by Marcy Jacks
The way his fox tail and black-tipped ears twitched whenever Seth touched them pleased him.
And made him want to yank Miles’s clothes off.
Miles was the first to pull back from the kiss, his breath hard and raspy. “Bed?”
Seth nodded. “Bed.”
They scrambled to make it to their bed, both of them seemingly racing against the other. Miles giggled over the silliness of it, and Seth loved it all the more.
One day, very soon, he was going to have to take his mate in a way that was a little more exciting than simply making love to him in bed every time, but Miles had always seemed so…fragile wasn’t the right word, but it was something close to that. Despite his history, he was an innocent, and Seth hadn’t wanted to take things too far with him.
“I want to ride you. Be on top this time,” Miles clarified, grabbing Seth by the collar of his shirt and pulling him down hard onto the bed. He hooked his leg over Seth’s waist, straddling him before those small fingers with their shallow claws raked at Seth’s abs and chest.
The real surprise—and pleasure—came when Miles dug his claws in just enough so Seth could feel the biting sting of pain and then the pleasure that came when his smaller mate leaned over him and pressed his mouth to Seth’s left nipple.
His teeth were sharp, biting just enough to warn Seth they were there.
Seth puffed out a laugh. “Not so innocent after all.”
Miles stopped abruptly. He pulled his mouth back from Seth’s nipple then blinked up at him in a daze. “What do you mean?”
Seth shook his head. “Nothing.”
He reached for the back of Miles’s head, pulling him down so their mouths could come together once more.
It was absolutely wonderful. The softness of Miles’s lips was just what Seth needed. He took command again. Much as he enjoyed it when Miles got a little aggressive, he needed to remind his small mate of who was in charge here.
When he finished with his mate, Miles’s eyes were dilated wide enough that Seth could hardly see the blue color around the black spheres in the middle.
And Seth couldn’t help but grin at him.
“Don’t get too many bright ideas. I’m still going to put you over my knee and spank you later.”
Miles tensed, the life coming back into his eyes very quickly. “What? But…what for?”
“For leaving the panic room.” Seth brought his mate back down for another slow, sweet kiss. He pulled back once more, just so he could get a proper look at Miles’s face.
He couldn’t help but laugh at the displeasure he saw there.
“It’s not funny,” Miles pouted.
“Yes it is, and if it teaches you a lesson, then it will be worth it.”
“But I don’t want to be spanked.”
Seth stroked his hands up and down Miles’s arms. He was naked, but Miles was not, and it was a crime in and of itself that such was the case. “Don’t worry. I’ll see to it that you enjoy yourself when I do it.”
Miles tilted his head to the side slightly, his brows furrowing. “How is that possible?”
Perhaps he was still somewhat innocent. Seth would enjoy showing him the many ways in which he could enjoy having Seth’s hand smacking against his ass.
“Get out of your clothes, sweet. You are overdressed.”
Miles still frowned suspiciously at him. “What do you mean about enjoying a spanking?”
“I’ll show you after I have you,” Seth promised. He brought his hand to the bulge between Miles’s legs. The smaller man’s mouth dropped, his eyes widening and his tail flicking wildly behind him at the sudden touch against his cock.
His clothed cock, but that didn’t matter to Seth at that moment.
“I want my skin on your skin,” Seth rasped out. “Your cock feels hot in my hand, even with your stupid jeans in the way.”
Even as he spoke, Seth could feel the pulsing of Miles’s dick against his hand. The heat that pulsed against his palm was almost too much to bear. He found himself getting drunk off it. His inner dragon blazed in a burning fire as he felt that heat building against his palm, especially when Miles began humping against his hand.
Seth grinned up at him, noting the rising color in Miles’s cheeks, how his nipples were budding through the material of his shirt, and it all came together to make Seth want him that much more. It made his desire spike, and his dick throbbed for attention.
Painful, but the wait would be worth the pleasure.
“Y-your eyes are changing,” Miles puffed, his hips still pushing against Seth’s hand.
Seth grinned. “Good.”
Miles grinned through his pleasure. “I like your dragon eyes. They’re red like the rest of you.”
“I like the orange and black of your fox ears and the color your cheeks make when you’re getting off on me.”
Miles’s eyes flew wide, as though he was embarrassed to have had that said to him at all.
Seth chuckled, removing his hands from his mate’s body and pushing himself up into a sitting position.
He curled his arms around Miles’s waist. Miles was much shorter than Seth was, but in this position, they were eye to eye as Seth kissed him.
The best part was when Miles curled his arms around Seth’s neck, holding on for dear life as their hips thrust together.
Seth was going to be inside his mate, but not right now. Right now the need to come, the animalistic urge to simply get off while Miles was with him was too much to ignore.
All the same, Seth brought one hand back around to Miles’s button and zipper. He wasn’t wearing a belt, so it wasn’t too terribly difficult to get his pants undone and pull his cock free from the confines of the denim.
Miles moaned when his dick was free. He thrust into Seth’s hand as Seth stroked him lovingly.
Their bodies were hot as Seth kissed and sucked on the side of Miles’s throat. His own hips humped the air as he desperately searched for the friction that he wasn’t getting.
He brought his cock forward, his fingers curling around both his and Miles’s dicks.
Miles’s mouth dropped open and his head fell back, the pleasure striking him hard as he fucked into Seth’s hand.
“Feels good, doesn’t it?” Seth asked, though it was definitely the sort of question that didn’t need an answer. He could see the answer well enough for himself in the shivering that came from Miles’s body as he squeezed his eyes shut, as his body rocked and trembled in Seth’s grip.
Seth pressed biting kisses to Miles’s throat. He wanted to leave hickeys and other small bruises there so he could look at any time and be proud to know that he was the one who’d left those marks in place. That he was the one who was responsible for making his mate come undone with this sort of pleasure.
“Your cock feels good in my hand, against my dick. I love it,” Seth said, gritting his teeth when the pleasure became almost too much for him to handle. “God, the silky feel of it. I always thought that was a stupid, cliché description, but you feel perfect in my hand, against my dick, the way you move as you fuck against my body. So fucking beautiful and mine.”
Miles nodded, though his voice came out as a barely-there mumble. “Uh-huh,” he said, as if he understood the things Seth was saying to him but couldn’t quite get the rest of his body to cooperate.
“Kiss me,” Seth said. “I want to feel if your tongue is as tied as it sounds.”
Miles moaned, and he leaned forward, taking the initiative as he pressed their lips together. His tongue came forward, briefly, teasingly, licking at the inside of Seth’s lips before he pulled back, the invitation clear, and Seth took it.
Miles moaned, and so did Seth as he took what he desperately wanted, what was his from the very start. Miles’s taste never got old, no matter how often Seth kissed him, and this time his flavor was made all the sweeter by the fact that Miles was still thrusting helplessly against him.
This wasn’t the easy back and forth of a man who desired the
pleasure more than the orgasm.
His mate was close. Seth could sense it in his movements, in the way Miles moaned and canted his hips as he wildly pushed his hips back and forth, fucking into his hand and giving Seth more pleasure.
Seth pushed his hips forward as much as he was able. It was difficult, even with Miles’s weight in his lap. The man was not heavy, but his weight on Seth’s thighs was more than enough to make it so that Seth could do little more than shift his hips back and forth in an attempt to meet each of Miles’s wild thrusts.
“I’m…I’m close,” Miles moaned, clenching his eyes shut, his jaw going tight, as if he was desperately trying to hold back the building pleasure.
“Come on me. Do it,” Seth demanded, tightening the grip of his hand just barely, only enough to make it so that Miles could feel the change, and Seth groaned as the effect worked on himself, as well.
His balls tightened, and that building warmth just beneath his stomach would not be held back for much longer.
“Come with me, sweetheart,” Seth demanded. “Stop fighting it.”
Miles’s fingers and claws reached out, pushing through Seth’s red hair and gripping tight as the tension through his body finally released. Miles gasped hard, moaned out loud, his hips fucking into Seth’s hand harder and faster than they had been before.
He was almost as wild as a dragon in heat, which was exactly what Seth turned into when he felt the warmth of Miles’s cum splashing against his stomach and even shooting onto his abs.
And he fucking loved it.
Seth couldn’t control himself after that. He wanted to hold back, was desperate to do so, but he couldn’t. He gritted his teeth and growled a low noise deep in his throat when he came. The strength of his orgasm shot through him as if there was a powerful force behind it, as if he hadn’t had his mate in weeks. Warm cum spurt onto Miles’s stomach and chest. Some made it to his neck even, and Seth moaned again at the sight of that, as if the wilder side of him was pleased by the marking of his mate.
Miles stopped the forward and back thrusting of his hips first. He slumped against Seth’s body, panting for breath, feeling even lighter than Seth logically knew he should have as his strength was sapped from him.
Seth stopped next. He had enough strength in his bones to hold himself, and his mate, up.
All the same, Seth’s arms trembled as he curled them loosely around Miles’s waist, holding him, kissing him on the side of his throat, and even wondering what it would taste like if Seth were to let his tongue out and slide across the pearly white fluid that had shot there when Seth had come to his pleasure.
He opted out of that for now. Miles’s skin seemed far more appealing.
“I’m sorry I made you worry,” Miles said, still panting for breath.
Seth could feel the heavy thumping of Miles’s heart against his chest as his smaller mate lay against him.
“Don’t worry about it,” Seth replied. “Try not to do it too much.”
Miles nodded. “I don’t like the gun.”
Seth sighed. “I’ll take it out of our room. I’d still rather you know how to use it.”
It was clear that it would be too dangerous for his mate to remain ignorant on how to handle such a weapon.
Things were not going to be as peaceful as soon as Seth had hoped.
Miles sighed, his heart rate slowing down, the heat of his body returning to something closer to normal. He nodded. “All right.”
Seth wanted to hold this man for the rest of his life and never let him go. He never wanted Miles to be in danger from anything or anyone. He didn’t even like the idea of Miles holding a gun, but the tiny claws he had would be nothing against humans in professional armor, or even his former vampire masters, should they simply decide to come here and take back the mansion and property themselves without the help of any humans.
“I’ll search out someone who is a…professional. I’m sure there are some shooting ranges I can take you to that will teach you this stuff better than I can. Though maybe you have some natural talent since you got that human on the first shot.”
That was apparently the wrong thing to say. Miles shivered immediately after those words left his mouth.
Seth pulled back from his mate, looking into Miles’s teary eyes.
He put his hands onto Miles’s cheeks, his thumbs brushing under Miles’s eyes just as any of his tears would have fallen. “Don’t cry for the dead. He made his choice when he came into our home.”
Miles sucked back a deep, trembling breath. He nodded. “I know. I just hate that I was the one to take him from this world. He wouldn’t have given me or anyone else a chance, would he?”
“Not at all. Don’t think of him. He would never think of you the way you are him had the roles been reversed.”
Seth really couldn’t have known what was in that man’s heart. Humans did terrible things for all sorts of reasons, but Seth was absolutely not going to put those nuances into his mate’s head, the chances of a family waiting for the dead human to come home, who would be waiting for the rest of their lives since he would never see them again.
Those were details that would keep Miles awake at night, make him wonder about what he could or could not have done differently, and now that it was too late for him to be concerning himself with those details, Seth wouldn’t put them into his head.
“I love you, and I want you to live a long and happy life, with me,” Seth said. “I am so sorry that will put you into these positions sometimes, but promise me that, unless you are defending yourself, you will not go out of your way to protect me.”
Miles blinked, that confused stare coming over his face. “But I—”
“No, sweet, say it. You don’t understand. I couldn’t live with myself if anything were to happen to you. It would kill me.”
He was guilting his mate into doing as he asked, but in that moment, Seth couldn’t bring himself to care. So long as it kept Miles alive, that was all that mattered.
Miles pressed his lips together, and he nodded. “Okay,” he said softly. “But only because you ask, and because I love you.”
Seth exhaled a hard sigh. Only then did he feel as if he could breathe, and he and Miles held each other, comforting each other, before Seth had to go back downstairs and deal with the aftermath of the battle.
So long as he had his mate by his side, he could handle anything that was thrown at him.
Chapter Ten
Sorin heard the sounds of crying from his place in the basement.
He’d been quickly returned to his cage after Seth left him alone and Stefan and Andrei noticed he was walking around.
At first, they looked at his burned and bloodied face and treated him as if he was one of the servants. The horror in their eyes was clear. They’d thought one of those men in black had beaten him to within an inch of his life. Seth had said something about a cheese grater. It was possible they thought the same thing.
They even thanked him for standing by Lucian and holding his back against their attackers.
Sorin was glad Lucian survived. He didn’t want the man to die. He didn’t exactly have a proper explanation for why he didn’t want the man to die, since he hated him, but it was true enough. He didn’t want him dead, and he was glad Lucian was all right.
He couldn’t say much for the others in the house, especially Beth…
Of course, the second the dragons realized who and what he was, their horror was quickly replaced with revulsion, suspicion, and rage. They grabbed him by the back of his scorched neck and dragged him back down to his cage. With the bodies of his cousins still in the other cage.
He tried not to look at them, tried not to think about how carelessly his father had ordered their deaths.
It was the only thing that made sense. Varrick wanted his son back, and if anyone got in the way of the men sent to retrieve him, their orders would be to dispatch any and all in their way.
That was just the way things worked.
/> Sorin never thought that law would apply to his own family.
The men who were chased out of here, the ones left alive from the dragons…Varrick would kill them for returning empty-handed. Did they know that? He hoped they were able to flee with their lives intact. He was sick of the killing.
And still hungry. The bites he’d gotten off on those humans had been more for defensive purposes. He’d swallowed some of the blood to be sure, but likely not enough for it to make any noticeable difference. His hunger was surely still there, and if he didn’t feed, his face wouldn’t heal fast enough to prevent scarring.
Or infection.
He inched closer to his bars on the other side of his cage, making sure to stay away from the stench of his dead relatives, and he couldn’t help but let a misery take over his heart.
Maybe he shouldn’t have given those humans trouble. They were going to die now because of him. If he’d just gone with them, maybe there wouldn’t be so much destruction upstairs. He would be comfortable and have his veins filled with blood and his belly full of good food.
He and his father didn’t get along well, but at least this proved, if anything, that the man didn’t want him dead.
Sorin closed his eyes. He just wanted to sleep. He didn’t want to have to think about any of this, where he was, the decisions he did and didn’t make…
It was enough to give him a headache…
Footsteps sounded coming down the basement stairs.
Sorin snapped his eyes open, looking toward the door. The crying and screaming could no longer be heard from upstairs, and he got the impression he’d dozed for quite a while when the door opened and Lucian stood there.
Dressed, his clothes clean and pressed, tall, and though his wounds were still incredibly fresh even by a dragon’s standards, he didn’t give any sort of hint that he was in pain from what the humans had done to him.
He looked fairly good, standing there like that, but Sorin was less focused on his clothes and how he looked compared to the sound of Lucian’s heart.
It was right there, pumping a steady flow of blood throughout his body, and Sorin’s hunger turned painful.