Fifty-Five
FIFTY-FIVE
Luca
AN UNACCUSTOMED FEELING buzzed beneath my skin as I mounted the stairs to Emiel’s attic bedroom. I didn’t understand what switch had been unexpectedly flipped inside my brain. But as I’d sat on the couch, pulling on my pants and shirt after discarding the used condom hanging limply off my dick, I’d realized that I wanted to be knotted by something that wasn’t made of silicone.
It didn’t make a single bit of sense. After the warehouse, after Blaze... I shouldn’t have wanted to be within a hundred yards of an alpha’s dick.
And yet, in a different way, it made perfect sense. This pack had come for me. They hadn’t left me alone in the deepest levels of my personal hell. Nat and Byron had saved me. Then Zalen had saved all three of us by finding us and calling the cops there. While all that had been going on, Emiel had kept Mia safe—when I was sure all he’d wanted to do was to wade into gang territory and start randomly bashing heads.
Now Emiel wanted us to mate each other. He wanted to make sure Mia would be safe from us , as much as from outside threats like SSG. But unlike me, he was also brave enough to move forward, even when ‘forward’ felt scary.
The thing was, I’d been noticing that it didn’t feel as scary now as it used to feel, even as recently as a week ago. Especially tonight, with champagne and dancing and sex still rushing through my veins like a cocktail of the finest drugs.
As much as I’d enjoyed it, the scene in Byron’s room hadn’t been about me. I probably could have made it about me, if I’d wanted to. I’d be lying if I said the idea of letting Nat fuck my passage hadn’t occurred to me. Nat felt safe in a way alphas didn’t—a nice, beta guy who was mostly just happy to be there.
And maybe he and I would do that, at some point. I hadn’t forgotten the feeling of Nat’s arms around me, the only thing holding me together as the world around me fell apart. His actions in the warehouse hadn’t been the actions of a thoughtless or selfish man... even if he had, objectively, done thoughtless and selfish things in the past.
But, I mean, who hadn’t done stupid stuff in their lives? Certainly not me. Since I’d gotten away from Blaze the first time, ‘selfish’ had pretty much been my middle name.
Hell, there was an element of selfishness to what I was doing right now.
“Emiel?” I called softly, stopping just below the level where I’d be able to see into his room.
The reply was immediate. “Yeah? Everything okay, Luca?”
Footsteps crossed the room, and then Emiel and Princess were peering down at me in the stairwell.
“Everything’s great,” I said, with perfect honesty. “Can I come up?”
“Course,” Emiel replied. “You can come up anytime. Don’t need an invitation.”
I resumed climbing the last few steps. “Well, the rest of us have doors. Which makes it a bit easier to let people know not to come in.”
Emiel scoffed. “In this house, we just pick the lock if there’s a door in the way.”
I winced, but it was obvious he was only teasing. And wasn’t that something? Emiel, teasing me.
“Picking locks is a terrible habit, and we should stop doing it,” I said virtuously.
He grunted. “Until the next time someone’s being a stupid dick about stuff, maybe.”
I thought about that for a couple of seconds. “Being a stupid dick about stuff is a terrible habit, and we should stop doing that, too,” I decided.
“Sounds like a solid plan,” he agreed. “Now, why are you up here? Thought you’d be in a big old cuddle pile until morning.”
I’m still horny , I thought. And you have handcuffs .
“I’m too wound up to sleep,” I said instead. “Thought I’d come up and see how you were getting on with Mia’s book.”
Not that I really had to ask. The tent in the front of his joggers was testament enough to the fact that mafia dragon-shifters were apparently doing it for him.
“The plot’s really stupid,” he said without judgment. “But I like some of the sex scenes. This one alpha guy has a forked tongue that can—” He seemed to remember who he was talking to, and cut himself off with a cough. “Anyway, the sex scenes are good.”
“That’s literally the only reason to read a book about mafia dragon-shifters,” I assured him. And then, “Can I ask you something? You can say no.”
“Ask,” he said, as Princess wound around my ankles and trotted off down the stairs on Important Cat Business.
“Do you want to have sex with me?”
I’d surprised him. His breath caught, and the scent of citrus and cinnamon coiled through the room. An answer of its own, but not the one I needed to hear.
He hesitated, wrongfooted and unsure. “Like, in general, or right now?”
“Let’s start with ‘in general,’” I suggested.
“Course I do,” he said, as though it was a foregone conclusion. “I know it’s hard for you, though. Same way it’s been hard for me.”
“And what about right now?” I asked.
He’d gone very still. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to answer that.”
I reminded myself how full of pitfalls this conversation still was for both of us.
“I promise it’s not a trick question,” I said. “You handcuffed and gagged yourself for Mia so you could be sure she was safe. I’m scared of having sex with alphas. But I wouldn’t have to be scared with you, because you’re willing to do that. Or, you were with her, at least. I don’t want to assume anything, and I was serious about you being able to say no.”
He was quiet for a long moment. I could practically see the wheels and cogs turning.
“You seemed really upset when I told you what she and I did together,” he said slowly.
“And then you told me that you didn’t have to worry about her hurting you, because she’s Mia,” I reminded him. “You were one-hundred percent right about that, by the way. But I’m a lot more messed up in the head than she is.”
Here, he seemed on firmer ground. “I’m not afraid of you, Luca.”
“Maybe you should be,” I said.
“No,” he replied. “I’m not afraid of you, because you get it. You know .”
I thought about a soft cock resting in my mouth... about no demands or expectations, and straps holding me in exactly the place I wanted to be.
“Yes,” I agreed softly. “I do.”
“The answer’s yes, by the way,” Emiel said.
“The answer?” I asked, confused.
“You asked if I wanted to have sex with you. Tonight.” He glanced away, not meeting my eyes. “I always want to have sex with both of you. All the time. But only if I know you want it, too.”
My stomach flip-flopped, alpha desires laid out before me, naked and bound into submission by alpha protectiveness.
“Can I put the handcuffs on you?” I asked, the empty core of me throbbing at the prospect of being filled.
“And the gag,” he said, like he was reminding me.
But I shook my head. “You don’t need the gag, Emiel. We’re going to mate each other anyway, aren’t we? So, what does it matter?”
His eyes widened. “We are?”
I realized that the thoughts stuck inside my skull didn’t magically transmit to his skull... and that I must still be feeling the effects of drinking more than I normally would.
“Yeah,” I told him gently. “I’m pretty sure we are. You said it yourself. We have to be certain that it’s going to be safe for the others.”
He frowned, his expression wavering between concern and something that looked a lot like awe.
“You do know you’re not just some kind of consolation prize, right?” He sounded unsure. “Even if I am.”
I gasped, playing up my outrage to cover the soft center hidden beneath. “You are no such thing , Emiel Hamilton! You shut that lying mouth right now, or I will get out the gag!”
His broad features continued to slide between different emotions before unexpectedly falling into stifled, choking laughter. Taken by surprise, I followed suit, until we were both laughing like idiots, bending over and bracing our hands on our legs to catch our breath.
“Oh, my god,” I managed after a minute or two. “I am so horny after watching Byron and Mia destroy Nat’s ass. That’s it, I’m cuffing you to the bed and having my wicked way with you.”
“Okay, yes, let’s do that,” Emiel said. He gestured vaguely at his crotch, where a monster cock was still distorting the thin fabric of his pants. “I was maybe gonna try out that sleeve thing, after reading the scene with the forked tongue and listening to you guys going at it downstairs. But this sounds much better.”
“A-fucking-men,” I agreed, and pounced on his bedside table, rummaging around for the handcuffs and key.
Mia had definitely been onto something, here. For possibly the first time in my life, I eased into the feeling of a thick alpha cock filling me up while my body stayed relaxed. Slow waves of pleasure rolled through me, without a hint of fear lurking beneath the surface.
I was in control, and it was a complete game-changer.
Emiel, who threw other alphas around a chain-link cage for fun, writhed sinuously beneath me, his head thrown back in apparent enjoyment. God, this was wild . I was wound up beyond belief after fucking Nat and not coming. My dick was still oversensitive from Nat clenching around me the first time he came, but I stroked myself anyway... just to feel the way the sensation ricocheted up and down my spine, twining together with the deeper pleasure as Emiel’s cock split me in half with every slow thrust.
“You could suck this for me some time,” I said breathlessly. “Would you like that?”
“Yeah,” Emiel said, his length twitching hard inside me. “Yeah, I want that, Luca.”
My orgasm threatened, teetering for a moment before subsiding. I stilled above him, wanting to draw things out as long as I could.
“Mia and I could tie you down and take turns riding your mouth,” I told him, the scene playing out in my mind like a porno film. “She’d half-drown you with slick, and then we’d switch and I’d shove my cock down your throat before you even had a chance to get your breath back. We’d both come all over your face, again and again—”
Emiel made a strangled noise and climaxed hard, jerking into me so violently that it lifted both of us off the bed. His knot began to swell inside me, but instead of the panic I usually felt, the sensation of being stretched and filled to bursting tipped me over the edge with him. My orgasm felt like a deluge washing away the dust and grime of a years-long drought.
“Oh, god ,” I moaned, falling forward in a limp mess to lie draped across Emiel’s shuddering chest. “Oh, fuck .”
Emiel, too, had been reduced to a puddle of jelly beneath me. Gradually, his full-body shaking subsided, and he took a deep, cleansing breath. “Luca... can you... would you undo my arms?”
A tiny jolt of adrenaline fluttered through my veins, but it was immediately swamped by my flood of post-orgasmic hormones. We were already tied together, Emiel’s knot lodged in my clutching passage for the duration. If that didn’t make me feel trapped, then having his arms free wouldn’t either.
“Mm-huh,” I slurred, rousing myself enough to retrieve the key from under the pillow where I’d stashed it. A few moments later, the cuffs clicked open. I tossed them aside and returned to my impression of a beached jellyfish.
Big arms came around me... careful, careful , like they were holding glass. An uneven purr vibrated to life beneath my ear, sounding like the rumble of an out-of-tune engine.
Things inside my head were becoming pleasantly soft-edged and swimmy. I felt a moment of aching sadness at the realization that I could have had this pretty much any time I wanted for several years now. Instead, I’d shunned it. But that wasn’t completely true. I’d needed to go through those times first, before I could get here.
“You should bite me now,” I said absently, rubbing my cheek over Emiel’s throat and collarbone. “Right now, while we’re like this.”
The rumbling purr beneath me intensified, and the fat knot inside me gave a single, jarring pulse. But then, the arms holding me tightened.
“Not tonight,” Emiel said. “Soon, though.”
“Why not?” I asked, hearing the petulant whine in my voice, but unable to stop it.
“You drank last night.” Emiel’s voice was low and serious. “I didn’t see how much. So... not tonight, but soon.”
I smiled against the sweaty skin of Emiel’s neck. “Says the man who thinks he needs a gag to stop himself biting people.”
Emiel went still for the space of two heartbeats, then he let out a little huff of laughter. “Yeah, okay. But... I do actually kind of like the gag. The way it feels, I mean.”
Maybe it was just the hormones, but fresh fondness bloomed in my chest like flowers in the sun.
“Then we’ll use the gag sometimes,” I promised him. “But only because you want it. Not because you need it.”
“Guess that’d be all right,” Emiel allowed, and went back to purring me to sleep.