by Susan Lain
Alek gathered Eliot in his arms, relishing the feel of a hot, lithe body against his own. Eliot sighed with contentment and wrapped his legs around Alek's hips, planting the soles of his feet over Alek's butt cheeks. Alek hooked his arms under Eliot's shoulders, Eliot's hands still tied up to the headboard.
Now Alek had a firm hold of his lover and could do as he pleased. He pulled his cock out almost all the way and thrust back with more vigor. Eliot moaned, throwing his head back, his eyes screwed shut, his mouth slack with pleasure.
"How would you prefer it this time, I wonder?" Alek tantalized Eliot with a crooning tone. "Slow and sweet? Or hard and fast?"
Judging from how Eliot thrashed about on the bed, his hips jerking frantically, he was already on the edge. That told Alek what the best strategy would be, and he chuckled evilly.
"Slow it is then," he purred.
Eliot growled loud, spewing vicious curse words that would have made an innocent man blush. But Alek wasn't innocent. He was wicked and he was in charge.
So with deliberate tardiness of motion Alek thrust in and out Eliot's sweet channel. Eliot rattled his leather handcuffs, but this time he couldn't break free with the same ease as before. Alek sank into Eliot with a gradual pace, his cock practically bursting at the seams. He was fast out of control, the need to come building like steam inside a boiler.
"You're killing me," Eliot whimpered in between rough pants. "Release me."
Alek looked down at Eliot's fierce expression and smiled, never ceasing his movements. "Giving me orders, Eliot? That is not how subs work." Eliot glared at him. That just had Alek laughing harder. "Sulking now too, sweetheart? Your ass is begging to be spanked again. I think I might use a wooden paddle this time, perhaps one carrying my mark."
Eliot bared his teeth, his green eyes flashing. "What would that be, oh master? A picture of a Saroyan sausage?"
Snarling, Alek rose to sit on his haunches. He scooped up Eliot's butt from the bed, yanked him closer to bury his dick in deeper and finally began a brutal, claiming pace. He fucked Eliot hard, fast and with profound thoroughness. An occasional slap on Eliot's thigh tickled his fancy.
Eliot screamed and shouted, writhing in place, unable to really let loose, not with his wrists bound and his hips held firmly by Alek. "You brute! I hate you!" Eliot called out, shooting daggers at Alek with his eyes.
Alek laughed. "Keep talking trash, kid. I'll show you how I deal with your kind."
Despite his own need burning in his balls, Alek slowed down even more. His tempo now moving at a snail's pace, Alek knew exactly what he was doing. The sensation of being inside Eliot never seemed to get old. His cock sure loved this clipped momentum, sliding in and out leisurely, every inch of him savoring the hot, wet channel gripping his shaft from root to tip.
"You monster," Eliot half-murmured, half-sobbed. He kept yanking on the wrist binds but couldn't shake loose. He was shaking a bit more with each heartbeat.
"What do you say?" Alek asked with a tone he knew to be infuriating. "I can go slower if you'd like."
"N-no, p-please." Eliot's voice cracked. His body glistened with a fresh coat of sweat, his skin flustered deep fuchsia, and his hips jerked of their own volition. "I…I'm sorry."
Alek dipped down and captured Eliot's lips in a brief but encompassing smooch. "I warned you that your mouth would get you into trouble. Still want to make wisecracks about sausages?"
Eliot's jaw trembled, as if he was about to cave. But his eyes burned with verdant flames, proof that he wasn't yet ready to yield. "Fine. I'll hide the sausage, at least any and all references to it. I swear."
That was pretty damn good, Alek had to grudgingly admit. If Eliot mastered one thing, it was well-timed double entendres. Of course, they would land him in a bigger bind.
"Man, you just never learn," Alek declared, stopping altogether, his cock buried in Eliot's ass but unmoving. He felt the involuntary spasms of the passage around him but refused to budge. In fact, he remained in place, frozen like a statue.
Eliot's lips turned down and he gave Alek the stink eye. "You fucking bastard, just wait till I get out of this. I'll kick your ass." He tugged at his binds like a furious madman and screamed out his frustration.
Alek laughed. He couldn't remember the last time he'd enjoyed a sexy scene this much. Eliot inspired magic with his obstinate stubbornness, impertinent attitude, and defiant humor.
The only thing Eliot had to do, if he really wanted to be released, was to use his safe word. But he was too headstrong for his own good, obviously not ready to demur to Alek's authority and surrender to his mercy.
"When we negotiated terms for the first time, you said yes to edging," Alek reminded his obdurate lover. "Was that a lie?"
Eliot raised his head as high as he could and gave Alek a withering stare. "Move, dammit. Fuck me already." His low, threatening voice was different from the shouts earlier.
Alek leaned in, smirking. "Use your safe words if you're displeased with how I'm handling your cockiness." To make a point, he gripped Eliot's cock at the base and squeezed, his fist acting like a cock ring. "Well?"
Eliot's green eyes raged like a tropical thunder storm. "You will regret this, I promise you. I won't forget this."
"No, you won't." Alek swiped a thumb over Eliot's weeping slit, the juices gathering there hot to the touch, sticky and sweet-scented. "Mmm, how wonderful you taste, Eliot."
Eliot whimpered and jerked. Alek squeezed his cock tighter, preventing Eliot from coming.
"You…I…" Eliot sobbed, his body shimmying, his skin covered in a thin sheen of sweat. "I can't…"
When Alek saw the tears rolling down Eliot's cheeks, he reckoned he'd gone too far.
"Eliot? Is this too much?" Alek used his normal voice, not his commanding Dom tone.
Blinking, Eliot looked up at him, appearing confused. Then he sighed, slumped and smiled softly. "No. Thanks for asking but I'm fine."
Alek stroked Eliot's prick, using gentle movements. "It's not always easy to tell with you."
Eliot chuckled. "What, me being so cheeky?" He closed his eyes, the blissful expression staying put, and he rocked his body back and forth. "I do want to come. But…I'm not ready to give in just yet."
Alek dipped down and captured Eliot's lips with his own. The sweet taste of pineapple and man made him dizzy with want. Alek was torturing himself by not moving, his dick throbbing with need, so he withdrew a little and thrust back in. Eliot moaned with a hushed tone and then kissed Alek with passion and hunger.
Then Alek sucked on Eliot's tongue, jerked Eliot's cockhead harder and stabbed at Eliot's sweet spot inside. Eliot cried out and his hips snapped upward.
"It's time, beautiful," Alek whispered, hovering over Eliot's lips. "Time for you to yield."
From that moment on Alek made it impossible for Eliot to continue fighting back. Alek started a swift pace, plunging in and out of Eliot's sweet ass with gusto, taking what he wanted and giving what was needed.
Alek shifted on the bed, letting Eliot's ass fall back down on the mattress. Then he covered Eliot's body and fucked him good and deep, hard and fast, ensuring that each sweep struck gold as his dick slammed over Eliot's prostate.
Eliot wrapped his legs around Alek's waist and hung on. But Alek could tell it was Eliot's way of finding leverage so he could top from the bottom and control the pace.
"Nu-uh, none of that. Keep going and I'll stop again." Alek wagged a finger at his lover in admonishment.
Finally Eliot let go. He sighed deep, slumped on the bed, his legs splayed open, his body pliant and exposed. "Fine. I give up. I give in. Please fuck me, Alek. I can't take it anymore."
His sotto voce voice tugged on Alek's heartstrings. "I've got you, Eliot."
Without drawing things out needlessly, Alek pounded Eliot good. He raised Eliot's legs to drape them over the small of his back. Then he gathered Eliot into his arms, conquered his lips, and let himself go wild. Lowering his defenses and inhibitions, Alek
reveled in the most satisfying sex he remembered ever experiencing.
"Can you come from this?" Alek asked, necking Eliot, sucking up marks of ownership.
Eliot hesitated. "I…I don't know." Then a sob escaped his throat. "I don't think so…"
Alek rewarded the confession by clasping Eliot's cock again and rubbed it with an almost bruising grip, caressing the length of the shaft from root to tip, showing him his devotion.
"Come on, baby," Alek entreated. "You can come now. Fly high."
Alek quickened his thrusts. Eliot mewled, threw his head back, arched his body, and shot ropes of spunk between their grinding bodies. Alek held onto the live wire trapped in his embrace and adored Eliot with every swirl, swivel, and suspended motion.
Finally Alek couldn't take any more either. His orgasm sparked a firestorm inside his balls, and then his cock burst into a flood of heated cream, filling the condom to the brim. Alek groaned, the pleasure bordering on pain, and puzzled if he'd ever come this hard in his entire life.
Breathless, Alek collapsed on top of Eliot who oomphed under his weight. "S-sorry." With great difficulty, he slid out of Eliot and off his body to lie on the bed next to his love, panting hard. With trembling hands he unfastened Eliot's wrists, rubbing the skin absentmindedly.
Eliot chuckled, also out of breath. "You know, when you let me believe you're a Dom and good at this, I thought you were bragging. Guess I was wrong. And that's the only time you'll ever hear me say anything remotely like that. You arrogant prick."
"You're welcome, sweetheart." Alek grinned, feeling triumphant. He'd fucked Eliot to the point where the smartass was able and willing to admit he'd made an error in judgment. That made Alek float high off the ground on wings of euphoria. How far they could take him, shoot him into space. Eliot was both the sun and the icy comet that was Alek didn't mind being drawn to him by the gravity of sheer passion.
*~*~*
"Do they always sleep with you in bed?" Eliot asked, chuckling as the pups settled in for the night, tucked on the covers at both of their feet.
Alek smoothed over the still wet hair at his nape after they'd had a short shower and let out a groan. "Yes. If I block the doors, they get noisy, whining and scratching. They're fine once I let them in." He watched Eliot who smiled wide, casting affectionate glances at the little critters. "But I can put them back out."
"No. They're adorable." Eliot snuggled under the covers with a satisfied sigh.
Adjule had already commandeered a spot beside him, at the nook of Eliot's neck. Alek felt a twinge of envy. That should have been his spot, dammit.
Grumpily, Alek assumed a position on his side, facing Eliot who rested a cheek against the pillow, watching him too. For a while that was all they did, looking at one another, listening to each other breathe, feeling the warmth of one another's bodies.
"What do you think about Crimson?" Alek asked quietly.
Eliot's smile faded and worry overtook his gaze. "He scares me."
Alek nodded. "Have you noticed how you and I both have been using that term of late with the mythkin? He instead of it?"
Eliot frowned. "No, I hadn't. But this thing has a name, a personality, emotions. It's not just an it." Before Alek could comment, Eliot mused, "I don't think I ever really understood the hows and the whys of naming them mythkin or calling the event Loreblast."
Alek chuckled. "The first creatures we identified were the gas gremlins. They reminded us of fairytales and legends of monsters. Hence…mythkin and Loreblast. Nothing more complicated than that."
"Hmm." Eliot didn't sound convinced.
That just made Alek smile more. "Monsters belong in wild tales of fantasy or ancient superstitious folklore, don't they? Yet they are our kin in the here and now, in a manner of speaking. Despite their many outward differences, they all have the same origins—the other phase—so they are kin to each other too."
"And the blast that brought them into our world was nothing short of a real-life myth of a world-changing event," Eliot finished for Alek.
Alek nodded. "Exactly. An explosion of supernatural life. Therefore, the terms seemed fitting. We figured people would get the reference or be able to connect the dots."
A pregnant pause in the conversation wasn't a pleasant lull. Shadows of an ominous future hung over them and darkened the ambiance.
"That creature, Crimson, is composed of tar sands oil," Eliot whispered, his gaze aimed somewhere over Alek's shoulder, his mind clearly a million miles away. "It's the dirtiest fuel on earth, Alek, worse than brown coal. Toxic and corrosive. If it spills into water, it sinks to the bottom, making it impossible to clean. If it spills on land, it kills everything it touches. Pipelines extracting tar sands oil have had hundreds of leak incidents. If Crimson is like that…we can't even get close to him without endangering our lives."
Alek embraced Eliot and pulled him close, their limbs entwining, their chests pressed tight together. Alek bussed a kiss over Eliot's forehead.
"We'll figure out a way to defeat that creature," he reassured softly. "I also think Duke was funding Newell's arms development and mercenary army."
"Agreed," Eliot murmured. "But is that the reason they're both dead now? Duke was shot by Leslie—which I admit surprised the heck out of me; he seemed so loyal—but Newell was, what, stung to death? How? By smog gnomes in a place without any smog? I don't get it."
"Me neither." Alek was stumped by the method of Newell's murder. If he had been killed by a smog gnome, how had it been done in a place without any smog? It made no sense. Changing the subject, he suggested, "We should go by the MERF laboratories tomorrow to warn them about those phase resonance weapons. We need to let them know the mythkin are in jeopardy."
"Agreed." Eliot sounded tired, his voice sluggish. A yawn confirmed as much.
Alek lifted his chin so he could plant a soft kiss on his lips. "Sleep. Good night, Eliot."
Eliot's dreamy eyes fell to half-mast. "Good night, Alek."
Holding Eliot in his arms through the night was the easiest thing Alek had ever done.
Chapter Twenty-Two
"What is that?" Eliot asked once they'd stepped into the elevator at the MERF labs.
Alek frowned, then growled, staring at the blinking red light going around the ceiling of the elevator. He drew his service weapon from his shoulder and shoved Eliot behind himself as they began their descent underground.
"It's the silent alarm. Something's wrong."
Eliot gasped, stepping to stand at Alek's back so that Alek would have a clear line of sight as the elevator stopped. "But the guard in the lobby upstairs seemed fine."
"He's a government employee, yes, but not with MERF. He's not in the know." Glancing over his shoulder, Alek met Eliot's gaze. "When those doors open, you will do whatever I say, got it? If I tell you to run, you run. If I tell you to stay down—"
"I stay down, check." Eliot wasn't about to argue. A bad feeling had sunk to the pit of his stomach. It was ice-cold dread. "I'll follow your lead, I promise."
By the time they reached the seventh floor below ground, they could already see through the double doors made of armored glass people in white lab coats lying on the floor, all unmoving.
"Jesus," Eliot breathed out, stepping back till he hit the elevator wall.
"Stay here until I check the perimeter," Alek growled out, his hunched position wary, his gun raised. He slunk out of the elevator and disappeared to the side.
Eliot focused on keeping his breathing level and listening for any weird sounds, like gunfire or scuffles. He moved closer to the doors so that he could keep them open with the tip of his shoe. He scanned the bodies scattered across the sunken steel-and-glass rotunda of the lobby. No one seemed to be alive. Fear gripped his heart, but he tried to rein in the frantic emotion.
A shadow appeared on the floor. Eliot gasped, hiding behind the corner.
"Eliot?" Alek's familiar voice called out.
Eliot exhaled and moved into view. "Right he
re. Are they all…?"
"Dead. Shot." Alek's grim expression spoke volumes.
His gaze was steadfast as he guided Eliot out of the elevator toward the side of the lobby where a lone guard station stood. It was a plain white desk with a laptop and a screen. No guards, dead or alive, were around. Eliot didn't even want to guess where they might be, perhaps caught in a fight somewhere in the facility, out of sight and out of hearing range.
On the wall behind the desk was a square-shaped metal safe. Alek opened a panel next to it and pressed his palm to the scanner which glowed blue. The safe popped open and Eliot could see a row of weapons and gear, including radios.
"Listen, I'm going to make an exception with you," Alek said—and handed Eliot a radio and a gun, which he accepted automatically. "These are for emergencies. This situation qualifies. We need to search the facility and find out where everyone is. Humans and mythkin. In order to be effective, we need to separate."
Eliot shook his head adamantly. "Alek, no. Are you crazy? Haven't you seen any horror movies? Splitting up is basically a guaranteed death sentence."
Alek snarled and grabbed Eliot roughly by the arm, yanking him closer. "We need to find out what's happened. I can't do that alone. We'll cover more ground if we separate. Eliot, I know you're not trained for this but, I promise you, you can do this."
Swallowing hard, Eliot tried to dampen his fears. "Y-yeah." Then he lifted the surprisingly heavy gun in his hand. Customer relations had taught Eliot human interaction, not armed conflict. "I don't know how to use this. And…I've never killed anyone."
"And you won't this time either," Alek reassured him. "The only weapons used at MERF labs are non-lethal, for security reasons. This is a tranquilizer gun. Mine is the only one using real bullets." He pointed to a tiny switch on the side. "See this? It's the safety. You have to turn it off to fire, understand?"
Flipping a switch didn't sound too hard, Eliot mused and nodded.