Page 46 of Xerxes Ascendant
Akira narrowed his eyes. “We’re not doing this.”
“Oh, yes we are.” Kyle shifted, tugging Akira’s knees forward so he couldn’t escape from where he was straddling Kyle’s thighs, keeping them face to face. “Spill.”
There was a twitch of amusement in Akira’s expression at the inappropriate word choice. “An eye for an eye,Sir,” he breathed, ghosting his lips over Kyle’s. “If you want it, you have to give it in turn.”
Heat sank into Kyle’s core and he realised that in Akira’s exceptionally horny mood, this had been a bad idea. “That wasn’t what I said.”
“No.” Fingers caught his chin when he tried to pull back, trapping him in place. The Master’s eyes gleamed. “It’s whatIsaid.”
Kyle wet his lips, noticing how Akira’s gaze intently followed his tongue. Stars. He might be the Dominant in their dynamic but it seemed Akira was matching him in it rather than using his sub side tonight. Kyle felt off balance, captured by not just his weight but the sheerpresenceof him.
“Not while you’ve got your sadist face on,” he said in an effort to regain some space, but Akira just laughed. Cold and dark and entirely remorseless.
“Come, Kyle,” he murmured, running his hands through his hair and tugging at it just hard enough to hurt. “Tell me what you liked when I had you at my mercy.”
Kyle shut his eyes. Akira was fucking cheating, looking at him like that. Like he was going to eat him whole.
“You didn’t enjoy my whip, I know that,” the man whispered into his ear, lips grazing the sensitive skin and making him shiver. “Nor when I had you in restraints. But you still got hard every time, sweetheart, and came so fucking quickly, so now you’re going to confess what did it for you when I was training you all those years ago.”
Kyle could have pretended to misunderstand. Answered with Akira’s submission, for his House training as a Dom had primarily involved the delectable yet emotionally distant man underhisheel, but it was clear that wasn’t what Akira meant.
He was talking about those rare scenes when Kyle had been required to experience their play from the other side to appreciate what his partners would be going through. When Akira had held him down and fucked him brutally into the carpet. Tied him up and teased him with sensation. Inflicted pain across his body with the hot and the sharp, the cold and the blunt.
Akira was right: he hadn’t enjoyed any of that. Kyle was a Dominant through and through, and while he understood the importance of the experience, he’d detested not having control of their scenes.
But he was also correct that Kyle had come hard and fast each time, and it wasn’t difficult to remember why.
“It was you, Akira,” he murmured. “Having all of your attention. Being the centre of your entire focus...”
His boyfriend went deathly still.
He’d clearly not expected that answer, and Kyle realised he’d fucked up. Maybe Akira wanted more from him than he could give; maybe he needed a switch like himself so he could fully express himself sexually and emotionally. Maybe Kyle’s inability to submit in the bedroom would tear them apart again, and would it really be so bad to fake it so he could keep him?
That felt nauseatingly dishonest and he could never go through with such a thing, but...but for a moment he had considered it. And he understood why Akira had lied to him in turn, because to keep him, Kyle would do nearly anything.
The difference between them was that Akira’s line was beyond his.
And that was okay. They weren’t the same person, and his man’s ruthless determination was part of what Kyle loved about him. He made decisions Kyle wouldn’t, and did things that Kyle couldn’t.
But if Akira didn’t feel the same way...
“Oh,Kyle,” he breathed, melting into his arms and instantly washing all those fears away. “You’re so perfect, you know that?”
Kyle, quickly recovering, snorted. “I amnot.”
“Believe it.” Each syllable was punctuated with a kiss, firm and breathless against his lips.
“You may not believe it yourself when you hear what I did,” Kyle said, because it hadn’t come up in his panicked tale earlier and Akira really should be made aware that his House now employed the mayor’s brother. If the Master hadn’t been so absent the last two nights, he might have noticed it himself, but as this was their first real chat, Kyle couldn’t justify neglecting to mention something so significant.
“Sweetheart.” Akira sighed. “Apart from not getting me off when I am begging for it, there is nothing you could do that would make me think worse of you.”
“We have a new employee.”
Akira sat back on his heels and gave him a thoroughly unimpressed glare. Dawn light was just beginning to filter through the rag-tag collection of buildings, gifting the air a fuzzy haze. “I retract what I just said. You know that’s a financial decision?”
“You-”
“Which I explicitly forbade you from making?”
