Chapter Six #2
I gripped his hips and pulled him down, burying my cock in him to the hilt. He made a sound I’d never heard before—half scream, half moan, nothing polite about it. His nails dug into my shoulders, and I felt him tremble.
I held him there, impaled, until the tightness gave way to heat. He rocked, a little, getting used to it. His eyes were glassy, lashes wet. He looked up at me like he was daring me to do it again.
I did.
I thrust up, hard, driving the air out of his lungs. He clamped down, trying to hold me inside, and I made sure he knew I was stronger.
I fucked him, not slow, not gentle. Every stroke was a claim, every withdrawal a threat. The sound of skin slapping and the slap of my balls against his ass filled the room. His cock bounced between us, leaking over my stomach, and every time I bottomed out he made a different sound.
He bent forward, forehead to my shoulder, panting. I grabbed his jaw, pulled him in, and kissed him for the first time. Not a kiss—an assault. I bit his lower lip, sucked the blood to the surface. Our tongues clashed, teeth knocking together. He kissed back, wild, all teeth and need.
I fisted his hair, yanked his head back. “Mine,” I said, voice ragged.
He tried to say something, but I fucked it out of him.
I rolled us, pinning him to the floor. I drove in deeper, harder, and watched his eyes roll back as I jerked his cock in time with the thrusts.
He wrapped his legs around my waist, heels digging into my ass, and took every inch like he was built for it.
“Say it,” I growled, squeezing his throat just enough to get his attention.
He gasped. “Yours.”
I slammed into him, each word punctuated by a thrust. “Good. Fucking. Boy.”
He lost it then, body locking up around me. He came with a sharp cry, spraying both our chests. The spasms milked my cock, and I let go, coming so hard I saw stars. I buried myself to the root, held him down, and rode out the aftershocks until neither of us could move.
We stayed like that, tangled on the hardwood, sweat cooling between us. After a minute, I pulled out, tied off the condom, and tossed it onto the side table to take care of later.
He didn’t move, not for a long time.
I lifted him into my lap, arms wrapped around his chest. He tucked his face into my neck, breathing shallow. I held him, silent, until the heartbeat at my wrist slowed to something normal.
“You all right?” I asked.
He nodded, still wordless.
I stroked his hair, thumbed the sweat off his cheek, and let the silence do the work. Next time, I thought, I’d see if he could break me.
Chapter Six
~ Vadim ~
I carried Iren out of the amber-lit room and into the corridor, his weight a surprise only in the way it made me feel human. He was not heavy, but there was enough to him—long bones, dancer’s muscle, that deceptive density that said survival was his first language.
His head lolled against the crook of my neck, jaw slack, mouth parted and dark with the beginning of a bruise where I’d bit him. One hand, still painted with chipped burgundy, curled tight in the lapel of my jacket. He did not let go, even in sleep.
Yuri waited at the end of the corridor, a silhouette against the metal doors of the elevator. He was a man born without a sense of surprise, but even he raised an eyebrow when he saw the cargo in my arms. He said nothing until we were within three steps, then, “Good idea?”
“Probably not,” I said.
I meant the opposite.
He looked at Iren, then at me, then back to Iren. His judgment was clinical, not moral. If he’d been told to dispose of the boy, he would have done it with the same care as adjusting a necktie. But that was not the order.
He pressed the call button. The elevator arrived with a sigh, wide enough to fit a piano. We stepped in. I shifted Iren’s weight, adjusting him so his face was hidden against my shoulder. If he drooled on the suit, I’d have it cleaned. If he bled, I’d remember the pattern.
Yuri keyed the elevator for the garage. “He’s still alive,” he noted.
“Some people are hard to kill,” I said. “I want to see how long he lasts.”
Yuri didn’t smile. He never did, unless something died. But he didn’t argue, either.
The ride was silent except for Iren’s breathing, which had settled into a slow, ragged pattern. I could feel his heartbeat, a slow drum against my chest. He smelled like sweat, soap, and whatever chemical they used to clean the floors. I catalogued the details. I didn’t want to forget them.
When the doors opened, the garage was empty except for the car and the half-light of the sodium lamps overhead. Iren stirred, just once, then burrowed deeper into my neck. He mumbled something, not English, maybe not even words.
I squeezed his shoulder until he stilled.
The car was already running. Black, armored, glass tinted enough to murder daylight. I opened the back door and slid in, keeping Iren draped across my lap, his legs curled in the foot well. He twitched once, then went limp again.
Yuri got behind the wheel. He adjusted the mirror, looked at me, then at the rearview. “Where to?”
“Home,” I said.
He nodded and guided the car up the ramp, past the security checkpoint, onto the arterial road. The city at night was a grid of lies, but the traffic was honest. It flowed or it didn’t.
Tonight, it did.
I let the silence stretch, cataloguing the way the world looked from behind ballistic glass. The neon signs washed the street in red and blue, punctuated by the steady amber of the streetlights.
The rain had stopped, but the asphalt still held a sheen, mirroring every passing headlight, every error in the city’s wiring.
Iren’s breathing grew even slower. His face, in sleep, lost the edge of defiance. He looked young—too young for the world he’d landed in. I pressed my hand to the side of his neck, feeling the pulse. Still strong. Still mine.
Three blocks from the turn, Yuri said: “We have a tail.”
My jaw tensed. I didn’t look back. “Description.”
“Four-door sedan. Rental plate. Lights off, but they’re not even trying to hide the mirrors.”
“Amateur,” I said.
“Or a decoy,” Yuri replied. “You want me to lose it?”
“Lose it,” I said. “Then double back and sweep for a second.”
Yuri nodded, then took the next left without signaling. The car’s suspension handled it like a pro. Iren did not wake, even as the G-force pressed his face harder into my chest.
The tail tried to follow, but Yuri bled velocity and took the next right at a crawl, using the delivery trucks as cover.
The rental slid past, committed to the original vector.
I watched it go in the side mirror, the dull shape of a man behind the wheel, hunched over the steering like a priest at confession.
“Whoever it is, they don’t have the stomach to get close,” Yuri said.
“They’ll get another chance,” I said.
He said nothing, which meant agreement.
I adjusted Iren in my lap, smoothing his hair back from his face. There was a cut at his temple, not deep, but new. I pressed my thumb to it, stopping the blood. He flinched, then settled.
We made three more turns, doubling back to the main route. I watched the rear window the entire time, but the tail did not return. Either they’d lost the nerve, or they were reporting to someone with more.
When we hit the straightaway for the mansion, I looked at the boy in my arms and thought about what it would cost to keep him. Not just tonight. Not just until the next man in a cheap suit decided he wanted something delicate to ruin. But always.
I’d taken many things in my life—lives, money, territory. But I had never wanted to keep anything.
Iren slept with his jaw slack, mouth open, one canine slightly chipped. His hand, still curled in my lapel, flexed when the car took a turn, like a man expecting to be thrown out but not willing to let go.
I set my palm against his chest. His heart was steady. Mine was not.
When we reached the gates of my estate, the guards waved us through without question. The driveway to the mansion was long enough for a meditation, so I used the time.
I thought about the tail, about whether it was a threat to me or to the boy. Either way, the outcome was already decided. The only variable was how many people would have to disappear before I was satisfied.
I glanced at Yuri in the mirror. “Pull footage on the tail. Full sweep. If it’s business, eliminate. If it’s personal, bring them in. I want to know which it is.”
“Understood,” he said.
The car glided to a stop in front of the mansion. I waited for Yuri to get out, then opened the door myself, lifting Iren’s weight with one arm and carrying him inside. The night was cold enough that my breath steamed, but Iren radiated heat through the fabric of his shirt.
The transition from bulletproof car to mansion always reminded me of why I built my life the way I did: every threshold crossed, every footstep on imported stone, a reinforcement that there was nowhere safer on earth than inside my own walls.
The air inside the house was just above freezing, conditioned to stifle mold and bacteria, but it felt warm compared to the taste of city night still clinging to the back of my throat.
I carried Iren through the vestibule and up the marble staircase, his head lolling against my chest, the rest of him deadweight and pliant in a way that only true exhaustion produces.
The hallway to the master suite was a long corridor, the kind designed to showcase art and to discourage loitering by the kind of help who can’t mind their business.
The staff—my butler Lin at the entry, one night guard at his post, the rest already dismissed for the night—knew better than to meet my eye, let alone comment on the bundle in my arms.
I felt their curiosity anyway, a brush of charged air against my skin, but none would dare.
Inside the master suite, I laid Iren out on the silk sheets, which were navy and almost as dark as the bruises along his spine. He sprawled, boneless, the way a person collapses when there’s no one left to impress.