Under the Skin (16 page)

It galled him to see it, but that didn’t mean Alexei had worn the same expression, no matter how tenderly his arms encircled the other man, no matter how intimate it had appeared as he whispered in the mob boss’s ear. Patrick could easily imagine them as lovers, though. Alexei wouldn’t have to sneak around to meet with Konstantin, not like he did to meet with Patrick, and while Alexei had said that the
vory
frowned on homosexuality, it would still be safer than being caught with a cop. He and Alexei hadn’t made any promises, hadn’t talked about exclusivity or anything else, although their meetings in the warehouse and since had led Patrick to believe Alexei wanted it, even if he couldn’t ask for or promise it. Had he been wrong? Had it been just a ploy to get Patrick to agree to have sex that night?

Almost immediately, Patrick scolded himself for his doubts. Alexei wasn’t such a good actor that he could pretend to the depth of tenderness he’d shown that night and since then if he didn’t feel something at least. Patrick owed it to them both to allow Alexei to explain what had happened on the docks without accusation. And if he wasn’t satisfied with the answer, he could always leave. Stripping down, he wrapped a towel around his waist and walked into the steam room.

The litter of crushed cigarettes at his feet gave evidence to how long Alexei had been waiting for Patrick’s arrival, but his expression was calm as he acknowledged his lover’s entrance. “Your supervisors are pleased?” he asked, quirking an eyebrow when Patrick seated himself on the bench opposite the one Alexei lounged on rather than joining him. “You brought them very rich catch.”

“Curious how I managed,” Patrick admitted, “but very pleased. They still want to talk to Konstantin, but the new arrests will keep them busy for a few more hours.” Despite his resolutions in the locker room, he couldn’t keep a sharp note out of his voice as he said the other
vor
’s
name, his eyes fixed on Alexei’s face as he searched for a reaction.

So he had not misjudged the look of surprised betrayal on Patrick’s face when he had held Konstantin back during the raid of the aborted drug deal. It was a delicate business to guide the younger man without letting him realize he was being led, though so far Alexei had managed it. That he made use of whatever means were at his disposal was not something he would prefer to share with his lover. “Konstantin was—concerned when your men arrived,” Alexei offered. “He is impulsive—acts without thinking. That is dangerous. I needed to keep him from drawing attention to himself.”

Patrick felt foolish when he heard the reasonable explanation, but a part of him still hurt, questioning the other man’s role in Alexei’s life. “I didn’t like seeing your arms around another man,” he admitted bluntly, “regardless of the reason.”

Alexei rose to his feet with the grace of a stalking panther, his towel falling to the floor as he crossed to Patrick’s seat. Bracing his palms against the tiled wall on either side of his lover’s head, he bent forward, his breath warm against the younger man’s ear. “Forget Konstantin,” he murmured, his lips moving over the light trace of stubble on Patrick’s cheek. “He means nothing.” When Patrick’s lips opened to protest, Alexei silenced them with his own, his tongue sweeping into his lover’s mouth, stealing his voice and his breath with the passion of his kiss.

All thought of Konstantin, indeed of anything beyond the press of Alexei’s lips against his, gone, Patrick reached up, grabbing Alexei’s hips and pulling his lover to straddle him, bringing their bodies into greater contact. The adrenaline that lingered from the sting was making him horny as hell, and Alexei wasn’t discouraging him. He stripped away his own towel, leaving nothing between them but a distance he very quickly closed, moaning when he felt the naked brush of his lover’s cock against his. Alexei, it seemed, was as horny as he was.

Patrick’s unrestrained response set a match to the passion that always smoldered beneath the surface of Alexei’s façade—a passion only this man would ever sate. Lowering himself to his knees on the wooden bench, Alexei sucked at his lover’s tongue, drawing it into his mouth as his body covered the man beneath him. When he hitched his hips, the head of his cock traced a trail over his lover’s sweat-covered belly. Patrick moaned and Alexei spread his knees farther, molding them closer, his lover’s rigid shaft sliding between the damp cleft of Alexei’s cheeks. Patrick threw his head back with a groan, hard enough to strike the sauna’s tiled wall. Alexei’s palm slid to cup the back of his lover’s skull, his mouth following down the straining tendons of Patrick’s neck, shifting just enough to drag himself over Patrick’s shaft with a friction that made them both gasp.

Not even the bite of pain when his head connected with the wall could blunt the sharp spike of desire that drove through Patrick when his erection slid damply against Alexei’s ass. He’d resigned himself to bottoming when he accepted Alexei as his lover, but the sudden reversal in positions made him yearn to sink inside the other man’s body. Alexei would be hot around him, and so tight…. His hands tightened on his lover’s shoulders as Alexei ground their bodies together. His control wavered precariously as he fought the climax already building within him. “Lyosha!” he gasped.

He was already so close he could come from just this, Alexei realized, but as good as the rough, slick frottage felt, his balls ached to empty themselves in Patrick’s heat. “Put your legs around me,” he rasped hoarsely. The change in angle as Patrick followed his order dragged the head of Patrick’s cock over his hole. His muscles clenched involuntarily, and Patrick wailed and stiffened against him, the wetness of his release slickening Alexei’s crease, letting them slide against each other even more readily.

The muscles in Patrick’s thighs trembled as he struggled to keep them around Alexei’s waist after he came, but the sudden, unexpected orgasm robbed him of the adrenaline rush, leaving him limp with satiation. He slumped to one side, his arms around his lover’s neck drawing Alexei down on top of him and pressing the other man’s still-hard cock against his belly. “You didn’t come,” he observed dazedly, trying to make his hand work so he could bring his lover some respite.

His palm following the graceful curve of his sated lover’s flank, Alexei settled into the gap between his legs. Scarred fingers traced the juncture of thigh and buttocks before delving into the path between them, Patrick’s shudder at the touch heightening his need to feel that contraction around his own throbbing cock. Even as he moved to position himself to sink into the beckoning heat, Alexei cursed and straightened, hating to pull away from Patrick’s embrace even for the brief moment it would take to retrieve the condom and lube from the shelf on the other side of the steam-filled room.

“Don’t,” Patrick murmured, hands tightening on Alexei’s shoulders when he felt his lover starting to pull away. “We don’t need them. You told me you’re clean. Just make love to me.” His cock jumped at the thought of feeling Alexei inside him with nothing between them.

“You are sure?” Alexei insisted, his pulse quickening at the image of sliding into Patrick without even the thin veil of latex separating them, taking him not in anger this time, but in—

Alexei bit off the thought before he could complete it, his pale eyes searching Patrick’s darker ones for any sign of hesitancy.

Patrick gazed back up at him with absolute certainty. “I’m sure.” As if to prove his point, he bucked his hips against Alexei’s, reinforcing the offer physically.

As desperately as he longed to give in to his lover’s temptation, Alexei would do nothing else to recall the brutality of the first time he had taken Patrick without protection. Reaching behind himself to where Patrick’s come still clung between his cheeks, he slicked his fingers in the creamy fluid, using the coated digits to gently breach the entrance to his lover’s body. Twisting and stretching the tight ring of muscle until it loosened around him, Alexei swiped a rough fingertip over the nub of Patrick’s prostate, a smug grin twitching his lips as the slender shaft stiffened and bobbed to renewed life.

Alexei needn’t have worried. Patrick’s thoughts couldn’t have been further from the episode on the boat, not when his lover was touching him so tenderly, so thoroughly. He writhed eagerly on the invading fingers, trying to keep them within him as they danced across his gland. “Fuck!” he gasped when Alexei pressed especially firmly on his sensitive spot. He could feel his cock swelling again, beginning to leak more sticky fluid onto his stomach. Running his palm through the puddle, he encircled his lover’s erection, coating it. “In me… now.”

More than ready to comply, Alexei sank deep into Patrick’s welcoming channel in one long, smooth glide. Even when his balls pressed against his lover’s ass, it wasn’t far enough, wasn’t deep enough. Alexei suspected it would never be enough. Wedging his hands beneath Patrick’s buttocks, he lifted him closer, sinking another fraction of an inch deeper. “Your legs—on my shoulders,” he husked, rolling his hips to stir in the clinging passage, the wet clasp around his bare skin sending waves of pleasure coursing through his veins.

Patrick hastened to do as Alexei asked, the vulnerability of the position another intimacy, a new gift he could offer his lover along with the gift he offered each time they were together. The new angle pressed the tip of Alexei’s erection directly against Patrick’s prostate, sending fresh paroxysms of desire through him. “Lyosha,” he groaned, unable to give voice to the emotions coursing through him.

“Patya,” Alexei answered, drawing back until only the swollen head of his cock stretched the pliant opening and then thrusting back again firmly, groaning at the friction against his naked shaft.
My Patya
, his heart insisted, though he would never speak the words aloud. His hips finding an instinctive rhythm, he leaned forward, closing his lips around a tawny nipple as the claim echoed with each pulse of his blood.
My Patya. My Patya. Mine.

Despite his earlier climax, Patrick was not proof against the passion rising through him again. Alexei’s shaft nudged his prostate with every pass, inciting his nerves to riot. Gasping with each direct hit, Patrick buried his fingers in Alexei’s hair, keeping his lover’s mouth on his nipple. He was exquisitely sensitive there, a fact too many of his past lovers had never bothered to discover. That Alexei had only endeared him to Patrick more, if that was possible. Patrick sincerely doubted it. He was already irrevocably in love, though he couldn’t admit it, even to his lover. He couldn’t say what was in his heart, but he could say other things. “Love… what you… do… to me,” he moaned between harsh breaths, his head tossing from side to side as his second orgasm neared.

Love
. Just the word, gasped in Patrick’s impassioned voice, was enough to set Alexei trembling on the verge of release. He knew Patrick meant only their physical loving, but now, in this moment, buried inside his lover, every barrier gone, Alexei could not deny what he himself felt. “
Ya tebya lyublyu
,” he groaned, claiming Patrick’s mouth as his orgasm claimed him, spilling himself into Patrick’s body, driving deep through the spiraling surge of pleasure until he carried his lover with him, the fierce constriction around his bare cock intensifying his own climax.

The haze of passion sated for a time, the discomfort of the hard tile sifted into Patrick’s consciousness again, making him squirm uneasily.

Feeling Patrick move restlessly beneath him, Alexei shook off his post-orgasmic lassitude and gently lowered his lover’s legs from his shoulders, moving slowly enough to allow them to remain joined as he settled atop Patrick. Reality would intrude between them again soon enough—he would prolong these rare moments when they were one for as long as he could. Stretching an arm to the floor, he captured an abandoned towel and slid it below Patrick to cushion his head. “Better?” he asked, the quiet query bearing little resemblance to his usual curt tone.

“Yeah,” Patrick murmured. “Thanks.” The unexpected tenderness had an unintended result, though, bringing back painful thoughts of Alexei’s arms around Konstantin on the wharf that evening. Alexei had held Konstantin in much the same way he was now holding his lover. Patrick told himself again that there could be plenty of reasonable explanations. Now he just hoped Alexei would give him one. “What is Konstantin to you?” he asked softly, trying to keep any accusation out of his voice. He couldn’t keep the hurt out of it, however. “And don’t tell me he’s nothing. You protect him too much for him to mean nothing to you.”

“Konstantin will be head of family now. Is my job to protect him,” Alexei answered, offering what truth he could, all too aware of what he left unsaid. He hated the continued deception, but the risk was too great, not least the risk to Patrick himself should he come to the attention of the
vory
.

“I should have arrested him tonight too,” Patrick said softly, hating how Alexei’s expression closed, shutting him out again. “He’s as bad or worse than the men we took in. I’ll still have to find him, tomorrow if not tonight.”

“I make sure he comes to answer questions, but you must understand. Konstantin was born
vor
,” Alexei tried to explain, wondering if Patrick could truly comprehend what that meant. “To him, it is birthright. Is all he knows, all he has been taught.” He exhaled deeply, pushing the hair back off his forehead. “In a way, he still follows orders.” That they would be
his
orders now rather than Fyodor’s, that he would do all he could to temper the worst atrocities of Fyodor’s legacy without rousing the suspicions of his volatile master or the other leaders of the
vory
—
that was not something Alexei could confess to his lover. Not if he ever hoped to see him again, and he did not know if he could continue on if he lost Patrick now.

“It doesn’t make him less reprehensible,” Patrick countered, though he was not so lost to sensitivity that he couldn’t pity the man. “God, Alexei, the things he’s ordered you to do! Can you really forgive him for that, really overlook it? I know you aren’t the heartless bastard you pretend to be. I could understand it when his father was still around to take revenge if you failed, but now… all you’d have to do is let me take him and you’d be free of him. Free of them.”