Page 151 of Vampire Kings Box Set

“That’s what this is about, isn’t it?” Lorien’s grin was triumphant now as he drew back, giving Henry his smuggest and most self-satisfied expression. "You want… no, you need to be in control. You can’t stand that I’m king, and in this city, you’re the prey.”

“You’re lucky we're surrounded by ten thousand strangers who don’t need to see what a wolf does to an arrogant baby vampire,” Henry said. “I’ll see you at home.”

Lorien watched Henry leave. It was a damn hot sight. Broad shoulders, powerful hips, tight ass. He was lucky to have him - if he had him at all. There was a very significant part of Lorien that was expecting Henry to bail on him, and soon. It was one thing to want to fuck, and even to stand up for him once or twice, but people got tired of being in the firing line, and Lorien was always in someone’s firing line.

Lorien fed several times that evening, and a pretty French girl made for a delightful desert. She was not aware that she had become food. She was too busy staring into the pretty bright lights of Times Square. He fed in the open, mistaken by those passing by for an ardent lover wrapping the young woman in a tender and passionate embrace. She moaned, and she came. Quietly, prettily, breathing her hot breath against his neck.

He had toyed with women before. They were amusing in many ways, and quite beautiful too. Usually he fed from men. Tonight it felt wrong to take a man. Almost like it might be cheating on Henry to have that intimate experience with another. Not that he’d ever fed on Henry. That was an intimacy yet to be indulged.

When he arrived home he was ready to sleep. It had been a long night and an emotional week. A lot was happening and he was not yet old enough to abstain from rest for great lengths of time.

Henry was waiting, sitting in an arm chair with hands on his thighs. There was something about that position that sent a thrill through Lorien. Something pissed off, but contained.

“You should be asleep,” Lorien said, taking his jacket off.

“I can’t sleep when I have someone to deal with.”

“Oh yes.”

Henry lifted his hand and crooked his finger. “C’mere.”

Lorien was torn between his natural desire to rebel and his much stronger and more recent desire to be as close to Henry as possible as much as possible.

He walked over to Henry and looked down at him.

“I don’t know what to do with you. I think you’re going to get yourself hurt, and I think you’re going to get my pack hurt too. So I’ve sent them away. Properly away, this time. I’m staying with you for the moment.”

“For the moment? You mean you’ll leave me if a vampire comes through the window?”

“I mean I’m going to pack you up like like luggage and take you with me when we inevitably have to flee this city because you’ve done something unforgivably stupid.”

“Or you could trust that I know what I’m doing. I’m not stupid, Henry. I know I may appear reckless and temperamental, but I have been alive for a very long time. At least thirty years as a man and ninety as a vampire. That’s a hundred and twenty years. You have forty. I’ve learned and unlearned ways to be that you haven't even thought of yet.”

“That’s one way of looking at it. The other is that being gunned down in your early thirties was enough of a trauma to trap you at that age in certain emotional respects.”

“Cool pop psychology,” Lorien replied. “Maybe you’re the one who needs someone with arrested development, a gaggle of stereotypical followers with no real depth to simply be there when you need them, and gone when you don’t. I don't know anything about your pack other than the fact they like pizza and sport.”

“That’s because you haven't talked to them.”

“Maybe,” Lorien admitted.

Henry stood up and put his hand to Lorien’s face, fingers curled beneath Lorien’s chin, thumb on his lower lip.

“I am worried about you because I care about you.”

"Trust me,” Lorien repeated. “I know what I’m doing.”

“So do I.”

The world spun very unexpectedly. It took Lorien far too long to realize that Henry had just put him over his lap. The muscular arm around his waist kept him trapped with wolf-strength.

“Henry…”

“Quiet,” Henry said, bringing his palm down hard across Lorien’s cheeks. “You are going to learn to behave in a more regal manner around your subjects. Screaming out murder confessions to a cluster of the city’s eminent vampires is a bad idea.”

Lorien felt his cock stiffen in response to being pressed up against Henry hard. This was juvenile and silly, but he figured he could play along if it made Henry feel better. There was some part of him that didn’t mind feeling small, and didn’t entirely object to how safe he suddenly was in this little illusory world where Henry was in control.

“You’re a bad boy, Lorien.”