Chapter 131: Earn It

Chapter 131: Chapter 131: Earn It

By the time Sebastian finished showering, he had already decided that Roberta’s restrictions were considerably more irritating once they followed him home.

Not because he objected to any of them.

The marking prohibition made sense. So did suppressing fertility until the organs currently developing inside him had finished becoming something Roberta trusted. Even the warning about rough sex was reasonable after the window had transformed a constitutional meeting into an exercise in pain management.

Reasonable did not make the conversation any less humiliating.

Sebastian shut off the water and stepped onto the heated stone floor, dragging a towel through his hair before wrapping another around his waist. The bathroom still held enough steam to cloud the upper half of the mirrors, though the ventilation had already begun clearing the glass near the sinks.

He dried his hair properly before leaving.

Walking into the bedroom with damp hair generally resulted in Nero deciding his pheromones were a more efficient hair dryer, and Sebastian did not have the patience to explain again that producing enough controlled heat to dry another human being was deeply unnecessary.

The suite beyond was quiet.

Nero’s voice carried faintly from somewhere near the sitting room.

Sebastian paused outside the bathroom door.

"...because the secondary rotation was supposed to remain unchanged."

Hale.

Or, more accurately, Nero talking to Hale.

The chief of security had gone home for the week after Sebastian informed him that having accumulated enough unused leave to qualify as a small historical period was not an achievement. Hale had objected until Nero sided with Sebastian, mostly because even Nero understood that a fifty-seven-year-old man who had served their family for more than three decades occasionally deserved to sit in his own house.

Apparently, leave had lasted less than twenty-four hours before somebody called him anyway.

Sebastian caught something about a temporary protection roster, an authorization code, and one of the senior officers misunderstanding whether Duncan’s newly expanded authority applied inside the Crown Prince’s private wing.

His interest died immediately.

He walked into the bedroom.

The evening sun had turned the suite warm gold, catching against the pale wood wardrobes and the glass doors leading to the balcony. Nero’s jacket lay folded across the back of an armchair, the blue shirt from earlier replaced by a softer ivory one with a narrow bronze pattern embroidered along the cuffs. He had changed his trousers too, choosing a warm brown pair that sat lower on his hips and looked considerably more comfortable than anything he had worn to work.

Nero himself was nowhere in sight.

His voice still came from the adjoining sitting room.

Sebastian crossed toward the dressing area, one hand holding the towel securely at his waist while he considered whether retrieving actual clothing was worth the effort.

The call ended.

Silence followed.

Sebastian reached for the first drawer.

Two arms closed around him from behind.

He startled hard enough that his hand struck the drawer front.

"What the—"

Nero’s face disappeared against his neck.

Sebastian looked over his shoulder.

"Where did you come from?"

"The sitting room."

"You were there half a second ago."

"I walk quickly."

"You materialized."

Nero ignored that accusation in favor of taking a slow breath against the skin beneath Sebastian’s ear.

Sebastian relaxed despite himself as Nero’s chest settled against his back.

The new scent had become Nero’s latest obsession with impressive speed.

It was still faint enough that Sebastian rarely noticed it unless he concentrated, but Nero apparently detected every fluctuation as though Sebastian had begun walking around with an alarm system installed under his skin.

Nero inhaled again.

Sebastian laughed softly.

"You smelled me from the other room, didn’t you?"

"I heard the bathroom door."

"That answer was suspiciously reasonable."

Nero’s mouth brushed his neck.

His hands moved.

One palm flattened against Sebastian’s stomach while the other slid slowly along his side, fingers tracing over ribs and waist before returning to his abdomen.

Sebastian looked down.

"What are you doing?"

"Checking."

"For what?"

"Changes."

Sebastian turned his head enough to see part of Nero’s face.

"You think I developed an organ between Roberta’s office and the shower?"

Nero’s hand spread over his lower abdomen.

"I want to know if I can feel anything."

"You cannot."

"I might."

"You heard the same explanation I did. Most of it is internal."

Nero hummed against his throat, apparently unwilling to accept medical reality without conducting his own examination.

His palm moved higher, skimmed across Sebastian’s chest, then down again with absolutely no clinical consistency.

Sebastian caught his wrist.

"That stopped being medical very quickly."

"It was never medical."

"At least you’re honest."

Nero kissed the side of his neck.

His other hand slid around Sebastian’s waist, fingertips brushing the upper edge of the towel before moving upward again when Sebastian gave him a warning glance through the mirror.

Nero’s reflection looked entirely unrepentant.

The ivory shirt made his white-blond hair appear almost luminous in the evening light, several long strands falling over Sebastian’s bare shoulder as Nero leaned around him.

Sebastian studied them in the mirror.

"Was Hale’s emergency resolved?"

"It wasn’t an emergency."

"I gathered that after losing interest thirty seconds into the conversation."

"One of the officers wanted clarification about access hierarchy while Hale is away."

"And somehow the kingdom survived."

"Barely."

Sebastian snorted.

Nero’s mouth returned to the point beneath his ear where Sebastian’s scent seemed strongest.

He breathed in deeply.

Sebastian’s fingers loosened around his wrist.

"You really like it."

Nero lifted his head just enough to meet Sebastian’s eyes in the mirror.

"I waited my entire life without knowing what you would smell like."

That caught Sebastian off guard.

Nero’s hand moved slowly over his stomach again, but the touch had softened, curiosity replacing the earlier mischief.

"For years, you had the dominant-alpha profile everyone knew," Nero continued. "Then that disappeared, and for months there was almost nothing except traces of me on you."

Sebastian leaned back against him.

"And now?"

Nero lowered his face to Sebastian’s neck.

"Now you smell like yourself again."

Warmth moved through Sebastian that had very little to do with the shower.

He let Nero nuzzle him for several seconds before the wandering hand at his waist started becoming ambitious again.

Sebastian laughed.

"There it is."

Nero paused.

"There what is?"

"The actual purpose of this inspection."

"I can have multiple purposes."

"You have exactly one at the moment."

Nero’s gaze dropped in the mirror.

The towel suddenly felt considerably less substantial.

Sebastian turned within his arms, forcing Nero to loosen his hold until they stood face-to-face.

Nero looked down at him with the particular expression Sebastian had already learned to distrust: pupils widening, mouth relaxed, attention very obviously no longer on security rotations.

Sebastian put one hand against his chest.

Roberta’s voice echoed conveniently in his memory.

No unnecessary rough sex.

No excessive strain.

No pretending pheromones made pain irrelevant.

Nero’s hands settled carefully at Sebastian’s waist.

Sebastian raised an eyebrow.

"You remember the lecture?"

"Every word."

"Good."

Nero leaned closer.

Sebastian stopped him with two fingers against his mouth.

The enigma stared down at them.

"If you want sex," Sebastian said, amusement already pulling at the corner of his mouth, "you’re going to have to work for it."

Nero’s violet eyes sharpened immediately.

Sebastian saw the challenge register.

Then Nero smiled.

The dangerous one.

"Define work."

Sebastian laughed and stepped out of his arms before Nero could turn the question into an answer.

"That," he said, tightening the towel around his waist as he headed toward the dressing room, "is your problem."