Dominic
A waltz, each slow and stately step toward the inevitable conclusion as Onyx twisted and turned within his grasp, never able to break free.
Knowing he would never be able to break free.
He was almost startled when the car came to a stop, realizing that he’d been further adrift in his thoughts than he should have been. “Good,” he said calmly, though he didn’t manage to hide the wince or the hiss of pain as he opened the vehicle door to leave the car.
Blood stained the seat where he had been sitting. He needed vampire blood, immediately.
“Come,” Dominic ordered Onyx, waiting for Shane to shadow the Rayne witch into the house.
Onyx climbed out of the car, scanning his surroundings. He shrugged unashamedly when he was caught looking around in such a measured way, but he allowed himself to be ushered inside and to Dominic’s bedroom.
Dominic went straight to his desk, unlocking and opening the drawer that contained the stashes of vampire blood and the aphrodisiac.
He picked up one of the vials of vampire blood and drank it quickly.
He closed his eyes and sighed in relief as the pain immediately eased when the wound began to seal itself together and the vibrancy of the world leaped into stark detail.
He held out a second vial to Onyx. After experiencing the effects of being re-collared while conscious, the Rayne witch would need the boost to his senses to combat the effects of the collar, and Dominic fully intended to take advantage of the effects of the arousal that also came along with the dose.
Arousal that he was already feeling burning through his veins.
“I need a shower,” Onyx announced without taking the vial.
Yes, Onyx needed to get clean. They both needed to get clean.
“Drink.”
Onyx eyed the vial. “I’m not hurt,” he pointed out, but he finally reached out to take it anyway. He downed it, handed the empty vial back, then headed in the direction of the bathroom, already starting to shed his clothes before he even reached the door.
Dominic put the empty vials back into the desk drawer, hand lingering over the vials of aphrodisiac.
He’d said that he wouldn’t dose the boy unaware, and he hadn’t.
But making Onyx drink a dose while aware he was doing so wasn’t a violation of his word.
It would, in many ways, make things easier for both of them if Onyx was responding to the aphrodisiac, and not just relying on Dominic’s skill.
He took the vial out of the drawer before locking it, setting the potent drug on the nightstand.
Shedding his clothing quickly, Dominic entered the bathroom to join Onyx in the shower, each step a predatory prowl.
He stepped into the shower, ignoring the hot spray of the water to instead crowd Onyx back against the tile until he could cage the Rayne witch between his arms. “Onyx,” he murmured possessively. “My Onyx Rayne.”
He dipped his head to press his face into the curve of Onyx’s neck, teeth skating over the skin where his throat met his jaw.
“Mine.”
Onyx was still as Dominic’s teeth grazed his skin, and he didn’t argue.
One of Dominic’s hands left the wall to curl possessively around the back of Onyx’s neck as he pulled away just far enough to look Onyx in the eyes.
“I almost lost you today,” he said, cataloging every fleck of color, every striation in the Rayne witch’s eyes. Recording them. Memorizing them. “My beautiful, wild tiger. Slaughtering your enemies and then returning to me.”
The words were reverent, dripping with desire.
“You didn’t almost lose anything,” Onyx muttered. “Ambrose wasn’t a threat. And don’t get it twisted. I only returned because I didn’t have a choice.”
Dominic snarled softly at the name. “Ambrose—” he dragged the name out “—was a fool.” He leaned in again, his teeth scraping lightly over Onyx’s jaw.
“Ambrose would have chained you up, and then skinned you, piece by long piece. Over… and over. While you screamed and begged. And then healed you to do it again.” The words were soft, almost loving, despite the horrific picture he painted.
He placed a gentle kiss where Onyx’s jaw met his throat.
“Why?” Onyx shifted in Dominic’s embrace. “What would’ve been the point of taking me to do that? To get to you? How would he even know that might bother you?”
“Why?” Dominic echoed, the words silky. “Because you’re mine. He would’ve taken you—” every few words were punctuated by another gentle kiss along the throat that Dominic exposed further by tipping Onyx’s head back with a handful of hair “—and defiled you. Because you belong to me.”
His hand left Onyx’s hair to start traveling down his body in a slow, lazy path to his hip, fingertips tracing the lines of Onyx’s muscles.
“Because you are mine.”
He’d been half-hard just from the vampire blood that was still raging in his veins, and his proximity to Onyx and the close intimacy of his touches was making him harder.
“It didn’t happen, and I’m here,” Onyx said, squirming beneath the touch.
“Yes,” Dominic agreed in the same silken tones. “You are. And tomorrow we can go back to the dance and the games, but right now, I am going to have all of you.”
His thumb traced slow circles on Onyx’s hip.
Onyx’s breath caught. “No,” he said flatly. “Don’t make me wish I’d killed you, Dominic.”
Dominic’s hand closed around Onyx’s cock and started to gently stroke him, making his breath catch in a hiss, and he watched as Onyx bit his lip to keep from making a sound.
“You cannot say that you don’t know exactly where all of this is leading, Onyx Rayne,” he murmured.
“You cannot claim that you are not aware that I will be inside of you again, soon. You want the things that I promised you; you have been talking yourself towards them more every day.”
He pulled back just enough to look at Onyx’s face again, gaze dropping immediately to Onyx’s lips.
“You cannot say that you don’t know that this is inevitable.”
“Inevitable doesn’t mean now,” Onyx replied, shaking his head. “You might think I’m yours, but you gave your word that you would wait until I was ready. I’m not ready.”
Dominic scoffed softly. “You are ready,” he disagreed. “You have been ready for some time. You know the pleasure that I can bring you.” He continued to slowly stroke Onyx’s cock. “That I have brought you in each step of the journey. I haven’t lied to you. You know that.”
“I’m not,” Onyx insisted, his voice unsteady. “And I don’t want it. I don’t want you inside of me.”
Dominic’s lips brushed lightly over Onyx’s. “If you wish to lose yourself in the pleasure, you can have a dose of aphrodisiac. It will help override the last of the fear.”
“No,” Onyx replied sharply. “I’m not afraid.”
“You are,” Dominic whispered against Onyx’s lips. “You’re afraid of many things. And with the drugs, you’ll have something else to blame when the pleasure overtakes you. Something else, so that it isn’t you responding to my touch, is it? It’s just the aphrodisiac.”
“I said no.” Onyx's breathing came more quickly. “I don’t want it. I don’t want you.” He tried to pull away, but his back was already against the wall.
“That’s not entirely true, is it?” Dominic's strokes on Onyx’s cock sped up more.
“You do want the pleasure; you just don’t want to want it.
You wonder, sometimes, when each time I touch you and you come harder than before, how much of the pleasure that you remember was real.
The times when you came so hard it felt like you were shattering. Wrapped up in the bliss of the potion.”
“You aren’t… You aren’t going to let me say no,” Onyx whispered, and there was a touch of betrayal in his voice.
“Tomorrow,” Dominic murmured against his lips with the faintest note of regret in the words, “you can say no again. Today, you almost slipped from my grasp. Today, the thread of fate trembled, and I felt the breath of Atropos on the back of my neck as you considered whether or not you would become my Sword of Damocles after all. Today, I need to reclaim you.”
“I should’ve killed you,” Onyx said almost inaudibly.
“Next time,” Dominic said just as softly, “you will.”