Chapter 49
Rowan’s mouth moved slowly against Yves’s, savoring the taste of him, coppery blood mingling with seawater on their tongues. His fingers dug into the front of Yves’s soaked clothes. Yves’s arms tightened at his waist.
Yves’s shadowy tentacles writhed around them, cutting them off from the outside world. In the back of Rowan’s mind, he knew this was bad. Very bad. But he couldn’t bring himself to care. They were both alive. Yves’s arms were around him. Yves was kissing him.
Rowan’s body began to shiver, the reality of witnessing Yves die and resurrect right in front of him chasing the adrenaline away.
He’d seen the bullet enter Yves’s forehead, his head snapping back with the force of it.
At the time, Rowan hadn’t been frightened.
Deep down, he held the utter belief that Yves would never leave him behind.
“Yves,” Rowan murmured into the kiss.
Yves’s body trembled now, echoing Rowan’s own shiver.
He pulled back slightly, hands coming up to thread through the messy strands of Rowan’s hair.
Rowan met his gaze, the flat darkness of the demon side blacking everything out.
There was nothing of Yves’s humanity in them; the demon held him together.
Yves said nothing, but rested his forehead against Rowan’s, the bullet wound pressed to his skin, blood dripping slow and warm down Rowan’s face.
A shudder wracked Yves’s body.
Rowan pulled back, and without the connection of their bodies, Yves’s legs seemed to give out. He crumpled to his knees.
“Yves!” Rowan grabbed him, but he was already stumbling back to his feet. Fumbling. Unsteady. The shadows at his back were fading, the void receding from his eyes.
“Captain.” John appeared at Rowan’s side.
He drew Rowan close, one hand clutching his arm.
“Everyone saw,” he said, low and stern. Rowan wasn’t sure if the demon shadows were visible to everyone now or just him.
But it didn’t matter. Everyone had seen Yves get shot in the head and not die.
Their secret was revealed for all to see.
Yves stumbled again, and both Rowan and John moved to catch him. Yves draped an arm lazily across Rowan’s shoulders, chains rattling, head lolling like a drunk.
The deck of the Kraken remained utterly silent, but for the quiet sobs of relief from Zanta, clutching Nia’s shivering wet form in her arms. Robin and Henri knelt beside them, but the rest of the crew stood dumbstruck, staring at their captains.
They hadn’t known. Rowan hadn’t even told those closest to him. Now the truth was out.
Yves moaned, low and pained.
“Take him to rest,” John said quietly. “I’ll handle things up here.”
Rowan nodded. The crew shifted back as the two captains descended the stairs. Even Logan’s eyes were wide with fear and distrust.
Rowan’s heart clenched painfully, but he couldn’t worry about that now. He dragged Yves into the stateroom and down the hidden stairs to the captain’s quarters.
Rowan laid Yves gently on the bed, unable to remove his soaked clothes and boots with the manacles still clamped at his wrists and ankles.
Blood seeped sluggishly from the wound but pink scar tissue slowly formed at its edges.
Bile rose in Rowan’s throat, and he averted his eyes.
It didn’t matter that he knew Yves couldn’t die, the sight of that bullet hole in his head burned itself into Rowan’s memory.
“Ro…” Yves’s voice came out hoarse from the damage of the bullet traveling down through his brain to the back of his throat. He swallowed, plush lips stained with blood.
“Let me clean you up.” Rowan tried to step away.
He needed to find something to open the manacles, but Yves caught his wrist, grip weaker than it should have been.
Rowan looked back to his face. The wound was a bit smaller now, scar tissue already fading to smooth skin around the edges.
It was unnerving to see Yves so weak, so wounded.
Rowan hoped he wasn’t in much pain. Rowan had never seen him die before.
How long did it usually take to heal and bounce back?
He knew the first time, when Yves and the demon were newly one, it had taken days for Yves to open his eyes again after drowning.
And whenever he’d seen Yves merely injured—usually by Rowan’s nails or teeth in the throes of passion—the wounds had healed just as any other person’s would.
But this, a bullet to the skull, hadn’t even killed him for long enough to fall.
Yves’s grip tightened, some of his strength beginning to return.
“Kiss me, darling,” he slurred, a coy, lazy smile curling his lips. His eyes were glassy. What was he doing? He’d been shot in the head. He was probably in immeasurable pain, yet he was acting like a tipsy youth.
“Are you in pain?” Yves’s grip still trapped Rowan’s wrist, but he bent low to smooth some strands of hair away from Yves’s face.
Yves giggled. Giggled. Rowan had never actually heard him giggle before. It was a light and musical sound, like a child full of joy at receiving a sweet.
“I feel…” Yves swallowed again, the damage to his throat slowly knitting back together like the shreds of brain matter.
Oh. His brain. The bullet had traveled right down the middle, and now that the demon had faded into the background, that left Yves to deal with the consequences.
“I f-feel…” Yves blinked, brow furrowing and wrinkling the edges of the wound when he couldn’t form the words correctly. The demon void began to spread out from one of his irises, curling across the white of his eye like smoke.
Yves’s fingers tightened suddenly. He yanked Rowan down onto the bed and rolled on top of him. The chain hit Rowan’s sternum as Yves pinned his wrists to the pillow beside his head.
“Yves, what—” Rowan’s protest was cut off as Yves captured his lips in a sloppy kiss. A wanton moan escaped Yves’s damaged throat.
For a moment, Rowan let himself give in to Yves’s delicious tongue slipping into his mouth, to Yves’s body on top of his. Then blood dribbled out of the bullet wound onto his face, Yves’s hips rutted against Rowan’s thigh, hard cock evident, and Rowan’s mind cleared.
Rowan broke the kiss, but Yves was not deterred. His lips moved down over Rowan’s neck, nipping his skin playfully.
“Wait…”
Yves’s long tongue licked sloppily over the shallow wound from Shaw’s knife, and up the side of Rowan’s neck to his cheek.
“Stop,” Rowan ordered.
Yves stilled, his tongue still flat against the scars on Rowan’s cheek. Rowan pushed his shoulder, for once having almost equal strength between them. Yves landed on his back, damp hair splayed out across the pillow. He giggled again and tried to pull Rowan down on top of him.
“Please…” Yves’s voice came out breathy and alluring. He licked a speck of blood from his plush lips, thighs falling open invitingly. “Don’t you want to fuck me?”
Rowan’s thoughts stuttered. Was Yves actually asking him for this? He couldn’t deny he’d dreamed of it. Of Yves looking just like this—minus the blood—falling apart beneath him. Begging for him. His long legs wrapping around Rowan’s waist. His soft, pliant insides sliding around Rowan’s cock.
“Rowan…” Yves whimpered. Gods, he was gorgeous.
Even with rivulets of blood on his pale face and a bullet hole in his skull.
For once his hair was a mess. He was a mess.
And he was all the more beautiful for it.
Rowan’s mind clouded, and he leaned down to capture that begging mouth.
Yves moaned into it, needy, the tendons of his wrist flexing against Rowan’s palm.
Rowan’s hips stuttered against him once, then he broke the kiss, pulling back to search Yves’s eyes.
One shone starry and human, the other as fathomless as the dark depths of the sea.
The sight jolted Rowan back to reality. Yves was injured, not in his right mind. Rowan wanted him, but not like this.
Yves strained against Rowan’s hold, trying to recapture their kiss. Rowan covered Yves’s mouth with his other hand, pushing Yves’s head into the pillow. He leaned down to kiss the little knot of scar tissue in the middle of Yves’s forehead, and Yves whimpered behind his hand.
“I can’t fuck you, love. Not like this,” Rowan said gently. His lips traveled to Yves’s hairline, his temple, his cheek. Yves’s eyelids fluttered. “It’s time to rest now.”
Yves’s body surged against him, thighs tightening on either side of his hips. But he was still too weak to dislodge Rowan’s hold.
After a few moments of struggle, Yves finally relaxed, and Rowan settled down on the bed next to him, removing his hand from Yves’s mouth.
The seawater from Yves’s clothes soaked into Rowan’s front, but he drew him close all the same.
Yves sighed contentedly, and after a while, turned his head to gaze at Rowan.
The pink scar was fading, the void of Yves’s demon eye receding again.
Rowan stroked his hair, trying to soothe whatever passions still lingered.
Had Yves meant what he said about Rowan fucking him, or was that just the result of the temporary brain damage?
They’d been sleeping together for almost two years, and Rowan had never topped.
Due to Yves’s past, being on the receiving end wasn’t something he was comfortable with, and Rowan hadn’t ever pushed him on that.
Now he wondered if Yves had some desire for it, deep down.