Page 70 of How to Bare Your Neck and Save a Wreck
Shane looked perfectly undone. His hair was mussed in the most majestic way possible, his cheeks lightly flushed. He’d wrapped Andres’s long necklace of rose gold and ruby around his own neck so many times that it was nearly a collar of its own. The layers of black and red, silk and lace, fell from his shoulder on one side and flowed around his petite body in a way that did nothing to hide the curves and angles beneath. He’d buttoned it low against his chest, one leg slipped gorgeously out of the side slit and the other propped up, the fabric bunched around his thigh. The fifteen-year-old in Andres wondered if he angled his body enough, whether he could see right up—
No, fuck, as delicious as Shane looked, swathed in the robe Andres had made with his own hands and spread out like he'd been brought near the verge of coming and denied at the last moment, this wasnotthe time for lust.
Shane sat up with a little whimper as Maul entered, pulling a pillow in front of him. The tension and fear that grew in him with each step Maul took was so real that Andres couldn’t be sure his words weren’t just as genuine. “Don’t let him touch me, master. Please.”
“Your money’s worth, huh.” Maul looked almost impressed, his gaze clearly roving Shane’s body like he was seeing all the places Andres’s hands had grabbed, imagining something Andres wanted no part in.
It made him sick. “He gives himself to me freely,” Andres clarified. “He enjoys the way I…carefor him. Don’t you, my pet?”
Shane ripped his gaze away from Maul long enough to land on Andres with such submissive longing that Andres wanted to wrap him up and kiss him until he was breathless, make himwhimper and squirm through more orgasms than he’d ever had in his life, and shower him with soft affection after.
“You can come to me now,” Andres told him, a depth to his dark growl that it would never have had if they’d kept their relationship masked and mysterious.
Shane all but flung himself at Andres, his robe whisking around him in a dance of fabric and lace. It settled as he tucked himself against Andres’s chest, pressing under his arm like that alone could hide him from Maul. Andres let him, holding him so tight he could feel the press of the little glucose monitor on the back of his arm, and kissing the top of his head.
Maul looked mildly disgusted. “Youdoactually care for him? How adorably pathetic.”
“You wouldn’t understand.” Andres bared his fangs. “You’ve never loved anything with flesh and blood.”
“Fair enough.” He shrugged. “Enjoy him all you want, just don’t come crying to me if he’s your downfall. If he’smydownfall though…”
“As I said, he does as he’s told,” Andres retorted. He steered Shane in front of him with gentle tugs and nudges. “Show him, my pet. Give me your neck.”
Shane’s obedience was immediate and flawless, his little sigh so immaculate even the best actor couldn’t have mimicked it. He tipped back his head, and Andres angled it sharply to the side, making him stretch. Shane didn’t protest, didn’t so much as tense, letting Andres hold him in place with a thumb and finger pressed into the soft spots underneath his jaw. With slow precision, Andres pricked a single fang into Shane’s skin.
Shane did tense then, but only for a second, loosening himself under what Andres hoped wasn’t too terrible a discomfort as he dragged that fang up the length of Shane’s neck, cutting a long, thin line through his skin. Blood began to bead from it. Andres licked it, sealing it as he lapped the blood.
A sound left Shane like he’d been shown something beautiful for the first time in his life, and once Andres had finished, Shane caved against him, his lashes fluttering.
Maul watched with growing fascination. The edge of his lips quirked. He took a step toward them, caressing one fang with his tongue. “If he listens to you so well, then tell him to let me bite him.” He smiled. “Just a little taste.”
The tremble that ran through Shane then was not the least bit sexy, and Andres could feel both their heart rates increase in tandem. And yet Shane didn’t squeeze the hand he wrapped around Andres’s. He would do this, Andres realized, love and horror intermingling. The mere thought of Maul still haunted Shane, but he’d suffer Maul’s bite if it meant he and Andres could be safe here.
But there was no fucking way Andres was going to trade any part of Shane for that.
“Go to hell,” he snapped. “Your fangs don’t belong in him. He is mine now. If you wanted him so badly you shouldn’t have sold him off.”
Maul opened his mouth, but Andres cut him off.
“No.” He scooted Shane behind himself, closing the final step between himself and Maul. “I think I’ve been insulted enough for one afternoon.”
One more step and they’d be fighting.
He hoped it didn’t come to that. God, if it did, could he win? Before this, he would have had a fair chance, but with the way his body had been reacting lately…
Maul watched, his lip curling. His fingers clenched. Then he laughed. “You really aren’t that boy I turned,” he said. There was no humor in his voice, only truth. “But you’re still my subordinate. Do you have something on Vitalis-Barron, something concrete and useful, or not? Because if you don’t, I’msure I can find another little thief who wants my paycheck, a house, and a plaything.”
Andres felt the threat like a kick to the gut. His fingers ached to run through his hair, curl his head down, pull back into the corner like it could protect him, even though he knew it couldn’t; knew it like the grip of Maul’s fingers into his collar when Andres’s early jobs hadn’t gone so well, the hiss through his boss’s teeth as he’d shoutedwhy did I even turn you if you were just going to fuck everything up, huh?Andres wasn’t certain how far this particular threat expanded—whether Maul was prepared simply to fire him and kick him out of the house he technically owned, or to dispose of him the way Andres suspected he occasionally did with his less desirable underlings and create himself a new Andres, fangs and all. Either way, Andres couldn’t push Maul that far. Hewouldfollow through, if not this time, then next.
“Andres,” Maul said, flat and deadly.
Andres swallowed. “I’ll send you what I’ve found.”
But his boss didn’t budge. “Then send it.”
Andres didn’t have to ask whether he meant now. He withdrew his phone casually, like it wasn’t killing him to hand over such delicate material, and tried not to flinch when Maul tipped the edge of his screen in order to see it. The sent message made his gut sink.
But Maul would learn all of this once Shane’s article came out. He was an asshole, and a selfish bastard, and whatever he did with the information Wesley and Vincent had gathered, it would not beforthe betterment of his community, but it would help them. It had to. Maul wanted vampires on the streets, if only so they could pay him.
