Chapter 20
twenty
Vincenzo
Iwake up to teeth.
Not enough to hurt, just the slow press of teeth at the back of my neck, followed by the warm drag of a mouth that has apparently decided sleep was a temporary inconvenience, and I’m far more interesting awake.
My eyes remain closed for one blissful second longer while I let the sensation settle into me.
Nikolaj is behind me, all heat and weight and impossible solidness, one heavy arm banded around my waist, his chest pressed to my back, his breath warm where his mouth moves over the marks he left there hours ago.
Another kiss lands low on my neck, then another just under my ear, slower this time, as if he’s cataloging what’s his with his mouth.
I let out a breath that turns into a faint laugh, and his arm tightens instantly, pulling me back harder against him as if the sound alone confirms I’m awake and therefore available for whatever brand of worship or violence he’s chosen to begin the day with.
“Good morning to you, too,” I murmur, voice wrecked from sleep and everything we did before it.
He hums against my skin, the vibration sinking all the way down my spine. “Thought I’d start with a reminder.”
“A reminder of what?”
“That you’re real,” he says, and then bites lightly at the slope of my shoulder.
I turn my head enough to catch a glimpse of him over my shoulder.
He looks half-feral and half-sleepy, which is a combination no man should be allowed to pull off, least of all him.
His hair is a mess, platinum gone darker than it used to be, less gold now and more ash, still falling in disordered strands over his forehead.
His eyes are barely open, but I can already see the blue of them through the dim, cold, and bright all at once. He looks like someone carved a war god into a beautiful man and then forgot to teach him moderation.
“You’ve spent the whole night proving I’m real,” I say.
“Not enough.”
Then he kisses my neck again, like that’s the end of the discussion.
I laugh properly this time, which earns me another hard pull against him. His hand slides over my stomach, broad and possessive and shameless, splaying there as if he means to keep me in bed with sheer body weight.
The worst part is that it’s working.
I’m so disgustingly happy in this exact moment that it feels unreal. That’s the truth of it. Not content. Not merely relieved. Happy. The kind of bright, stupid happiness that makes a man suspicious of the universe, because no one like me gets this without the bill arriving later.
I know what waits outside this room. I know what I am when I put my clothes back on: king, husband on paper, son, strategist, problem solver, and professional liar when necessary.
I know what he becomes the second he steps back into his own life: Pakhan, Blade, monster, and myth. We both know this little sliver of peace exists on borrowed time.
And still, I have him wrapped around me, breathing into my skin like he can’t get enough of me, and for one ridiculous, precious stretch of morning, I’m allowed to be happier than I’ve been in eight years.
Nikolaj’s hand slides a little higher, just enough to be a threat and a promise at once. “Where are you going?”
“Nowhere,” I say. “At least not yet.”
“Good.”
I should leave it there. Instead, I make the mistake of wriggling forward half an inch, mostly because I need to get up before I die of either dehydration or starvation and partly because I want to see what he does.
What he does is growl low in his throat and drag me right back.
“Nikolaj,” I protest, laughing again because there’s no heat behind it. “I need the bathroom.”
“No.”
I huff out a laugh. “No?”
“No.”
I turn a little more in his hold, enough to see his face properly now.
He’s got his eyes fully open, and he looks entirely too pleased with himself.
One corner of his mouth is threatening a smile, but he’s trying to keep it under control.
It doesn’t work. On him, smugness always looked better than it should.
“I’m serious,” I tell him.
“So am I,” he says and hooks his leg over mine, trapping me more thoroughly.
When I try to shift again, he only drags me closer until there’s not an inch of air left between us.
The man is naked, enormous, and apparently insatiable.
I knew all those things already. They still delight me more than they should.
“You are impossible.”
“Mhm.”
“I also need food.”
That gets a brief pause. His hand presses flat over my stomach, as if verifying the claim himself. Right on cue, my stomach growls, and he actually laughs—a real laugh, rough and too pleased. It goes straight through me.
“That is humiliating,” I mutter.
“No,” he says, mouth brushing the side of my neck again. “That’s adorable.”
I scoff, scandalized. “Take that back.”
“Never.”
I elbow him lightly in the ribs, which has no real effect beyond making him laugh harder and kiss the side of my throat in what feels suspiciously like a reward for the attempt.
It’s absurd. Entirely absurd. We are two men who have built empires out of blood and broken promises, and here I am in a ruined bed arguing with Nikolaj Dragovich because he called my stomach noises adorable.
God help me, I love him.
He must feel the shift in me, the way my body goes warm and helpless with it, because his laughter fades into something gentler. His nose brushes my temple, and his arm tightens once more.
“Stay,” he says.
The word is simple, almost childish. Not a command, but a request disguised in his usual roughness.
My heart does something embarrassing. “I can’t stay in bed forever.”
“Why not?”
“Because eventually, I’ll either die or bite you.”
“Both have appeal.”
I smile despite myself. “You’ve gotten needy.”
His silence this time is brief but telling. When he answers, his voice is lower. “I’m making up for lost time.”
There it is—the truth of him. He says it into my skin like he doesn’t want to look at me while he admits it, and that honesty makes my chest ache so hard I have to close my eyes for a second.
I twist carefully in his hold until I can get one arm up between us and turn enough to face him more fully. He loosens his grip only because he has to if he wants me to look at him. Even then, one hand stays firm against my waist like he doesn’t trust the movement.
I touch his face, and he stills instantly. “You don’t have to make up for anything right this second,” I say softly.
His eyes search mine with that same battered intensity they had last night, like he still can’t quite believe I’m here and answering him kindly. “I know.”
“Do you?”
“No,” he admits.
I smile and brush my thumb over the line of his mouth. “I’m not evaporating the second I stand up.”
“You don’t know that.”
“You’re being dramatic.”
“You taught me.”
That gets a laugh out of me again. “I definitely did not.”
His mouth curves. “You absolutely did.”
Then, because apparently even this small amount of softness has a time limit before he starts acting on every instinct he’s got, he turns his head and kisses the center of my palm before pulling me back against him one last time and burying his face at my throat like he needs one more minute of contact before he can let me go.
I let him have it, then I pull back to look at him pointedly. “Bathroom.”
He makes a face like this is a personal attack. “Five minutes.”
“No.”
“Three.”
“Nikolaj.”
He huffs, offended by the use of his full name in that tone, and finally loosens his arms. “Fine.”
“Thank you.”
“I’m not happy about it.”
“I know.”
I kiss him quickly, while he’s still pouting about releasing me, and his hand immediately jumps back to my hip like he wants to change his mind. I laugh against his mouth and escape before he can.
The bathroom is flooded with soft morning light from the frosted windows, all white stone and chrome and obscene hotel wealth. I close the door behind me, lean against it for a second, and just breathe.
The mirror is an unkind friend.
It gives me everything at once, the second I step beneath the light. My hair is wrecked, my mouth swollen, and my throat and chest are marked in ways no concealer on earth could hide if I needed to leave in the same clothes as last night.
There are bruises, fingerprint-dark at my hips, along with bite marks across my shoulder, the side of my throat, the inside of one thigh, and lower, there’s the sort of evidence that would make a lesser man blush.
I just smile because that’s what they are: evidence. Not of carelessness, but of claim. A king laid hands on me last night and made it very clear to my body who I belong to.
I should probably be horrified at how obvious it all is. Instead, I look at myself and feel something close to pride.
I spent eight years loving a ghost and woke up this morning with the real man’s mouth all over my skin. If I have to spend the rest of today finding strategic collars and pretending I don’t know why every step feels a little different, so be it.
I touch one of the bruises on my throat and smile.
“You smug bastard,” I murmur to the empty room, meaning him and meaning myself.
The rest takes longer than it should because I keep catching sight of another mark and remembering exactly how it got there.
By the time I finish and splash cool water over my face, I’ve got my expression mostly under control, though there is only so much a man can do when he looks this thoroughly claimed.
I open the bathroom door, grab my boxers from the floor, and call out, “Nikolaj?”
“In the kitchen,” he calls back immediately.
His low voice carries through the suite with ease, and there’s something so domestic about it that I have to stop for half a second in the corridor just to absorb the absurdity. Then I follow it.