Page 81 of Gemini Kings
His own mom beat him like a 1950s reform school nun and made him feel ashamed.
Like his suffering was his fault.
“Holy fucking shit. That… that issonot okay.” The lightning lurks in my voice. I’m so upset I can barely get the words out.
That’s child abuse.
It’s fuckingchild abuse.
God damn it. His mom’s a monster. If I ever meet his Lady Mother, I swear I’m gonna kill that bitch.
And where the fuck was Rasputin Senior lurking during all this?
“There is no… Senior.” A little humor lightens his flat tone. “My mother does not wed her mates when she rises. Her way was always to mate them and then kill them. That is why I am now the last. My brothers, they are merely wyverns.”
“Jesus. No wonder there aren’t any left,” I mutter. “Fuck, that’s psychotic.”
In fact, there’s so much crazy to unpack in what he just said that I’m gonna need a bellboy to help me schlep all that baggage.
But here’s the bottom line.
This guy was raised without a father, even a shit father like mine. He’s basically been abused and brutalized by his whole damn family.
My heart aches like a bruise. I want to wrap myself around him from behind.
But I’m afraid of what will happen if I do.
Instead I release the wet weight of his hair to float free in the water and skim both hands gently down his back, letting him know without words that there’s nothing shameful in these scars, not for him or for me.
He shudders under my touch and whines low in his throat. That’s his dragon, I know it.
His dragon is… keening.
And fuck it, fuck this superheat, fuck me, fuck everything. I slide my arms around his waist and tuck up against the back of him. The shock of his body races all down my front, sparked by the scrape of my lace-covered nipples against his back, the press of the front of my thighs against the back of his, the nudge of his bare ass against my belly.
Need pulses between us, glowing red and hot in the moonlight.
But that’s not what I’m doing here. I’m trying to offer comfort. I’m fighting like hell to keep my libido locked down and my motives straight.
In my arms, he’s absolutely rigid. He’s not touching back. It’s like he’s afraid of being touched. He’s afraid of being touched from behind.
Well, no wonder, given the state of his back. Hasn’t anyone ever touched him with love?
So much about him clicks into place in my brain.
Now an awful suspicion rears its head. I lean close and growl in his hair, “You know no one here’s ever gonna do that to you, right? There’s plenty to eat. I’m, uh, a benevolent ruler and I definitely don’t go around scourging people. Even Lucius is, like, gentle under all that wolf.”
Under my touch, his lean body vibrates with something like a chuckle.
“Lucius’ nature is not gentle. He is alpha, and he is fierce, especially in defense of his pack. But this is as it should be.” His tone shifts from humor to something more complex. “As for you, my Zara… you will rule as your nature demands. And I… I will find my place in your world. As you must do in mine.”
That right there’s my cue to stop touching him.
But I can’t.
I flatten my palms along his belly, which goes a long way toward distracting him from the conditioned fear of having anyone (even me) behind him. He’s all hot skin stretched over sinew and bone and dragon.
And I just know if I… ease my hands down a bit… I’ll find that stiff barbed cock of his standing straight up for me.
