Chapter 13 Ilya
THIRTEEN
ILYA
I’m still on edge, and I hate it.
I hate that part of me wants to lash out.
I hate that I can see myself falling into my father’s patterns.
Hurt Micah, and my anger will go away.
Except the idea of hurting Micah is unthinkable. I can’t, I won’t do that to him.
If Micah cried, I wouldn’t feel good. I’d only hate myself more.
It wasn’t even supposed to be a day where I wore gloves. It was routine. But Boris had said there were cops sniffing around the gambling hall, so I’d gone to the building next door to take care of things.
No cops, but a man with a fake badge who’d insisted on speaking to me.
He said he knew things about me.
He said if I didn’t want everyone to know I was gay, I would pay up.
There’d been only one solution.
Beating him bloody convinced him that trying to blackmail me was a bad idea. I doubt I’ll see him again, but I’m much more concerned about something else.
How the fuck did he know about me? I haven’t done anything indiscreet—
Except I kissed Micah at the bar the night we met.
I had parfaits with him out in the open.
I’d gone to Club Alpha with Silvano Cresci and Kyran Winters.
I picked Micah up from the restaurant.
Shit. Anyone could know.
“Ilya?” Micah asks, drawing my attention back to him. He’s still tense, but he isn’t backing away from me.
“I’m sorry,” I repeat for who knows how many times tonight. “I’ll take the guest room tonight.”
“What?” Confusion flickers across Micah’s expression. “Why would you do that?” He sets the cello case aside and approaches me, as cautiously as he might a feral dog. “I don’t want you to sleep in a different room. I mean, unless you want to?”
“I am, am…” I curse, the English word slipping from my mind. Wound up, I want to say, but I can’t think of the English equivalent so I settle on, “still angry.”
“That’s okay,” he replies, stopping in front of me. He’s within reach, but he doesn’t completely close the distance between us. “What can I do to help you relax?”
“I don’t know,” I answer truthfully. “I won’t hit you. Not now. It’s not safe.” I glance down at my hands. “I am out of control.”
Now Micah does step closer, and he puts his hands into mine. “You are in control,” he whispers. “I’ll prove it to you.”
“How?” I ask. “If I do it wrong, if I hurt you—”
“Tie me up,” Micah says. “Blindfold me. You can do whatever you want to me.”
I inhale sharply. “Mishka… I don’t know all the rules, but that’s dangerous. Don’t offer such things to strangers.”
“You aren’t a stranger,” he says, his eyes locking onto my own with strange determination. “I know you won’t hurt me. You’ve had so many chances, and you never have. You’ve always been so careful with me.” He squeezes my hands. “I trust you.”
Trust.
How easily he throws that word out. He knows who I am, what I am, and he still desires me.
And god help me, but I want him too.
I want to prove to him that he can trust me, that I’m nothing like my father.
I nod.
“All right,” I say. “But if I do something wrong, you’ll tell me immediately.”
There’s something strange in his expression, but he promises, “I will.”
Micah leads me to the bedroom, holding my hand. It’s so small compared to mine, but it isn’t delicate. I can feel the calluses, the ones he earned by practicing the cello.
I want to know more about him. I want to lay him bare for me.
I want something good.
“Do you want me to undress?” he prompts. “To kneel for you? Or do you want me on the bed?”
I think about what I’d seen at the club, and some of the sites Silvano had sent to me.
“Undress,” I order. “And lay down on your back on the bed.”
He nods, his expression one of intense concentration as he quickly undresses and neatly folds his clothes before setting them aside. He climbs onto the bed, lying down on his back, then looks at me without raising his head.
He obeys so easily, without hesitation.
I let out a long breath, and some of my tension eases.
Seeing him like this erases the worst of the day. I am not simply Vladislav Zima’s son.
“I’m getting rope,” I say. “Stay there.”
I wait for Micah to nod before I go to the walk-in closet and find the soft bondage rope I’d bought at Club Alpha. Silvano had approved of it, saying it was a good choice for a beginner.
I want to laugh at that idea. I have tied up enough men that I don’t really count as a beginner.
This will be the first time I’m not going to hurt somebody with the rope, though.
I take my sweater, shirt, and socks off while I’m here, then head back out to Micah.
His eyes are on me immediately.
I hold up the rope. “I will tie you to bed. To the bed.”
Micah nods again, and he scoots up so he’s closer to the bedposts. “Here?” he asks.
“Yes.” I get closer and take hold of one wrist. I press a kiss to it first, feeling Micah shiver, before I begin wrapping the rope around it.
I make sure to tie a knot on the loop so it can’t tighten if Micah begins to struggle.
That’s not something I usually worry about when I’m dealing with tied up men.
Micah isn’t other men, though. He’s soft and kind… and he trusts me.
I won’t do anything to make him regret that.
He rests back, his body relaxed, and he offers me a small smile when I catch his gaze. “It’s all good,” he reassures me.
I wind the rope around the bedpost a few times, then thread it over to Micah’s other hand. I kiss this wrist too, and take just as much care as I bind him.
This isn’t the elaborate rope play I’ve seen in internet porn, or even on display at Club Alpha. But it’s Micah, and he looks beautiful like this.
His breathing is quick, but there’s no fear or panic in his expression. His cock is half-erect already, and I have the urge to take it into my hand.
Or my mouth.
I lean down to kiss him. I keep my eyes open, and this close, I can see every lash, every little fleck of gold in his deep green eyes.
“You truly are not afraid,” I murmur.
Micah shakes his head. “Not at all,” he says without hesitation.
I kiss him again, then reach over to my nightstand to take my sleeping mask. Micah looks at me curiously, and I smile at him. “A blindfold. But you can easily remove it if you shake your head.”
“Okay.” He lifts his head so I can put the mask on him, then rests his head back against the pillows again.
What a sight.
I kiss his jaw and begin nosing my way down his body. I’m going to take my time with him. I’m going to make him feel good. I’m going to give him pleasure, not pain, and my hands will for one night be free of my family legacy.
He lets out a soft sigh, tilting his head back, as I kiss along his skin. For the most part, it’s flawless, but there’s the occasional scar marring it. Cigarette burns, mostly, and my blood boils at the idea that someone might’ve harmed him that way.
It says something that I recognize the mark, too.
I find a more benign mark, a simple mole on the side of his hip, and I lick it. Micah moans and lifts his hips.
His cock is erect now, jutting up and begging for attention.
I move so I’m directly in front of it. I settle my arm over his thighs so he can’t move anymore, then I blow against the tip of his cock. Micah lets out a soft gasp.
I smile, then drag my finger down the underside of his erection. “Is there something you want I should do?”
“Anything you want,” Micah says immediately, squirming beneath the light touch. “As long as you’re touching me.”
“Anything is dangerous,” I say, moving on to tap the tip of his cock. “Maybe I’ll only lightly tap for the next hour.”
He whines, lifting his hips as though that will give him some sort of friction. “But that’s not what you want, is it?” he asks.
No, it really isn’t.
But I can tease him a bit longer. I bend down and kiss his thigh, so close that his cock brushes against my cheek.
When was the last time I’d sucked a man off?
Almost never. I found men who spread their legs for me, or we gave each other hand jobs. There were no lazy blowjobs, there was no teasing.
Hard, rough sex, because I was a hard, rough man doing things in secret.
Micah doesn’t see me as only a hard, rough man, though.
I don’t want him to.
I want him to see a different side of me than anyone ever has.
He moans as I tease him, his body trembling as I kiss every inch of bare skin on his thigh. “Please,” he whispers.
“Please?” I repeat, this time dragging two fingers along his shaft. “What do you want?”
With a soft, awkward laugh, he replies, “I guess I’m not very patient, am I?”
“I would be less patient,” I say, smiling. I continue to tease his cock with light touches. “But I can’t read minds, Mishka. What do you want I should do?”
“Touch me more,” he pleads. “With your hands, with your mouth, I don’t care. I just need more.”
With my mouth.
I take that as an indication, and I wrap my lips around the head of his cock.
It’s a good thing I’m holding Micah’s thighs down, because his hips snap up, and he lets out a loud cry. If I didn’t know better, I would say he was already on the verge of coming.
Surely that can’t be, after only a bit of teasing.
But I back off anyway, just in case, and he whines again. “Ilya…”
Hearing my name on his lips makes me want to give him everything.
I take more of him into my mouth, licking and sucking. I drink in his sounds, his little cries and gasps and pants. His thighs strain underneath my arm.
I get the entirety of his cock into my mouth and hold him there. I lick every vein and bump, taking in the feel and taste of him. I want to be able to recognize him by taste alone.
“Ilya, Ilya,” Micah murmurs. “Please, I…”
Something salty bursts across my tongue, and I reluctantly pull back, releasing his cock. Micah lets out a long, disappointed whine.
“Is there a problem?” I ask smugly.
He whimpers. “N-no.” He pauses, then adds, “But you’re a tease.” I see it when he braces himself, when his body draws tight, like he expects me to react negatively. “Sorry. I didn’t mean anything by that.”