47. Viktor
Viktor
It was ridiculous, of course.
If there was a single wolf in the pack who was incapable of romance, that wolf was me. But that was an excuse, and I didn’t want to be the kind of person who made excuses for my poor behavior.
If I was lacking in some way, I wanted to fix that.
Buying a replacement for the destroyed bunny had been good, but also, Drew had led me to it. That meant it wasn’t really a gift from me, but the thoughtful young raccoon.
I had wanted to give Daire something from me. Something that could only be from me. And since I was the only one he was sleeping with, well . . .
The first time we’d had sex had seemed pretty bad to even me.
Not the sex itself, which I thought had been great, but the filthy cave and the “we’re going to die if we don’t fuck” part of it.
The whole time I was lighting candles and laying out blankets and then the freaking rose petals, I was telling myself that it was ridiculous. That Daire might not even notice, and if he did, it would make things awkward.
But then he’d walked in, immediately noticed, and the look in his eyes . . .
Well, for that expression, I’d gather rose petals and spread them on the bed every single day, even if it seemed silly to me.
Then the way he practically fell into my arms? Well.
After years of holding myself apart from everyone, Daire falling into me was the best feeling in the world. The way he never hesitated before touching me. Never seemed worried about bumping up against “my trauma,” the way my whole family did.
I wasn’t broken to him, and I never had been.
It made me feel less like I was broken, knowing that he didn’t think of me that way.
Then he pulled back, shoved up onto his toes, and pressed his lips to mine, and I couldn’t worry about any of that anymore.
It was just his warm, pliant body against mine as I lifted him up and laid him across the bed.
Mark, the wolf suggested, but I shoved that away. I couldn’t bite Daire. He was a witch. It would take his magic away.
The wolf seemed exasperated by the very idea, and darted over into him and back, as though to make the point that Daire was already as much werewolf as witch.
No bite would change what we were, when magic had decided it for us.
Daire had a wolf, and no nascent wolf would be born inside him from a bite, taking the place of his magic.
And that was . . . well, it was fair. I couldn’t imagine a bite would change anything, when we were already practically four beings in one.
Fine, so a bite would probably happen sooner or later, but Daire had been through too much, too recently, to press for that sort of thing. We had to give things time to settle.
What if, after a year and a chance to clear his head, he decided that he wanted to move on? Join a different coven, move to a different state, just leave us in general? Being mated to a werewolf would complicate that.
No, I wasn’t sure it was truly possible, with the magic and wolf still loosely flowing between us, but if it was what he needed, I would have found a way to let it happen. I wouldn’t shackle someone to me. I’d spent too long in forced servitude; I would never willingly do that to someone else.
But that wasn’t a thought for now. It was a thought for later, if Daire did change his mind.
Now? That was for Daire in a whole different way.
I stripped him slowly, one piece of clothing at a time, tossing them onto the nearby chair so they wouldn’t get lost, but paying more attention to each inch of revealed skin, glowing with inner light under the candles I’d lit around the room.
He seemed perfectly golden like this, smooth and soft, and the way his breath hitched when I ran my fingers over his body was the sweetest sound I’d ever heard.
“This is what you deserved, always,” I told him, drawing myself up next to him on the bed. “Soft light, soft words. Everything you ever wanted.”
He bit his lip for a moment, then shook his head as he turned toward me.
“No. I mean, it’s what I wanted because I didn’t know.
” His eyes gleamed for a moment, bright green with magic, and he turned again, so that he was straddling me, and started tugging at my clothes.
“But we had to go through the cave to get here. This wasn’t a place we could start.
We had to survive escaping the coven, because this would have never have happened with them. ”
He tossed my shirt onto the same chair I’d been using, then scooted down to work on my fly, grinning up at me. “And it’s beautiful, you know. I appreciate it. It’s romantic and lovely. But if I had to take the cave first in order for this moment to be with you? Then that was totally worth it.”
He tugged my pants down, and clearly growing impatient, just shoved them off the bed onto the floor, along with my socks and shoes, then threw my underwear over one shoulder without a single care. He was smiling like a child opening gifts on their birthday.
“Besides,” he went on. “Maybe I’m romanticizing it in retrospect, but I seem to remember the cave being pretty hot. And you’re always the sexiest guy in any room you’re in.”
Leaning down, he started peppering kisses all over my belly and chest, before coming back up to meet me, face to face. “I love this. And I love you.”
“That’s a good thing, since I love you back. I’m not sure what we’d do otherwise.”
That made him laugh, even as he was reaching for the oil in the nightstand, almost falling off my lap with the way his whole body shook.
He came back with the bottle and moved back to give himself a little room, smearing oil all over me, then his fingers, reaching back to stretch his own hole to ready for me.
All the while, those twinkling green eyes held me still.
“I’d love to just shove down onto you, you know, but you’re an inconvenient guy. Your dick is way too big for that.”
I snorted. “You wish it were smaller?”
That brought the laughter back. “Not even a tiny bit. You’re perfect just as you are, Viktor . . . um . . . ”
“Novikov,” I offered. “Not that it matters. What matters isn’t history. It’s now. Us. What comes next.”
He smiled and shivered, then offered a little shrug, before lifting himself up above me.
Holding my cock in place, he started to lower himself onto it, letting his eyes slide closed as he groaned with the feel of it.
I almost did the same, but ended up glad I had not, when he quietly answered.
“I dunno. I think Daire Novikov would sound cool.”
My whole body shivered with the pleasure of him riding me, combined with such a complete show of . . . of forever? Of the fact that he wanted as much as I did.
Again, the wolf started up in my head, demanding I bite him.
Instead, I grabbed his hips and pulled him down onto me as his whole body fell into the motion, giving over and letting me set the pace, even though he was the one on top.
His tight heat was addictive, and somehow, even if he did want to leave the pack, I didn’t think I could stay behind without him. Yes, they were my family, but he was my person. My whole future.
His eyes flashed open, and I could see the wolf in them, and then, confusion. “Why do I really want to bite you all of a sudden?”
I sighed and rolled my eyes. “He’s impatient. Like a child. I told him not yet, so he went and asked you.”
He leaned down against me, kissing each cheek, then my lips, and then pulled back enough to look at me properly. “The wolf wants . . . biting? Is this some kind of wolf kink?”
I sighed, and rolled over so I was atop him, and started slowly pumping into him again, my body too impatient to put sex on hold for a conversation. “Not some kind of wolf kink. Some kind of wolf marriage. Mating marks. You’ve seen Aleks’s neck. The bite there.”
Daire’s eyes went wide. “I figured that was from a fight. It was . . . on purpose?”
“Mating,” I agreed. “A permanent symbol of belonging to each other. They don’t heal completely because they are accepted.”
His lips fell slack, and his eyes went hazy, and for a moment, he seemed to lose focus on the conversation, pushing up into every stroke of my cock. Then he blinked up at me and said, “Then do it. I—I mean, if you want to, and not just—”
Without another thought, I was leaning down, pressing my teeth into his neck. Like an untried teen. Even worse, when my fangs broke his skin, my whole body erupted in orgasm, tensing above him as I spent.
I had to force myself to let go of the bite and pull back, only to find Daire looking drugged, a blissful half-smile on his face, and between us, a pool of his own come. He’d come from the bite too.
Fuck. We were going to have to try that again, the other way.