Page 83 of Alpha Heat

Xan swallowed hard. “Like bitch or slut or…” Xan’s ears were so red they looked painful. “Or worse things.”

Urho touched Xan’s chin. “Why? Do you not think you deserve to be cherished?”

Xan’s eyes dropped to the carpet under their feet.

“Well? Answer me.”

Xan sounded small and scared when he whispered, “I don’t know what that’s like. With Jason, it was just games. Not…” He shuddered. “I’ve never had that. I didn’t want to assume you’d give it to me. No one has ever wanted to give that to me before.”

“What about Caleb?” Urho asked gently, his heart aching for his poor boy.

Xan explained shyly how during the heat with Caleb, the sex they’d accomplished had been desperate, terrifying, and frustrating. “There was no ‘cherishing’ between us. Just tears, and pain, and fear.” He raised his eyes to Urho’s, his voice trembling. “So I don’t know if I’d like to be cherished in bed or not. I’ve never experienced that before.”

Urho tugged him close and kissed his hair, his eyelids, and his hot ears, still red with shame and embarrassment. “Let’s see if you like it. If you don’t, then we can try something else.”

“What ifyoudon’t like it?” Xan asked with a wobbly voice as Urho pressed him back against the bed and loomed over him, taking in his red cheeks, wide eyes, and flushed chest peeking out of his bathrobe. “Fucking me, I mean. What if you don’t enjoy it? It won’t feel like with an omega. The way I’m made is different, and—”

“I’m going to like it,” Urho interrupted, sliding his hand into Xan’s robe, stroking over the smooth, almost-hairless skin he found, and then pushing the garment off Xan’s shoulders. “I’ve liked everything we’ve done so far. I don’t know why this would be any different.”

“I’m still nervous,” Xan whispered as Urho untied the knot holding his robe closed. He spread the robe open, revealing Xan’s smaller-than-average form, his thick alpha cock, and his pale skin flushing more and more with every breath.

“I’m nervous too,” Urho admitted. “But I want you and we’ve made promises. Those might not be as good as contracts, not as formal, but I don’t take them lightly.”

“Me either.”

And now he wanted so much more than just Xan’s body. He wanted to carve his way into this man’s life and heal his wounds, be his friend, his partner, and maybe, somehow, Caleb’s too, albeit in a different way. How this was all going to work, he had no clue, but it started here, in this bed, making Xan understand what it meant to feel love.

“Get comfortable. On your stomach for now.”

“My stomach?” Xan asked, but he did as he was told, tugging a pillow down to cradle his face.

Urho straddled Xan’s thighs and removed his own robe entirely, throwing it aside and letting his balls and hard dick slide over Xan’s plump ass cheeks. Xan lifted up to gaze over his shoulder. “I wanted to see you…” His eyes were hungry as he took in what he could of Urho.

“You’ll have plenty of time to see me when you turn over. Just relax. I want to check on how you’ve healed.”

Xan released an odd half-sob and dropped his head to the pillow, his muscles trembling with emotion. Urho rubbed his hands soothingly up and down Xan’s back, gently massaging his shoulders and squeezing down his arms.

“Just rest,” Urho said. “Feel me here with you.” He pushed his cock against Xan’s buttocks, and then bent low to kiss his shoulder blades, one at a time. He then kissed his way down Xan’s back, his knees digging into the soft mattress.

When he got to the place where Xan’s lower back dipped in, he heard the soft sound of Xan’s tears. “Are you all right?” he whispered against the last wet place his kisses had left on Xan’s warm skin.

“I’m scared,” Xan whispered back, his words almost obscured by the pillow he clutched.

“I won’t hurt you.”

“That’s what I’m scared of,” he said, a sob breaking free. “What if you don’t hurt me and I love it? And then what if you never want to give it to me again?”

“Oh, sweet boy,” Urho soothed, abandoning his quest to get a look at Xan’s asshole to rise up and take Xan into his arms. He turned Xan and cradled him against his chest, kissing his hair and stroking his back and arms until Xan quieted. Their hard cocks slid against each other as Urho rocked them gently in a quiet rhythm. “Let me show you,” he whispered. “I promise I’ll never take it away from you.”

“How can you know that?”

“Because I know my own heart.”

“Do you?” Xan sounded amazed.

Urho held him close, squeezed his eyes shut, and felt the rightness of their bodies fitting together. He kissed Xan’s head again. “I’m learning more of it every day. Let me show you.”

“If I let you cherish me,” Xan’s voice broke again. “You’ll never stop?”