“I’m not a child just because I’d only ever one had lover before you and Nikoly. Well, a lover of a kind.” Tiiran put his nose in the air. “I know how most affairs work, even the ones outside the library. Whatever Nikoly says, I wasn’t that jealous.”
“Rubbish liar.” Orin clucked his tongue. “You ran from us, Tiiran.”
“Because I wasn’t special anymore!” Tiiran huffed at him, throwing his free hand around in a wild gesture. “But of course I wasn’t. I realize that now. It was just a stupid fantasy I didn’t know I had, and it doesn’t matter anymore. I was wrong.” He rubbed his chest. “I do admit when I’m wrong. I’m not some Master Keeper with shit for brains and too much self-importance.”
Orin opened, then shut, his mouth. He waited several beats to speak. “And Nikoly’s lovers? You weren’t upset at the idea of them touching him?”
Tiiran looked to the side. “I… knew they would be better than me. And I was imagining foolish things, as I said.” A tiny growl escaped. “But people who are only dazzled by his face shouldn’t be allowed to touch him. They don’t see that he’s lonely, and hungry, and takes on far too much just to… just to please me.”
Orin rose to his feet, forcing Tiiran to step back or get onto his toes. “And me?”
“You’re allowed to touch him.” That didn’t sound how Tiiran had intended. “If Nikoly wants you to, of course. Which he does. He thinks you’re beautiful, because you are.”
Orin put a hand over Tiiran’s mouth. “I meant, are people allowed to touch me according to your rules? That doesn’t upset you?”
Tiiran took hold of Orin’s wrist and Orin let him lower his hand so Tiiran could speak. “I don’t like it.” Another tiny growl. “But I accept that it will happen because you’re so very attractive and compelling, Orin, and—”
Orin shoved him backwards onto the bed.
The mattress rocked. The contents of the tray rattled and sloshed until Orin picked it up and moved it to the chair. Then he stood over Tiiran, who was now on his back, naked in front of a fully dressed Orin.
Orin seemed to like the view. “Whatever you are trying to convince me of, remember I am not one of your assistants.”
“I don’t know what that means.” Tiiran briefly put his thighs together but that didn’t make him any less naked. His skin was flushing with embarrassed heat but so was his mind. Tiiran liked to be humiliated, Nikoly had claimed. Tiiran only knew that after a while, the burning, embarrassed sensation was so strong that he couldn’t think anymore, and with Orin, he liked that. He met Orin’s hot stare. “But obviously you aren’t an assistant. You’re Orin. Assistants whisper aboutyou.”
“So I must want to tup all of them?” Orin questioned, tone light—which Tiiran didn’t believe for a moment. “Or is this you testing me again? You know the consequences of that.”
“Hmm.” Tiiran kept his mouth shut but Orin must have heard the words he hadn’t said. He stopped, then leaned down to put a hand around each of Tiiran’s ankles.
“Greedy kitten.” Orin was fond of calling him that. “Nothing happens until I look you over. I want to be sure I didn’t seriously hurt you.”
“Before you hurt me again?” Tiiran wondered, then squawked when Orin slid his hands up to his waist and flipped him onto his stomach. Orin put a knee on the bed and a hand in the center of Tiiran’s back so Tiiran couldn’t raise himself up.
The burn within Tiiran was so much hotter than before. He turned his cheek to the mattress and shivered. Orin waslookingat him. Just looking, but Tiiran already wanted to beg him for something,givehim something.
“I couldn’t see in the mirror,” Tiiran confessed, out of breath for no reason. “I wanted to see.”
Orin pressed a kiss to the small of his back, then another where Tiiran’s backside started to curve out. “Good. Good kitten. I’m going to touch you now. We will do this every time. Understand?”
Tiiran inhaled. “Yes, Orin.”
His behind got another kiss, this time a little lower. Then Orin skimmed his fingertips over sore places before pushing down. The touch was light, but Tiiran squirmed. Orin hummed and did it again elsewhere, before sliding his big hands down to urge Tiiran’s thighs apart. He stopped again.Looking.
“Does it look well?” Tiiran asked, not nervous but with his stomach quivering. He’d never been studied from that angle and didn’t know what to do.
“It looks beautiful.” Orin began to stoke sensitive places, apparently enjoying Tiiran’s squirming. “You look like….” He sighed but said it. “You look like you have been with me.”
“How many have you left like this?” Tiiran huffed to the bed, but Orin must have heard his muttering, because he gave Tiiran’s backside a smack.
“And you’renotjealous?” Orin demanded incredulously, rubbing over the place he’d hit while Tiiran shuddered and felt his blood pound. “Behave, kitten. You’ll have trouble sitting today as it is—which is part of the experience, so that you remember for next time. Not that I’ve think you’ve forgotten, considering your behavior this morning. Get your knees up under you.”
Tiiran did so, only to gasp at another spank, light but firm. “Yes, Orin,” he remembered to say too late. It was slightly uncomfortable at this angle, his face to the bedding, his back bowed, but he didn’t entirely dislike it. “But, Orin,” he began, then froze, but no smack followed the words, so Orin must want to hear what he had to say. “Last night,” he exhaled it, shivering, “did I do something wrong?”
“No.” Orin seemed fond of kissing Tiiran’s backside, and of petting it over and over again, sometimes down over the curves and other times cupping them or squeezing them apart. “But are you making plans, kitten? I thought you didn’t want me near your boy. Then yesterday, you put him at my feet.”
Everyone kept harping on that and not what Tiiran was telling them. “That’s not what I said,” Tiiran reminded him. “I know I am new to this and foolish, but…”
He should have expected the blow, and nearly had, but not the strength of it. He whined to the bed, luxuriating in the hot echo of it through his body and mind.
