Chapter 36 Vaughn
VAUGHN
“Uncle Maks! Be careful. He’s injured.”
My shout carries from where I’m sitting with Uncle Anton on the slope, dressed in outdoorsy gear.
I should’ve insisted on keeping Yulian indoors, but he was getting annoyed with simple walks around the estate. We’re over ten days out from when we came here, so Uncle Maks suggested fishing.
Nothing strenuous, right?
Wrong, as they’re wading now.
The lake looks like it’s been painted into the land, glass smooth except for the lazy shimmer of sunlight across its surface. Birch trees guard the far bank, their pale trunks catching the golden rays, and the snowcaps in the distance look close enough to touch.
Under different circumstances, I’d be admiring the view, but I’m more preoccupied with watching Yulian, who’s knee-deep in freezing water like a goddamn idiot.
His jeans are rolled haphazardly, the cuffs already soaked. Uncle Maks towers beside him, looking ready to wrestle a bear for breakfast, and hands Yulian a fishing rod like it’s a medal of honor.
“Uncle Maks!” I call again when he doesn’t reply.
He doesn’t even turn his head when he says, “He’s breathing. He can walk. That’s all the equipment he needs. Stop fussing, boy.”
“I’m not fussing. His ribs are broken and bruised.”
“It’s water and a stick. He’ll live.” He finally glances back, a slow grin pulling at his mouth. “Tell him to stop nagging, Antosha.”
“He’s right, though,” Uncle says. “It’s cold.”
“Thank you!” I say to Uncle Anton, who’s sitting beside me.
“Why do I even try?” Uncle Maks shakes his head. “The boy definitely takes after you with the nagging.”
“It’s after Kirill.”
“Nah, he’s not a nagger-in-chief like you…” Uncle Maks trails off when Uncle Anton gives him a look. “Still love that about you. Don’t be jealous of your own brother-in-law.”
My focus shifts back to Yulian, who winks at me and then goes back to focusing on his task. His hair’s catching the sunlight in sharp streaks, and the way he’s holding that rod makes it clear he has no idea what he’s doing.
But he follows Uncle Maks’s instructions with complete concentration. Every time he moves, I’m on the edge of my seat, contemplating how to get him to safety.
Yes, sure, I’ve been overly careful with him over the past ten days, but that’s because he needs to heal properly.
The idiot even tried to have sex on the third day, then grumbled when I told him it’d be impossible.
So now I don’t even kiss him that long in order to avoid awakening his monstrous libido.
That doesn’t seem to be working, though, because just sleeping in the same bed is enough to get him excited. Hell, sometimes I catch him getting hard just watching me do the most mundane shit.
It’s honestly a struggle because I’m barely keeping myself in check in the first place. Helping him shower, seeing him in his gorgeous naked glory without touching him the way I want to is sweet torture.
He felt my hardening cock against his ass the other day and said I was being cruel by not allowing sex.
But really, I’m apprehensive about hurting him in any way. Yesterday, the doctor came for a checkup and said he’s healing well, but he still needs rest.
As he was leaving, Yulian said, “I have a very important question, and you better think carefully before you reply.”
The doctor, a man in his sixties with a shock of white hair and a groomed beard, wore a serious expression. “I’ll reply to the best of my knowledge.”
“When can I have sex? And remember, think carefully.”
“Yulian,” I hissed under my breath.
The doctor didn’t seem fazed, probably used to these types of questions from Uncle Maks. “A week or two.”
“I said to think carefully, Doc.” Yulian stood up and even flexed. “Look, I’m feeling really good. You said I’m recovering well and that I’m young and killing it. Come on, give me a better number.”
The doctor remained silent.
Yulian pointed a thumb at me as he whispered, “We’ll both die of blue balls if you don’t give that guy the green light.”
“I heard that,” I said. “And stop pressuring him.”
“If you’re careful and not putting strain on your ribs, you can have slow sex, and I mean really slow,” the doctor said. “Nothing that makes you twist, lift, or breathe too hard. And if it hurts, you immediately stop.”
Needless to say, Yulian tried to fuck me as soon as the doctor left, which I didn’t allow, of course.
And now, he’s doing this in the lake, completely blasé about his health.
“He’ll be fine,” Uncle Anton says from beside me. “He looks happy. Let him be.”
“I’m just worried,” I whisper.
“I understand, but a guy like Yulian doesn’t seem to like being tied down. He’s a restless energy ball, and the best way to keep him happy is letting him have his way once in a while.”
I drag my gaze to Uncle. “Is that what you do with Uncle Maks?”
“Mm. I suppose.” Uncle Anton smiles warmly as Uncle Maks waves at us. “He looks his best when he’s out there, being active and wild.”
“Don’t you worry?”
“Of course I do, but I also know for a fact that he can protect himself and that I can protect him. Besides, no matter where he goes, he’ll always come back home to me.”
“I’m just…” I let my gaze flit to Yulian, who’s grinning as he pulls on the rod.
“I’m not sure I can protect him from his dad.
Alina is safe with Cyrus, and he’s safe with me, but I feel that as long as Yaroslav is alive, Yulian is in danger.
I know you and Uncle Maks are extremely private, but did you ever worry about danger from society or the upper echelons? ”
He shakes his head. “I am the upper echelon. When you have enough power, no one dares to touch you.”
That’s similar to something Mom and Dad say. With enough power, we become invincible.
“Look, Mishka!” Yulian holds up a big fish.
“Beginner’s luck,” Uncle Maks grumbles.
And I just stand up and make my way to them, because I have an idea.
An entirely reckless one that makes complete sense, and I want to hug him, touch him, because this may be the moment our new lives start.
“That was the best ever,” Yulian says after we step out of the shower with towels wrapped around our waists. “I always wanted to go fishing again. Reminds me of the times we used to go to Dedushka’s estate when I was young.”
“You said your mom took you and Alina there during summers?”
“Yeah, they were my happiest memories ever, probably because Dad wasn’t there. Dedushka taught me how to do all sorts of things—horseback riding, fishing, shooting, hunting. You know, things Dad had no interest in teaching me because he doesn’t like spending time with me.”
“Your father is an asshole.”
“I know, right?” He grins, but I still feel like a dick for nagging while he was probably taking the experience with Uncle Maks as a trip down memory lane.
He sits on the edge of the bed, and I help him with replacing some bandages; thankfully, he’s healing properly. But it still stings to see all the slashes, the new scars covering old ones.
I sit behind him on the mattress, my legs on either side of him as I do his back. My fingers trace the glorious tattoos interrupted by the slashes.
“It’s the mountain and the cave,” he whispers as my fingers pause on the top of the mountain, trembling slightly against his skin.
“What?”
“The wolf’s me,” he says, his fingers brushing the ink on his shoulder. “Half charging, always ready to strike but never free. The barbed wire is Dad’s cage. His way of trying to hold me down. It doesn’t work.”
My hand slides to the other shoulder, stopping over the raven’s wing. “And this?”
“That one is the part of me that still thinks it can escape. The feathers are broken because…well, you’ve seen what happens when I try to escape.”
“I’m sorry.” I drop a kiss to the raven and the wolf, and he shudders.
He shifts, then clears his throat. “The mountain is ours. You must’ve guessed that.”
“I wouldn’t have dared hope.” I trace my finger over the thin thread of red that bleeds from the base of the mountain. “Is this blood?”
“No. That’s the day I saw you kiss Danika, after hoping you didn’t abandon me. I thought I’d lost you to her.” His mouth quirks, but it’s not from amusement. “Turns out, I didn’t.”
“You never did.” I take his hand and slip it beneath the towel to my inner thigh, then press it against where my lone tattoo is. “These are coordinates.”
“Coordinates?”
“Yes, to the cave we spent the night in.” I swallow. “I had this done because I couldn’t allow that time to just disappear. I wanted to remember it.”
“You wanted to remember me?”
“Mm.”
“That makes me happy.”
“Yuli?”
“Hmm?”
I trace the line of red in his tattoos as he strokes my thigh. “You can think about this red thread differently.”
“Differently?”
“Yeah. You know, in some Asian cultures, they say fated lovers are bound by an invisible red thread tied around their pinkie fingers. So this”—I kiss the tattoo—“could be our thread of fate. Because you were right all that time ago when you said we were meant to be together.”
“I love that. And wow. You’re actually saying I’m right for once?”
I chuckle. “Don’t get used to it.”
“I think I will.”
He strokes my thigh, and tingles erupt down my spine.
I don’t say this out loud to not encourage his libido, but not having sex with him has been torture.
I don’t know how I survived before him. I’ve honestly never been such a sexual being, but then this guy came along and now I can’t seem to have enough.
“Can I ask you something?” I say, to distract myself.
“Anything.”
“Back in the mountains, why did you take a bullet for me?”
He chuckles. “I wanted to impress you.”
“Be serious.”
“I am serious. It’s not that I wanted to die or something, but I really didn’t want you to get hurt.”
Fuck. My heart kind of thuds so loudly, it’s beating in my throat.
“Thank you,” I whisper in a choked voice. “I don’t think I ever thanked you properly for what you’ve done.”
“You have by saving my life in that cave.”
“It was the least I could do. I owe you my life.”