busted lip curved into something between a grin and a snarl, and he kissed her hard, teeth clashing, tasting like whiskey and iron. His hands shook when he touched her waist, sliding under her shirt, but he held her steady like she was the only soft thing in his world.

—-

“You know I’m too drunk right now,” he’d muttered as he left, breath fogging the cool air. “If I do what I want, I could break you in half. Can’t have that. I gotta calm down.”

She waved it off like she always did—half amused, half worried—but the sentence lodged cold and real in her chest. Mars saying anything about breaking her in half sounded like a promise and a threat all at once. She’d gone to bed with his afterimage raw in her skull, his hand still warm at her throat, the room vibrating with something that hadn’t been there before.

Three a.m., the house was quiet except for the low whoosh of the refrigerator and the occasional creak from someone stumbling down the hall to the bathroom. She couldn’t sleep. The words refused to let her. She dressed quickly—sneakers, his oversized hoodie someone left on a chair, jeans—and padded down the hall.

Her knuckles hit his door with a soft, nervous rhythm. She’d expected hesitation. Instead the door opened before she could think twice.

Mars stood framed in the doorway like an answer to a question she’d only just thought to ask: white beater clinging to a chest mottled with ink, tattoos crawling up his arms and across his collarbones; a chain catching the little overhead light; boxer shorts riding low. His busted lip was darker now, the dried blood a thin, violent line. He looked like he’d slept between fights and dreamt of her.

For a beat he just stared at her, like he was mapping every inch he’d waited all day to claim. He was half-hungover, half-still-drunk—eyes heavy, voice gravel-rough. And he looked, impossibly, unbothered.

“You okay?” he asked, voice small and half-skeptical, as if surprised she’d actually come.

She swallowed. “I couldn’t sleep.”

A slow grin—half rueful, half hungry—pulled at his mouth. He stepped back, making room for her to come in. “You best not wake the crew,” he warned. “They already think I don’t play about you.” The corner of his mouth tightened like some private joke.

She stepped inside. The room smelled like him: gasoline and sandalwood and the residue of whiskey. Without thinking she moved close enough to brush the side of his hip while she passed, and her fingers caught something hard and hot against the fabric of his boxers. A shock of awareness rolled through her—solid, undeniable.

Her breath hitched. He didn’t flinch. Instead he watched her with something like protective shame. “You felt that?” he said softly, like asking if she’d heard a sound in another room.

She met his gaze, cheeks burning. “Yeah.”

He let out a short, broken sound—part laugh, part apology. “I told you I was too drunk,” he said. “I told you if I did what I want I could break you. I meant it.” He looked down at his hands, at the scars and the swollen knuckles, then back up at her. “But I ain’t about to do anything you don’t want.”

There was a long pause where the air thrummed between them. She could see the honesty in him—the two halves colliding: the violent, protective city boy and the part that loved her so bad he couldn’t sleep.

“You won’t touch me unless I want you to?” she asked, testing him, needing him to say it out loud.

He stepped closer, the chain clinking against his chest. One ruined hand came up to tuck a stray hair behind her ear with a tenderness that didn’t match the rest of him. “I won’t,” he said, and his voice was a vow. “If you tell me to stop, I stop. Right then. I don’t want you thinking you got dragged anywhere you didn’t go.”

Then he added—half playful, half warning, the drunk truth leaking in—“But I can’t help what you do to my body. You touch me soft like that and I’m gone, babe. If you stay, get used to feeling it.” His thumb ghosted over the pulse at the base of her throat, his eyes dark and honest. “That’s not a threat. That’s an honest-ass confession.”

She wanted to argue—wanted to tell him she didn’t want to be the cause of his wreckage. Instead she let herself study him: the busted lip, the bandaged finger, the way his chest rose and fell like he’d run a race. She saw the gun of the earlier night—tucked here, put away—and the way he’d locked it up because the idea of her seeing that side of him hurt him more than the danger did.

He watched her, waiting. She let her palm rest against the battered pad of his hand, feeling the heat, the small tremor. “I’m not leaving,” she said finally. “Not tonight.”

A breath left him like relief. He leaned down and kissed her, careful at first, then with more hunger when he felt her answer. The kiss tasted like whiskey and asphalt and something softer—an obsession laid bare. When his free hand found the waistband behind her, he paused, searching her face.

“You good?” he whispered into her mouth.

She nodded. “I’m good.”

He smiled then, something easy and feral. “Alright,” he said, voice low. “Then you can stay. But just so you know—I’m loud. I’m messy when I’m like this. You’ll hear me in the living room, you’ll hear me from the bed, and the boys might be able to guess what’s going on. You okay with that?”

She laughed, the sound bright and tired. “I’m okay with it.”

He kissed her again, deeper, letting the mistakes of the night and the fight and the gun slide away for a while. In the dark, with a buzzing house and friends who now knew better than to test him, Mars wrapped his ruined hands around her like a promise.

“Then get used to feeling it,” he murmured against her lips, thumb still tracing her pulse. “Because I’m not gonna hide when it comes to you. “

After a long pause he uttered

“Before I do... what I would like to do to you, are you okay with the others knowin... cause I’m about to prove a point”