CHAPTER 90: CHAPTER 90: COMPROMISE (2)

Victor’s gaze didn’t waver, his crimson eyes holding Elias in a stillness that felt carefully planned, as though every breath, every inch of space between them, was something he’d already measured.

"I’ll mark you," he said, the words smooth but weighted, "only as an alpha. Not as my god’s soulmate."

Elias’s brow furrowed slightly, suspicion flickering through the fatigue and the slow heat building under Victor’s proximity. "And the difference?"

"The difference," Victor said, leaning in until his lips brushed the shell of his ear, "is that this one fades. It’s erasable. If you decide you don’t want me, if you decide you don’t want this, you can walk away without the bond anchoring you to me for eternity."

His thumb skimmed along Elias’s ribs again, unhurried but confident. "While it lasts, it keeps you under my protection. No one touches what I’ve marked. No one challenges it without challenging me."

Elias huffed softly, though the sound came out thinner than intended. "You make it sound like a rental agreement."

Victor’s mouth curved against his skin. "Call it a trial period, if that makes you more comfortable. I’d rather you have the choice... than risk someone else reaching for you before you’ve made it."

"Jonathan’s visit really ticked you off, didn’t it?" Elias asked, his eyes now half-lidded in a lazy expression that made Victor’s instincts flare.

Victor’s answering smile was slow, almost lazy, though the sharpened edge beneath it betrayed just how far from relaxed he truly was. "Ticked me off?" he echoed, his voice low, the words brushing over Elias’s skin like a gloved hand hiding claws. "Let’s call it... clarifying."

Elias’s mouth tilted in faint amusement. "Clarifying that you hate my father?"

"Clarifying," Victor murmured, his thumb pressing a little more firmly against Elias’s ribs, "that I don’t like the idea of anyone, blood or not, thinking they can waltz back into your life and stake a claim they forfeited years ago. Jonathan just happened to be arrogant enough to try it to my face."

He didn’t move back, instead, he let the silence stretch, the warm, unhurried press of his body making it clear this wasn’t just about Jonathan. It was about history, about scars, about the kind of quiet warning that didn’t need to be shouted to be understood.

Elias shifted, the movement unhurried, his thigh pressing in a slow, totally planned slide against Victor’s. It wasn’t an accident, not with the way his gaze stayed locked on Victor’s, dark and measuring, like he was testing the limits of that vaunted self-control.

"Careful," Victor said, his voice low and warning, but there was no real space between them anymore, no clean line where Elias ended and he began.

"I am being careful," Elias murmured, though the subtle grind of his hips said otherwise. "I’m just... thinking."

He knew Victor was right, Matteo’s charming edges had already frayed into something sharper, something obsessive, in less than two weeks. And now Jonathan, absent for nearly a decade, had decided to reappear like he’d never left. Elias wasn’t naïve enough to miss the pattern.

He would take the mark.

But he wasn’t going to make it easy, even if it would be just for one more minute of Victor being humbled.

Victor’s jaw flexed as if he could swallow the sound he wanted to make, his thumb tightening fractionally against Elias’s ribs. "You’re playing with fire."

Elias’s mouth curved, slow and deliberate. "That’s the point."

For a moment, Victor didn’t move, then his hand slid from Elias’s ribs to his hip, anchoring him with a grip that was equal parts restraint and claim. His crimson gaze sharpened to something molten, the kind of heat that promised Elias had exactly one more move before patience burned out entirely.

"Say yes," Victor said, his voice like velvet drawn over steel.

Elias tipped his head back just enough to let a faint smirk curl his mouth. "I will. But first, I want to see how much it kills you to wait a minute."

Victor’s breath left him in a slow, measured exhale, the kind that said he was counting in his head for reasons that had nothing to do with composure and everything to do with not sinking his teeth into Elias right this second.

"A minute," he repeated, as though testing the word on his tongue. "Do you want me to waste it standing here, or do you want me to spend it making sure you can’t walk straight to your next panel tomorrow?"

Elias laughed under his breath, the sound dry but edged with something warmer. "That’s your idea of restraint?"

Victor’s lips brushed his temple, deceptively gentle. "Restraint," he murmured, "is me not ending this conversation with you under me right now."

"Mm." Elias shifted again, slow enough to make it a statement, slow enough to feel the hardness pressing his thigh. "You keep saying ’restraint’ like it’s supposed to impress me."

"It’s supposed to keep you breathing evenly," Victor said, his voice dark velvet now, his hand tightening just enough at Elias’s hip to hint at the strength behind it. "But if you want to see what I’m like without it..."

Elias’s smirk deepened, though his pulse betrayed him with a jump. "Then you’d better make the mark quick, before I change my mind."

That was all the permission Victor needed.

In the space between one breath and the next, Elias found himself pinned back against the couch cushions, Victor’s weight settling over him with the inevitability of gravity. Crimson eyes caught his, held them, and then Victor’s mouth was at his neck, teeth grazing his scent gland, close enough that Elias’s breath stuttered and eyes closed, his long light brown lashes fluttering.

"Very," Victor murmured, the faintest edge of a smile in his voice as he inhaled him again, like he could hold Elias in place by scent alone. "Because when I stop being gentle, you won’t be sitting in my lap... you’ll be under me."