Golden Eagle (Sons of Rome Book 4)

by Lauren Gilley

  “Do you want to know a secret?” he whispered, though they were all alone. “I hated the war. God, I hated it…but I was afraid for it to end, because that would mean I wouldn’t get to see you again.”

  Sasha whimpered.

  Nik sank down to his knees, and buried both hands in Sasha’s fur, in the thick ruff of his neck. “Sashka. My heart. I promise I won’t fail you anymore.”

  Sasha lunged forward, knocked him flat on his back, and licked a big, wet stripe up his face.

  Nikita barked a laugh, and then kept laughing, as Sasha flopped down on top of him and kept licking his face.

  That was when he felt it. A surge of peace, and love, and trust, and every good, warm emotion describable. There was a click. A locking together. A binding – he understood it now. Not like chains and collars, not manacles. It was a unification. A perfect understanding; an ecstasy like the best sex, like reaching the peak together.

  A soul bond.

  There was a flash of bright light.

  And Nik was on the couch again, lying flat on his back, taste of Sasha’s blood in his mouth, laughing, still. Sasha lay on top of him, human again, blood red on his lips, eyes crinkled as he laughed, smile dominating his whole face. Radiant.

  “Fail me,” he said, cackling. “You stupid.” And he kissed Nikita with an audible smack.

  ~*~

  When Nikita remembered they had an audience, and twisted his head around to look for Val, he was already at the door, hand on the knob, trying to sneak out silently.

  “Val!” Sasha sprang to his feet, and Nikita followed. “Wait!”

  Val turned to them, when they reached him, and Nik wasn’t prepared for the smile he bestowed on them: the warmth, the pride that was almost fatherly. Nikita couldn’t remember his own father, and he’d not been witness or recipient to that kind of emotion before, but that was his first impression when he saw Val’s expression, and drew up short.

  “That wasn’t so hard, now was it?” Val asked, gaze moving between them.

  “No,” Sasha said, tipping his head toward Nik. “Not for me, anyway.”

  “I didn’t–” Nikita started, but caught Sasha’s grin, all teeth and nearly-shut eyes. He could feel his mate’s happiness, he realized with a start.

  He’d always been able to sense it, innate instinct reading the shifts in Sasha’s scent, and energy; attuned to every little facial twitch. He’d always known when he was feeling somber – though, for too long he hadn’t known exactly why. That it was perceived rejection, and a lack of further closeness that depressed Sasha the most.

  But this. The knowledge that Sasha was happy sat warm and welcome in the back of his mind. A happiness woven of a dozen threads: contentment, excitement, love, lust, and longing finally quenched.

  “Can you tell if it worked?” he asked Val, though he didn’t need to. Their link was as tangible as the weight of the clothes on his body. “Did we do it right?”

  Val chuckled. “Yes, it worked. And I can tell that you already know it did.”

  Sasha hugged Val with all the fervor and abandon of a child. “Thank you, Val.”

  Val hugged him back with exquisite care, one hand on the back of his head. “You’re welcome, darling.”

  “Thank you, Val,” Nikita echoed, more somber, but heavy with emotion.

  Val lifted his head, and reached with one hand to stroke Nik’s cheek. “I never doubted you. Try not to doubt yourself so much.” Then he drew back from both of them. “I’ll leave you alone, now. And see you tomorrow – tonight?” He shrugged, grin going toothy. “My dears, it’s going to be a delight.”

  Nikita snorted.

  He blew them a kiss and slipped out, door closing quietly behind him.

  They were alone, then. Bound.

  Nikita planted his feet and was ready when Sasha whirled and launched across the scant foot between them. He caught him around the waist, and was smiling when Sasha kissed him.

  He kissed him, and kissed him, and kissed him. “Nik,” he said every time he drew back, his hands holding Nikita’s face, his eyes luminous with wonder. “Nik.” Kiss. “Darling.” Kiss. “You really–” Kiss. “–did it.”

  Nikita shifted a hand up to his nape, and gripped his falling-apart bun lightly, holding him off long enough to say, “Sashka. I need you to know that I’m never going to abuse this. That I won’t–”

  Sasha leaned in, lids lowering, lips parting on a soft whine that went straight to Nik’s cock when the move tugged on his hair, and kissed him again. “You’re precious,” he murmured, and oh, that went to his cock, too.

  Maybe, Nikita reasoned, they’d talked enough.

  “Bed,” Sasha pleaded, tugging at his jacket, and that decided it.

  They didn’t run there, but it was a near thing.

  Sasha pushed Nik’s jacket off his shoulders, pushed up the hem of his shirt, and leaned in before Nik could even get it over his head, dragging his teeth across his chest, right over his pounding heart.

  Nikita felt the barest scrape of a fang, and shuddered – and had an idea.

  He ditched the shirt and caught Sasha with one hand splayed across his throat, urging his face up so he could press his lips to his forehead. And then, because temptation was too great, skimmed down the slope of his perfect nose and kissed his lips, too; slow, messy, and wet, while Sasha’s hands flexed helplessly against Nik’s ribs. When he pulled back, he said, “What do you think about being on top this time?”

  Sasha’s pupils blew wide; a thin, eager whine sounded in his throat. He liked that idea. But he said, “Are you sure? I don’t…”

  “Yes, I’m sure.” Nikita kissed him again, mouth, cheek, jaw, ear. Whispered, “I’ll walk you through it.”

  Sasha pressed in close, undulating against him, and Nikita could feel how hard he was, how eager. He tucked his face into Nik’s throat and sucked at the skin there, pinching lightly with his teeth. Marking him, Nik realized. A sweet pain, and then Sasha shifted to the other side and repeated the motion; deliberate and proprietary.

  An alpha wolf, everyone kept saying, and that always seemed so odd, his sweet, bright Sasha, but here was the alpha now, staking a claim, wanting, grinding against the thigh that Nikita offered forward.

  “I want – I want–”

  “What do you want, baby?”

  “Lie down. Please.”

  He did, and Sasha took a moment to stare at him, chest heaving, gaze tracking over his face, and the fresh marks on his neck; his chest and stomach, lingering a moment on the bulge in the front of his jeans.

  Nikita looked too, drinking in the sight of his aroused mate, and he could feel the binding; feel their mutual adoration.

  Slowly, Sasha reached up and pulled the elastic from his hair, shook it out. It had gotten long, brushing the tops of his shoulders. He peeled off his sweater next, unbuttoned and pushed down his jeans; they were so tight he had to work his hips side-to-side to get them down, and that did beautiful things to the lean muscles of his belly.

  Nikita reached for his own waistband, but Sasha said, “No, I want to.”

  Naked, he climbed up onto the bed and straddled Nik’s thighs. He didn’t go straight for the jeans, though. Breathing a little unsteady, pulse pounding visibly in his throat, he smoothed his hands up Nikita’s stomach, up his ribs, fingertips playing into every dip between the bones. Palmed his pecs, thumbed his nipples, until Nik’s own breathing hitched and caught.

  “I know that outfit has terrible memories attached to it.” He traced Nik’s collarbones, smoothed the pads of his fingers over the fluttering pulse at the hollow of his throat. His gaze locked with Nikita’s, relentlessly blue. “But that’s what you were wearing when I realized I love you.”

  “Oh,” Nik said, faintly.

  Sasha leaned down and kissed the place where his fingertips rested. Shifted down, warm lips mapping the whole of his chest.

  He was going to take his time, Nikita realized, with a faint pulse of nerves. Unwelcome nerves
that threatened to pull him out of the moment. Lying here, letting Sasha worship him – and that’s what this was, no denying, Sasha’s reverence tangible – left him feeling vulnerable in a way he so rarely, rarely allowed. And old habits died like vampires, which was to say: hard.

  Belatedly, he realized Sasha was talking to him.

  “…looked at pretty girls before, but.” He flicked a nipple with his tongue. “I’d never seen anyone as beautiful as you.” He closed his lips around the nipple, and sucked.

  No one ever did this to him – for him. There had been a few times with Dima, in dark rooms, in stolen moments, years and years ago. But nothing since, decades of drought, and even then it had never been Sasha. Sasha’s fingers teasing at him; Sasha’s hot, wet mouth wringing sensation from him.

  His hands found Sasha’s hair, and he threaded his fingers through the tangled pale waves of it, clinging to him.

  “Do you like it?” Sasha asked against his skin.

  Did he mean his mouth? Or the sweet words that fell from it?

  Nikita loved both. “Yes, baby. Don’t stop.”

  He felt the shape of Sasha’s smile against his chest. Another long suck at his nipple. “You had snowflakes melting in your hair, I remember. Such thick hair; pretty like a sable pelt. You were terrifying, and I thought you were the most beautiful person I’d ever met, but your eyes were so sad.” He shifted to the other side of Nik’s chest, and repeated his ministrations. “I hate it when you’re sad.”

  “Not – not sad – now.”

  Sasha raised up on his arms to they were face-to-face, his cheeks flushed, his mouth pink and damp. “You are still the most beautiful, and you deserve to be loved, my darling Nikki.”

  He couldn’t help a smile. “Nikki?”

  “Trying something new.” Sasha cocked his head, eager. “Is it working?”

  “Everything you do works. But you don’t have to flatter me – I’m already yours.”

  “You need flattering, and I want to do it.” Sasha kissed him, heated and sweet.

  Nik touched his waist, stroked down his flanks and massaged his ass; ghosted a finger down the crease, just a tease.

  Sasha broke the kiss with a whine and rested their foreheads together, hips moving in a helpless roll, grinding their erections together through the barrier of Nik’s jeans. “Oh. Nik…”

  “I know.”

  Nikita grabbed the lube off the nightstand while Sasha stripped off his jeans. Then they came back together, nothing but bare skin on bare skin, and Nikita didn’t feel vulnerable anymore; just hot, and ready, needy.

  “Come here, baby.” He pressed the lube into Sasha’s hand, and opened his legs in invitation.

  Sasha was hesitant at first, slow and careful, sweet and shy. “Is this alright? It doesn’t hurt?”

  “No, it’s good.” A pleasant burn. It had been a long time, but his body remembered, cock flushed and leaking on his belly. It was an effort not to palm himself, to lie still and not push down on Sasha’s fingers. “You remember that spot I showed you? When I did this to you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you–” And then Sasha found it, and Nik’s head fell back, spine lifting off the mattress. “God.”

  Sasha chuckled, throaty and pleased with himself.

  When Sasha finally slicked himself, and moved into position, there was too much lube, his hand slippery where it gripped Nikita’s thigh. He hesitated, biting his lip – but then he was pushing, in, in, in, and through the incredible pressure of being filled, Nik got to watch Sasha’s mouth fall open; got to hear the low “hah” of the breath leaving his lungs, like he’d been punched. Sasha’s gaze was fixed on their joining, and when he finally bottomed out, his eyes fluttered closed, head tipping back, weak with the overwhelming pleasure of it.

  “Sashka, kiss me.”

  He all but fell doing it, slick hand skidding up Nik’s ribcage, clumsy as a new foal. It wasn’t a true kiss, just a brush of lips and a huffing of shared breath.

  Nikita petted the hair back off his forehead, smiling helplessly. “Feels good?”

  “Oh my God,” Sasha moaned; his hips twitched and he moaned again, shuddering. “Oh God, Nik, you’re so tight.”

  “Do you want to move?”

  “Can I? Oh, please…”

  “Move, baby.”

  With a ragged breath, Sasha pushed up on his hands, hair hanging down in his face, and pulled his hips back.

  The drag was slow, and good, and Nikita couldn’t hold back a little sound, a humming sigh of appreciation.

  Sasha’s gaze snapped up to his face, bright behind a half-screen of hair. He watched Nik’s face as he pushed back in, a steady, relentless movement until their hips kissed together again, skin tacky with sweat. It was a predatory look, hunger mixed with fascination. He was doing this to Nikita, making him hum and arch up into the movement like a cat being stroked, and he was marveling at it.

  He repeated the motion, again and again, agonizing in its slowness.

  Nik petted his arms. Tucked his hair behind his ears. Squirmed a little, wanting more. “Come on, baby,” he said again, and Sasha’s next thrust came quicker, harder. “Don’t worry so much. Just do what feels good. Aren’t you my alpha wolf?”

  And, oh, that did something.

  Sasha took a big breath, and his rhythm faltered a moment. But then his hand tightened on Nik’s thigh, he spread him wider, and he thrust in with a snarl.

  Nikita laughed, but it tapered off into a moan. He felt wanton, split open and raw, and he didn’t give a damn. “Yeah, right – ooh, baby, yes, right there. There. Keep going.”

  Sasha braced with knees and hands and he was the alpha wolf, growling on every hard thrust, a primal sound that built and built in his chest. He couldn’t stop touching Nik, like he didn’t know where he wanted to put his hands most: his thighs, his hips, his ribs. He leaned down and bit the join of neck and shoulder, soothing the punctures with his tongue when Nik cried out.

  Nikita drifted. Floated off on a tide of sensation, pleasure punctuated with sweet spots of pain, lost to the indescribable power of having Sasha over him, inside him. Strong, and reverent, and sheltering and making him feel…so many things. Everything. He spent so much of his waking time worrying about Sasha, wanting to keep him safe and protected – and in that time, he forgot something that was filling his mind, now, just as surely as Sasha filled his body: Sasha was strong. Physically, mentally, emotionally. Right now, in this moment, Nikita didn’t have to be the captain; not the vampire, not the leader, not the responsible one. He could give himself over to Sasha’s passion and revel in his own; rake his nails down Sasha’s back, cling to him, move with him. He was safe, he was loved, caught in a feedback loop because they were bound, now, both in the exact same place in every way.

  He’d never felt like this in his life. Whole. Unhurt, wanting nothing…except more of this. More, and more, and more.

  The world tilted, and he opened his eyes sluggishly. Sasha had sat back on his heels, holding Nikita in his lap, Nik’s thighs spread open over Sasha’s, Sasha still deep, deep inside, and now hitting him at a new angle.

  Sasha – face flushed, pupils blown, fangs long – stared up at him with naked adoration, and, one hand between his shoulders, one arm around his waist, urged him to move, to ride him. He tipped his head to the side, hair swinging off his gleaming throat. “Feed, love,” he encouraged, voice more wolf than man.

  Nikita kissed him first, wet and messy, and trailed a string of kisses down his face and throat until he reached his pulse, and finally sank his fangs.

  Sasha howled – a low, quiet crooning. A wolf sound.

  A sound of joy.

  41

  Alexei put enough syrup on his waffles to feel vaguely sick afterward. The walk home didn’t help, only added a headache to the problem.

  Home. He flopped down on Dante’s fancy sofa and allowed himself an internal chuckle at the notion that he’d called Dante’s place home. Like he was
n’t a lying, scheming, traitorous–

  The vampire himself appeared at the end of the sofa, wearing dark bags beneath eyes still a little red-rimmed from crying in Colette’s kitchen. The wind had tangled his hair hopelessly; it was so curly when he didn’t put product in it, a thick, dark tangle down past his shoulder that highlighted the bony thinness of his face. His expression was one of subdued subservience; a quiet, respectful sort of peace. Unnerving.

  But beautiful. Alexei didn’t like the way he kept ducking his face and playing the subordinate, but the real him was so much lovelier than the slicked-back playboy he’d pretended to be.

  “Let me take your boots off,” he said, reaching for the laces where Alexei had kicked his shod feet up onto the arm of the couch.

  No, Alexei meant to say. Don’t act like my fucking servant.

  But he was at that point of exhaustion when people said stupid things, loopy from lack of sleep. He said, “You’re so pretty.”

  Dante froze, eyes widening, fingers on the laces. “I’m sorry?”

  Alexei knocked the toes of his boots together lightly, dislodging him. “You’re so, so, so pretty. Did you know that?”

  Dante looked panicked.

  “You do, otherwise you wouldn’t have tried to be this ladies’ man orgy guy. Right?”

  He retracted his hands, slowly, holding them in front of him like he wasn’t sure if he’d have to use them to shield himself from an attack. “I…”

  “I thought you liked me,” Alexei said, and, okay, he was definitely pouting. He sounded a little drunk.

  Somehow, Dante’s eyes widened further. He swallowed, throat bobbing hard; it looked like a painful movement. “I do.”

  “No, I thought you liked me. I thought…” His voice shook; he hated how vulnerable he was being; would never have been if he hadn’t been so fucking tired. “I thought you – thought I was special.”

  Bright emotion flared in Dante’s gaze. He took a deep breath. “I do.” He moved around the arm of the couch and sat slowly down on the edge of a cushion, by Alexei’s knees. “Your grace,” he started, hesitant, and then a bit of fervor broke through. “Lex, I do think that. I do – care.” He put a strange weight on the word. It wasn’t like. Care sounded heavier, somehow. Poised to flinch away, like a child approaching a big dog, he eased a hand down onto Alexei’s knee, and squeezed. “I care,” he repeated, with even more emphasis.