“I saw enough.” Nix’s expression turned thoughtful. “He’ll be good for Kai, I think. He’s…sweet.”
“He was allowed to be.”
“So bitter, Vanya.”
Nix straightened from the doorway and prowled closer, circumventing the desk to come up behind Ivan’s chair. Normally Ivan wouldn’t allow someone in that position—letting someone into his blind spot was asking for a bullet to the back of the head—but he was feeling…heavy tonight. Who cared if the incubus snapped his neck?
Then again, Nix couldn’t. He wasn’t allowed to hurt Ivan, so he wouldn’t. It was a simple equation, and he was the only person in the world Ivan could say that about.
If only everyone was held to such constraints.
Ivan picked up another piroshki.
Nix’s voice was quiet behind him. “You’re softer with him.”
“Sascha?” Ivan asked, almost laughing at the thought. Saschawould surely have something to say about such an accusation. To say he would disagree was putting it lightly.
“Sergei.”
Ivan paused, the piroshki held to his lips. “He raised me,” he said eventually.
“And now he’s betrayed you. How tragic.” The words could have been sarcastic, but Nix didn’t sound taunting. That spiced, smoked scent he carried around with him drifted to Ivan’s nose.
Ivan suddenly wished he could see his face.
Fingers carded through Ivan’s hair, and he dropped the piroshki in an instant, uncaring where it landed, closing his eyes and leaning back into the touch. He didn’t exactly groan, but it was close.
“Is this part of the contract?” he asked, his voice strangely hoarse. “Tending to me?”
The fingers in his hair stilled, then started up again. “Sure. You can say that, if you want.”
What Ivan wanted was too difficult a question for the moment.
For now, Ivan needed a moment. Just…a moment, being touched by someone who wasn’t cruel, or conniving, or indifferent.
So he let Nix play with his hair, the touch eventually evolving into more of a scalp massage, Nix’s fingers firm and confident and perfect. Ivan wasn’t sure how long it lasted. Minutes. Hours. Centuries. Nix didn’t make it sexual, even when Ivan finally groaned at a particularly firm bit of pressure. When he was done, Nix only patted Ivan’s head, then walked around the desk, plopping into the chair across from him, his tail hanging over the side.
Ivan blinked blearily at him, then poured himself another glass. “It took me longer than it should have, to realize who my mole was,” he said, even though Nix hadn’t asked him.
Maybe it was the visit from Sergei, the reminder of old times, that was making Ivan chatty.
Or maybe it was just the vodka.
“I hadn’t been able to fathom it. He’s known Sascha since he was a baby.”
Nix leaned his chin on one hand, his pretty eyes fixed on Ivan. “Why did he do it?”
“I don’t know.” Ivan let out a bitter laugh. “I haven’t asked. But he was the only one who knew where Sascha would be and when. He thought to frame the driver, but Sascha had sent his driver away the night before without telling us. He’d bribed him to keep quiet about it.”
“And does Sergei know you know?”
“Not yet.”
“And how long are you going to keep him at your side?” There was no judgment in Nix’s gaze, no sign that he thought Ivan was an idiot for not acting sooner. Only consideration.
“Not much longer.” Despite his occasionally maudlin thoughts, Ivan didn’t have a death wish. Keeping Sergei at his side indefinitely would be beyond foolish. His current hesitation was risky enough.
Nix studied him in that way of his. Like he was seeing through every bit of Ivan, right down to the core. “You don’t want to hurt him,” he surmised.
