Page 13 of Wreaking Havoc (Demon Bound #1)

12

Sascha

S ascha hadn’t expected his first time hosting in his new home to be filled with so much tension.

He cleared his throat, if only to make some sort of noise to cut through the silence. It was still mildly sore, but the ache was already easing every minute. It had just been a twenty-four-hour bug, probably.

And poor Kai had thought he was literally dying.

Kai who had lost all sense of reason and chill, and was acting like the living room they’d all settled in was a battleground and Sascha’s brother was enemy number one. Kai’s armor was back on—those shoulder plates that protected none of his vulnerable bits but did leave quite a lot of delicious chest on display.

Sascha steered his mind firmly away from that direction. It wasn’t the time.

Alexei, for his part, was seated across from them on the couch—his boyfriend, Jay, tucked against him—alternating between eyeing Kai warily and staring with concern at Sascha. His fangs had disappeared, and his eyes were back to normal.

Even after his throat clearing, the silence was growing oppressive. Sascha caught Alexei’s eye. “So. Your boyfriend’s a vampire.”

Alexei glanced down at Jay, who was staring at Kai in obvious fascination, and the fondness in his gaze as he looked at his petite partner was unmistakable. “Yes.”

“And now you are too.”

Alexei didn’t answer that. He didn’t have to though. Sascha had seen, hadn’t he? Sascha let out a bitter laugh. “No wonder you never came home.”

“I wouldn’t have been welcome,” Alexei said pointedly.

You would have been welcomed by me , Sascha thought. But he didn’t let the words out. Alexei had stayed in New York longer than he ever should have, and Sascha knew well enough what his own role in that had been. Protect the baby, right? Even at Alexei’s expense, even as Ivan had broken down his spirit year after year.

It was no wonder Alexei had grown tired of it.

Sascha glanced at Kai, who was still in demon form, standing halfway in front of the armchair Sascha had settled in. His wings were gone, but Sascha somehow knew if either Alexei or Jay even looked at him askance, they’d be back, blocking him from view. Protecting him from his own brother.

Would Kai get tired of it too?

It was a stupid fucking question. Kai wouldn’t have a chance to get tired of anything. The contract would end, and he’d disappear.

As if sensing the pit of despair that thought opened up in Sascha’s stomach, Kai settled the weight of his massive hand suddenly on Sascha’s head, brushing at the strands there.

Another honest-to-God growl erupted from Alexei. “Don’t touch him.”

Kai looked back at him placidly, his hand still planted on Sascha’s head. “I don’t answer to you, bloodsucker.”

Sascha cleared his throat again, wishing he had a glass of water. He grabbed Kai’s arm and lowered the hand to his shoulder. “Let’s all just relax, hm?”

Jay, who’d so far seemed happy enough to be tucked against Alexei’s side—like this was any old family reunion and not a meeting of two different, not-supposed-to-be-real, supernatural entities—was apparently in agreement, because he laid a calming hand on Alexei’s arm before straightening. “Oh! I know!” He reached down to rummage in the backpack he’d brought, ignoring Kai’s warning rumble. After a moment of searching, he plopped a large ziplock baggie on the coffee table.

Sascha leaned around Kai—who’d stepped in further in front of him—to peer at it. “Are those…cookies?”

“Yes!” Jay beamed at him. “Peanut butter chocolate chip. Alexei said you liked those.” He looked up to Alexei for reassurance, the only sign he might be nervous, before smiling widely again at Sascha. He looked a bit like a little doll, with his wide gray eyes, delicate features, and Cupid’s-bow lips. “I wanted to make you something more fitting for a reunion, like a three-tiered cake! But Alexei pointed out that wouldn’t travel so well. Your brother’s very practical.” He cocked his head, his eyes trailing over Sascha’s face. “You really don’t look at all alike.”

They didn’t. Where Sascha and Ivan had lean frames and the icy-blue eyes and white-blond hair of their father, Alexei was a different creature. Six foot five with a broad frame and rugged features, he had eyes of multicolored hazel, and his hair was a long dirty-blond mane he kept up in a bun.

Sascha was pretty sure the man-bun had started as an act of defiance against Ivan’s desire for immaculate presentation from his brothers, but it suited him.

Jay turned his attention to Kai again. “May I see your wings again?” he asked politely.

“No.”

“Okay.” Jay nodded amiably before tucking himself up against Alexei again. He was wearing a highlighter-yellow sweatshirt with a tie-dye heart on the chest. It was disconcertingly hideous.

Alexei wrapped an arm around Jay’s shoulder and stared at Sascha, an unreadable look on his face. “That one said you were dying,” he said, his eyes darting to Kai and back again.

“I just had the flu. He misunderstood.”

Alexei’s lips twitched just the slightest bit. “So you really did summon a demon by accident?”

Did he think it was funny ? After dismissing Sascha’s phone call and treating him like a child? Sascha sniffed, crossing his arms. “I told you, didn’t I?”

“Right. Guess you wouldn’t call one on purpose.” Now Alexei did smile. “Unless you were looking for a shopping buddy?”

It wasn’t an unfair assessment. When they’d both still been in New York, Sascha had spent the majority of his time shopping or club-hopping. Alexei had even joined him every now and then. Still, Sascha couldn’t hide his wince. Frivolous, spoiled Sascha.

Kai’s fingers twitched on his shoulder. “He needs me to find the ones who had him stabbed,” he said coolly.

Well, shit.

The color drained from Alexei’s face. “What?” He rose from his seat. “You were stabbed ? Where? Show me.”

Sascha held up a hand, but it landed on Kai’s back. He’d blocked Sascha again. Sascha pushed impatiently at his hip until the big lug stepped aside. “It’s fine, Alexei. It’s all good. Kai healed me. I don’t even have a scar anymore.”

Alexei looked no less stricken, although he hadn’t come any closer. Jay was hanging onto his hand, keeping him from getting in Kai’s face. “Why didn’t you call me? I would have come.”

“I know,” Sascha said firmly. “I know you would have. But Ivan said not to.”

Alexei’s face turned thunderous. “Fucking Ivan.”

Sascha shrugged. It was a familiar refrain between the two of them. “I didn’t want to give him any reason to hurt you.” He cocked his head. “ Can you be hurt now?”

It was Jay who answered. “Not for long.” He looked earnestly at Sascha. “So if you’re stabbed again, please call.”

Kai cut in, his voice harsh. “He won’t be stabbed again.”

Alexei gave him an appraising look. “You’re going to find them?”

“Yes.”

“Kill them?’

“Yes.”

“Good.” Alexei sat back on the couch, some of the tension in the room finally dissipating. He sighed heavily. “Ivan was supposed to be protecting you.”

Sascha shrugged. “Well, he pissed someone off. He’s been more careless than usual.”

“He’s not over it yet?”

Sascha knew the “it” Alexei referred to. Alexei leaving. Alexei costing Ivan millions. Alexei thwarting Ivan’s plans and his iron grip over all of them.

Now it was Sascha’s turn to sigh. “Are any of us over any of it?” He could only hope Alexei knew the “it” he referred to. Their father. Their childhood. The violence in their blood.

“Do you have a lot to get over?” Alexei asked him, not unkindly. “You were away for most of it.”

And there was Kai growling again. “Are you that oblivious? Your brother is not without trauma.”

Sascha’s cheeks heated as Alexei narrowed his eyes. “It’s fine, Kai.”

Jay cut in then. “I think we should get Sascha some food. A human body needs food for healing. That’s what Danny says, and he’s a nurse. Why don’t I make syrniki?”

Sascha blinked in surprise. “You know how to make syrniki?” It was a Russian pancake dish their grandmother had made them, when they’d visited her in Russia. Sascha could barely remember; he’d been so young the last time. He wasn’t actually sure he remembered at all or if he’d just heard Alexei tell the story so many times he’d convinced himself he did.

Jay smiled proudly. “Alexei taught me.”

For the first time, Kai showed interest in their guests beyond suspicion and anger. “You know how to make human food?” he asked Jay. “Show me.”

Sascha scoffed. “Why? You don’t eat.”

“But you do.” Kai met his eye, something in his gaze Sascha couldn’t quite read. Something heavy and…important.

Oh God, Sascha’s cheeks were on fire. Maybe his fever was back. He could feel his brother’s questioning gaze on him. But when he looked over, Alexei’s expression was unreadable.

“You should have tea too, zaychik,” Alexei told him. And him using the pet name Kai had taken over didn’t do much for Sascha’s blush. “Do you have any raspberry jam?”

Another of their grandmother’s legacies. “No,” Sascha said. “But I have some dusty chamomile bags from the previous owner in one of the cupboards.”

Alexei nodded. “That’ll have to do.”

Jay patted Alexei’s arm, planting a kiss on his shoulder. “Kai and I will cook. You two talk.” He gave Sascha another one of his earnest looks. “Talking can be very helpful.”

But Alexei grabbed Jay’s hand when he tried to walk away. “Jay…”

“I’ll be fine.” Jay grinned up at Kai, who loomed a foot and a half above him, not including the horns. “You won’t hurt me, will you, demon?”

Alexei’s expression softened, and Sascha realized then how incredibly, deeply in love Alexei was. He would die for Jay, Sascha was certain of it.

A deep loneliness stabbed at Sascha’s gut.

And then Kai’s hand was in his hair again, brushing softly at the strands. “Talk with your brother. I’m only a room away.”

Only a room away. That was a nice thought. Sascha wasn’t alone, not yet. He still had someone in his corner.

The only question was, For how long?

Sascha and Alexei ended up talking late into the night.

Sascha wasn’t sure what Jay and Kai got up to after cooking—Jay had handed Sascha a plate of pancakes with such sincere enthusiasm Sascha had worried for a minute he was going to watch him eat every bite, and then Jay had wandered off with three pancakes in each fist—but he could tell Alexei had an ear out for Jay and Kai. Every now and then, a bright laugh would erupt from elsewhere in the house, and a small smile would grace Alexei’s lips.

So Sascha drank his tea and ate his pancakes, and they talked. Sascha told him all about the mess Ivan had created, and Alexei caught Sascha up more fully on what had happened to him in Hyde Park, and the life he’d made for himself there. It all might have stretched the limits of Sascha’s credulity, if not for the fact that he’d summoned a literal demon into his living room just a few days before.

Eventually they were all up to speed—no more missed months to account for, no more easy (if unbelievable) topics to cover. An uncomfortable silence filled the room, full of too many things still left unspoken.

Alexei rubbed at the back of his neck, not quite meeting Sascha’s eye. “So. Our childhood messed you up too, huh?”

Was Sascha really almost thirty and they’d never had this discussion? But it wasn’t like their family was known for its heart-to-hearts. Even the two of them, in all their previous closeness, had been more action than talk—spending time together but not exactly plumbing the depths of their psyches. Sascha knew Alexei loved him, but he also knew Alexei thought of him as…careless. Care free.

Sascha hunched his shoulders up, fiddling with the tassels of the cushion in his lap. “I know what it was like for you. I—I remember Sergei breaking your finger that one time. For flinching.” He winced. “You weren’t even a teenager yet.”

“Flinching.” Alexei hummed. “Was that what it was for? I’d forgotten the reason.”

Sascha gave a clipped nod. “So I know you had it worse. But just because I was sent away doesn’t mean I wasn’t aware of it. The danger. The violence. God, the way Papa’s goons would look at me if I didn’t act just right.” Sascha shuddered, his stomach twisting.

“Our father wouldn’t have let them hurt you. He was an asshole, but you were still his baby.”

“I’m glad you’re so certain.” Sascha met Alexei’s gaze resolutely. “ I wasn’t.”

“Sascha…”

Sascha’s hands clenched into fists on his pillow. “I’ve felt powerless my whole life. What else was I supposed to do but shop and party and—and dick around?” He let out a bitter laugh. “No one would let me do anything else. I have a business degree I’ve never even used.”

“I’m sorry.” Alexei’s expression was pained. “I should have realized.”

Sascha forced his tense muscles to relax. “I don’t know if I wanted you to. I liked that we got to have fun together. And you had plenty of your own shit. I’m not saying mine equaled that. Just that I did have shit.”

Alexei leaned back into the couch with a loud sigh. “Our family’s legacy, huh? Complete and total shit.”

“Ivan would disagree.”

Alexei made a noncommittal noise. Then he cocked a brow at Sascha. “You know, there are legitimate branches of the family business you could take part in.”

“Psh.” Sascha waved a hand. “As if Ivan would let me.”

Alexei leaned forward, looking surprisingly eager. “Then make him let you. So you’ve been powerless before? You’re not anymore. You have an actual demon at your disposal, Sascha. One that looks at you like you’re his precious fucking treasure.”

Um. He did?

“Well, he has to look at me like that,” Sascha said nonsensically, too taken aback by Alexei’s assessment to use actual logic. “It’s just, you know…the bargain.”

“He learned to make syrniki for you tonight. Is that part of your bargain?” At Sascha’s silence, Alexei gave a decisive nod. “You’re not powerless anymore.”

Sascha frowned down at his lap. “It’s not my power though.”

“It’s power you’ve tamed. As far as I’m concerned, that makes it yours.” Alexei glanced at the clock on the wall, some antique thing the previous owner had left behind. “It’s late. You need to rest.”

“I feel fine,” Sascha argued with a pout. He did, actually. The tea had cleared up the last of the soreness in his throat, and the food had given him back some strength. Although, that didn’t stop a yawn so wide it almost cracked his jaw from escaping him.

Alexei gave him a look.

Sascha huffed. “Fine. There’s a guest bedroom made up for you and Jay. Kai’s not using it.” At Alexei’s raised brow, Sascha flushed. “He likes to stay close,” he mumbled.

“I bet he does.”

Sascha stuck out his tongue. “Good night, Alyosha.”

He flounced out of the living room to find Kai waiting for him right there, at the bottom of the stairs. Sascha glared at him, embarrassment making him peevish. “Have you just been lurking there the whole time?”

Kai smirked. “Not the whole time.”

“Ugh. Come on, then.”

And Kai did, just like that.

It’s power you’ve tamed. As far as I’m concerned, that makes it yours.

Had Sascha really tamed this demon? He hadn’t done much. Only exchanged orgasms and whined a lot and briefly made Kai believe he was dying. It wasn’t like Kai was any less bossy or cocky.

But God, the heat in Sascha’s cheeks just wouldn’t go away. Whereas moments ago he’d been ready to drop from exhaustion, suddenly he was fully alert as he walked along with this monstrous beast from another realm who’d agreed to protect him.

Not by sending Sascha away. Not by ignoring him. But by standing with him (or, as he had earlier, deliberately in front of him). Blocking him from danger. Lending Sascha his power.

It was the kind of protection Sascha had never known.

Sascha’s room was much more cluttered than when he’d left it. At some point during the night, Kai had apparently moved all his packages from the hallway in there. Sascha would go through them at some point, but it hardly seemed the time.

Instead, he went through the motions of getting ready for bed, incredibly aware of the demon waiting for him, perched on his bed and watching his every move.

“You’re agitated,” Kai eventually said, when Sascha came out of the bathroom after brushing his teeth.

Sascha frowned at him. Possibly it was more of a pout. “I’m not.”

“I can feel it.” Kai placed a taloned hand on his chest, over the swirling tattoos there. They should have been distracting, with that endless motion, but Sascha had gotten used to them. It was almost comforting to watch now.

“You can really feel me there? My soul?”

“Yes,” Kai answered, staring intently, his eyes beginning to glow in the dim light of the room.

And because all Sascha’s past easy flirtatiousness with men seemed to have fled his body, he blurted out with zero finesse, “Are you going to fuck me now?”

“Would you like me to?” Kai asked in a purr. He ran his tongue over sharp teeth, and Sascha noticed for the first time that it wasn’t the light pink of a human’s tongue but a dusky blue.

Of course it was.

Sascha shuffled his feet in place, suddenly unsure. “I don’t know.”

Kai cocked his head, a lock of silky black hair falling over his chest. Sascha wanted to touch it. The hair or the chest or both. “And why don’t you know, zaychik?”

“When the contract’s done, you’ll be gone.”

There was silence as Kai stared at him, his expression unreadable.

God, Sascha was stupid for bringing this up, wasn’t he? This demon just wanted to get his dick wet, and Sascha was messing it all up with his stupid feelings.

Then Kai spoke. “I don’t have to leave. There is a way.”

Hope stole Sascha’s breath, bottling it up in his chest. “What way?” he whispered.

“A permanent bond.” A look of pure satisfaction crossed Kai’s face, as if the thought pleased him. “A mating bond. I would no longer claim just a piece of your soul—I would be linked to all of it. Linked to this realm, and to you.”

That was about as clear as mud. Sascha tried to make sense of it. “So you’d stay here for—for my lifespan?”

Kai shook his head. “ My lifespan. You would be linked to me as well.”

“And how long is that?”

“A very, very long time. Longer than you can fathom. Your aging would slow to the point of imperceptibility.”

Cool. What an incredibly overwhelming proposal completely out of the blue. A breathless laugh escaped Sascha’s lips. “Well, that’s insane.”

Kai didn’t even flinch. “And why is that?”

“I mean…” Sascha lifted his hands in demonstration, trying to encompass everything. “We just met.”

Kai scoffed. “What does that matter? I’ve tasted your essence. I know you better than anyone.” His eyes narrowed. “You think perhaps you could not care for me?”

Now Sascha really laughed. “Not loving people isn’t my problem. My father was cruel and cold, but I still loved him. Just like I still love Ivan, even when he’s controlling and vicious. And Alexei, even though he left.” He continued babbling, his brain apparently no longer in control of his mouth. “I’d have loved my mom, if she’d have let me. If she’d stayed even a few more years, like she did for my brothers, I would have loved her forever.”

That was Sascha’s real flaw, wasn’t it? His horrible weakness. He couldn’t help loving the people around him, even if they were terrible people. Even if they tortured men and pushed Sascha away and left him all alone.

Kai stood, and even after their days together, his height still took Sascha’s breath away. “Then there’s no issue. I’m not human, Sascha. I don’t need your mortal reasoning to know what I want. I run on instinct.” He stepped toward Sascha. “On desire.” Another step and he was close enough that all Sascha could smell was that spicy, smoky scent. Kai’s voice lowered almost to a whisper. “And what I desire …is you.”

Sascha didn’t know what to say. So of course he found himself blurting out, “You haven’t even fucked me with that monstrous dick of yours yet.”

Kai traced a finger down Sascha’s neck, leaving a trail of fire in its wake. “Is that what needs to happen for you to decide?”

And then broad hands were wrapping around the backs of Sascha’s thighs, and he was being lifted up with ease. “Very well, then. Let’s get to it.”