Page 17 of The Kingpin's Omega Lover
“I admireyou, Malori. I don’t care that you’re omega male. It’s part of you, but it does not wholly define who you are, or your value to the rest of the world. You’re more than a slick hole and a womb. You have so much more value than that.”
Malori’s eyes burned but he refused to give in. He would not allow King to see him cry. “Do you only think that because you have an omega brother?”
“Honestly?” King stepped closer, arms still crossed, dark eyes intensely focused on Malori. “Yes, in a way. Before I knew about Kens, I believed the worst propaganda about the place of women and omega males in our society. I was gross and wrong. After he presented as omega, Kensley was still the same brother I loved and valued. But my own deep-rooted misogyny was a huge factor in my choice to send him to the abbey. I wanted him protected from men who thought like I did.Then. I promise I don’t believe those things anymore. You are my equal in every way, and you deserve the same protections as anyone else.
“I know it’s horrible, Mal, but sometimes it does take it happening to us for a person to finally care. And when we do care, we care a lot.”
Malori wrapped his arms around his belly and took a single step back, shoulders hunching, trying to parse everything King had told him. “But you were abused, too. How could you think other people deserved being treated that way?”
“Because back then it wasn’t about anyone else. It was aboutmysurvival. And I thought that the only way to survive was to stand on the broken backs of others, and I didn’t care whose back or how it was broken. I wanted to be on top, safe, not vulnerable to another man’s attack ever again. But there are other ways to survive that don’t require me to hurt others. I can be at the top without trampling on innocent people. I don’t want to be the kind of leader who hurts others simply because I can.”
“Only if they deserve it,” Malori said softly, thinking of today’s kill. The kill he’d desperately wanted to make and had been furious at King for pulling the trigger (literally or metaphorically, Malori didn’t know, and he would never ask).
“I want to kill, too!”
“Only if they deserve it,” King repeated, and suddenly he was right in front of Malori. Warm hands rested on Malori’s shoulders, and Malori looked up, into dark, simmering eyes. “I don’t care what kind of person you were before the Farm. I don’t care if you dealt drugs, stole from poor widows to feed your habit, or even if you sold yourself to survive. There are very few things on my list of actions that could make someone deserve three-plus years of physical torture and repeated rapes. And I can’t fathom the additional emotional torture of losing two children.”
“I didn’t lose them.” Malori snarled, hating when people phrased it like that. As if Malori had misplaced them in a shopping mall. “They were stolen.”
“You’re right, I’m sorry.”
“Good.” He gazed at King, his own arms falling to his sides, torn in two directions. He wanted to kiss King again, to shove the bigger man backward onto that plush couch and pounce. To see how far King would really allow things to go between them. But he was also enjoying this quiet moment of understanding, of truly connecting with another human being over their shared pain, and the promises King had made to avenge Malori’s specific pain. “So why did you walk away?”
King blinked several times. “When?”
“Earlier in the gym. I was thanking you for saving my life, and you got all stiff, abrupt, and then you left. It’s like you realized what you were kissing and needed to get out of there.”
“Please, don’t call yourself a what.” King slid one hand up to cup the side of Malori’s neck, and Malori nearly purred from thegentle touch. “I always knew exactly who I was kissing. I know exactly who is in my arms right now. I got a little scared that we weren’t on the same page about why.”
Malori rested his own palms over King’s bare chest, adoring the fact that King had admitted to being scared. Most men in King’s position would never say such a thing, never admit to such a fatal weakness. “Why were you kissing me, King?”
“Because I’m attracted to you. Because you knocked me on my ass and kept me there. Because one taste of you was not enough, and I meant it when I told you to take what you wanted. I wasn’t lying to you in the moment, and I won’t take it back. I’ll clear the rest of my day and tomorrow, if that’s what you want.”
Malori’s stomach twisted with an unfamiliar combination of arousal and fear. He slid his left hand down King’s chest to his hip, and then around to rest over the top of his ass. “You’d really let me fuck you?”
“Yes.” Not a second’s hesitation.
He closed his eyes and could see it. See King naked on that big bed, ass in the air, cheeks spread and ready for Malori’s cock. He could see himself doing something he’d never done before, an act that had been forced upon him countless times. He could see himself taking that power back by using another person. But—“Have you ever? Before?”
“Willingly let someone fuck me? No.”
“Fuck.” Malori broke free of their embrace and took several long steps backward, until he nearly hit the wall.
“What’s wrong? I’m telling you I want this, Mal.”
“I don’t want it. Not like this.”
“Not alone in my bedroom when I’m telling you I want to make love with you?”
“No.” He couldn’t explain it to himself, much less to King, and he’d never manage while King was looking at him with hisentire heart in his eyes. Make love. Fuck. “Let me know when we’re going to the shooting range.”
Before he could change his mind, Malori turned and fled.
SIX
“Where’s the goddamn update!”King slammed his open palm down on his desk and glared at the phone he’d jostled, which was on speaker. Across from him, leaning forward in his chair, Bishop raised his eyebrows at King’s errant shout. King ignored the look, uninterested in his best friend’s opinion on King’s bad mood.
“I’m sorry, sir, but there’s nothing new to report today,” Julian replied. “We’re constantly monitoring the facial recognition program, but every hit we get is a dead end.”
