Chapter 96: Mine to Keep

Chapter 96: Chapter 96: Mine to Keep

Nero had imagined Sebastian entering his home often enough that the reality should have felt familiar.

It did not.

He stood just inside the doors to his personal wing and watched Sebastian move slowly through the main sitting room, taking in the tall windows overlooking the eastern gardens, the dark shelves built into the far wall, and the sunken fireplace surrounded by low couches Nero had chosen years ago because formal furniture irritated him in spaces meant for rest.

Sebastian looked completely natural there.

That was the first problem.

The second was how violently Nero wanted the sight to become permanent.

His mate was inside his home.

The word came with enough force that Nero’s breathing changed.

Mate.

They were engaged. The platinum rings were still being finished, the wedding had yet to happen, and Sebastian had not given him permission to mark him.

His instincts cared very little about administrative details.

Sebastian had chosen him.

He slept in Nero’s arms, reached for him without thinking, wore his affection openly now, and had walked willingly into the private space Nero had imagined sharing with him for years.

That was enough for the enigma.

Nero’s pheromones slipped into the room, smoke and burning wood spreading through halls where he normally kept them almost entirely contained.

Sebastian glanced back.

"This part of the palace feels different."

Nero crossed the remaining distance and rested one hand against his lower back.

"It is."

The contact steadied him for several seconds. Then Sebastian followed him into the library.

Two levels of dark shelving surrounded the central reading area, with a narrow upper gallery running beneath the glass ceiling. Sebastian immediately drifted toward the military shelves, trailing his fingers over several spines before pulling out an engineering text and checking the publication date.

Nero watched him.

He could already see the room changing.

Sebastian leaving books open across the table.

Sebastian complaining that the technical section needed updating.

Sebastian drinking coffee near the windows while pretending not to notice when Nero came in purely to look at him.

The images formed too easily.

Worse, they felt less like fantasies and more like memories that simply had not happened yet.

"You have an entire section on turbine systems."

"I knew you would inspect my library eventually."

Sebastian turned.

"You bought books in anticipation of me criticizing your collection?"

"Some of them."

"That is deeply strange."

Nero smiled.

Sebastian returned the book to the shelf and kept walking.

The private dining room produced another problem.

Sebastian paused near the smaller table overlooking the inner garden and rested one hand against the back of a chair.

"I like this one."

Nero’s mind supplied breakfast there tomorrow.

Dinner next week.

Sebastian, barefoot and sleepy, drinking coffee badly enough that Nero would eventually replace it with something stronger.

"We’ll use it."

Sebastian looked over.

"You already use it."

Nero’s gaze stayed on him.

"We."

The word settled heavily in Nero’s chest.

Sebastian’s expression softened before he moved toward the terrace doors.

Nero remained still for a moment, listening to something primitive inside him tighten.

Every room made it worse.

Every space Sebastian entered immediately began reorganizing itself around his presence in Nero’s imagination.

By the time they reached the bedroom, the fixation had grown sharp enough to feel physical.

Sebastian stepped inside and looked around.

The room occupied the eastern side of the private wing, with a broad bed against a paneled wall, a sitting area near the windows, and balcony doors overlooking the palace gardens. The adjoining dressing room extended beyond an open doorway, already large enough for another wardrobe despite Nero living there alone.

Sebastian’s eyebrows rose.

"This is excessive."

Nero leaned against the doorway.

"You’ll survive."

"The bedroom has its own sitting room."

"You complain when I work in bed."

"You should not be working in bed."

Nero barely heard him.

His attention had gone elsewhere.

Sebastian’s clothes beside his.

Sebastian’s watch on the nightstand.

Sebastian sleeping in that bed, dark hair spread over Nero’s pillows while morning light crossed his face.

The image struck deeper than the others.

Tomorrow.

Then another morning.

Then years of them.

Nero wanted repetition. Routine. Evidence everywhere that Sebastian lived there and had no intention of leaving.

The obsession he had carried for years had changed since Sebastian accepted him. Distance had once made longing simple in a brutal way: Nero wanted, Sebastian refused, and Nero endured because he had promised to wait.

Now Sebastian gave him pieces of what he had wanted.

Each piece created hunger for the next.

A kiss made Nero want every morning.

A shared bed made him want every night.

An engagement made marriage feel too far away.

The collars made the absence of a mark increasingly difficult to ignore.

Sebastian belonged beside him, and Nero’s instincts were beginning to treat that belief as fact rather than desire.

Stay.

Nero crossed the room.

Sebastian had moved toward the balcony, his hand resting on the glass door while he studied the gardens below.

Nero came up behind him and wrapped both arms around his waist.

Sebastian relaxed against him.

That tiny surrender sent something ugly and possessive through Nero’s chest.

He lowered his face into the side of Sebastian’s neck and breathed in.

"You’re clingy again."

"Yes."

Sebastian covered Nero’s hands with his own.

Nero closed his eyes.

He wanted to keep him there until Sebastian forgot any other place had ever been home.

The thought arrived without softness.

If someone tried to take Sebastian away, Nero would destroy them.

The possibility of Sebastian choosing to leave was worse.

Nero’s arms tightened before he caught himself.

He had promised choice.

He had built the last seven years around that promise, even while manipulating everything around Sebastian that did not violate it.

He would honor it.

He knew that.

The enigma beneath the promise was far less civilized.

It wanted permanence enforced by instinct, bond, scent, marriage, mark, and every other means available until separation became impossible.

Mine.

Nero kissed the side of Sebastian’s neck and forced himself to loosen his hold.

"There are people you should meet."

The senior household staff was waiting in the private reception room rather than the formal entrance hall, exactly as Nero had ordered. His steward stood near the front alongside the house manager, personal attendants, senior kitchen staff, private security, and the few employees who worked closely enough with Nero that Sebastian would encounter them regularly.

Sebastian slowed beside him.

"You organized this."

"Of course."

Nero kept his place at Sebastian’s side through every introduction.

Once the final name had been exchanged, he rested his hand against Sebastian’s back.

"Lord Sebastian Fitzgeralt will be residing in the private wing with me."

The room grew more attentive.

"He has full access to the residence and does not require separate authorization for anything concerning his own rooms, schedule, meals, belongings, or access to me."

Sebastian glanced toward him.

Nero continued calmly.

"His instructions regarding his personal affairs carry the same authority as mine, with one exception: medical restrictions remain under his physicians’ control, and nobody here is to help either of us circumvent them."

That produced the faintest amusement in Sebastian’s expression.

The steward inclined his head.

"Understood, Your Highness."

Nero let his gaze move across the room.

He wanted the message understood before Sebastian spent his first night there.

When the introductions ended, the staff dispersed quietly.

Sebastian waited until the doors closed behind the last attendant.

"You made that sound permanent."

Nero looked at him.

The instinctive answer rose immediately.

It is.

He kept the words behind his teeth and reached instead for a strand of dark hair that had fallen across Sebastian’s forehead.

"I wanted them to understand where you stand."

Sebastian studied him for a moment, then stepped closer until their shoulders touched.

The gesture calmed something inside Nero and fed something else.

He looked toward the corridor leading deeper into the residence.

Their residence.

The thought came effortlessly now.

Sebastian was here, inside Nero’s private rooms, wearing his engagement ring and planning to sleep in his bed.

Nero had wanted this for seven years.

Now that he finally had it, the idea of ever returning to empty rooms felt unbearable.