his hand. This was his fault. He should be the one warning Yasir to back off. “Don’t talk, Yasir,” Niko warned. “And don’t touch Varian.”
“Don’t touch him?” Yasir spluttered a laugh. “Isn’t that his choice?”
“I’m not protecting him,” Niko met the man’s eyes. “I’m protecting you.” He’d said enough, and tightening his reins, he trotted his horse on, leaving Yasir to mull over the words of warning that had been long overdue.
He drew up alongside Vasili and opened his mouth to demand Vasili talk to Yasir when Vasili asked, “You hear that?”
“Yasir has some interesting theories about you.”
“I’ve heard them. I can hardly not hear them when he fills every second with needless chatter.” Vasili kicked his heels against Adamo and grabbed the reins “Yar!” He startled Adamo into a gallop, threw a grin over his shoulder, which was surely designed to lure men to their deaths, and then hunkered down, riding Adamo over the brow of a hill, vanishing in the heat haze.
“Dammit.” Niko whipped his reins, launching his mount into Vasili’s dust trail. He galloped over the hill toward the roaring sound Vasili must have been referring to. The lush landscape rolled back, revealing a narrow ravine split in half by a plunging waterfall. Cool mist spritzed the air. Water droplets scattered the sunlight, projecting a rainbow above the pool. After the dry heat of the desert, the waterfall oasis didn’t seem real.
Niko pulled his horse to a stop at the high point on the bank. Near the pool’s edge, Vasili had already dismounted Adamo. He waded, fully clothed, into the water, threw Yasir’s hat back onto the stony riverbank, shook his hair out, and dove underwater, vanishing from sight.
Seconds passed.
The falls thundered. The pool’s surface rippled and churned. Vasili should have resurfaced. Niko’s heart thudded hard in his chest. He couldn’t hear it, not over the sound of the falls, but he felt it thumping against his ribs.
Vasili burst from the pool’s surface, gasping. He ran his fingers through his platinum hair, turned, and appeared to be laughing, though the falls stole that sound too. A pure and carefree smile lit up his face, and Niko’s wrecked heart raced for another reason.
Adamo had plodded to the pool’s edge to drink. Vasili splashed water at the horse, called it a damned fool, and then stilled as he caught sight of Niko watching.
Niko expected the man’s smile to die a quick death on his lips, but it broadened instead. He watched Niko, and Niko watched him back, and what was this because it seemed like Vasili might be waiting, but surely not for Niko to join him?
The prince’s deft fingers loosened off the laces of his collar, gaping the shirt open. Water glistened on his face, and with his hair swept back, his stunning appearance was all the more striking. His clothes clung to his chest and arms in all the right ways, reminding Niko of the time the prince had stepped naked from his bathing pools at the palace. And by the three, he looked like some vision of desire deliberately put on this world to lure Niko into that pool and probably into some kind of trap.
The sudden clatter of the approaching wagon snapped Niko out of his reverie. The prince’s smile slipped sideways, turning sly as he turned his back and dove under the surface a second time.
Niko released a breath and shifted uncomfortably on the saddle, trying to alleviate the awkward and damned inconvenient arousal. Apparently, he still wasn’t over the kiss in the field.
“Ah, finally.” Yasir appeared and tore off his shirt as he made his way down to the pebbled beach.
Vasili, drenched through, waded from the pool as Yasir unashamedly stepped out of his trousers and took a running dive into the water. Vasili’s lofty gaze tracked the man’s powerfully graceful plunge.
Niko swallowed the bitter taste of jealously on his tongue. Despite what his body thought, he didn’t desire Vasili, so what did it matter if the prince happened to be drawn to Yasir?
Vasili gathered his messy hair in his hands and wrung it out. He lifted his gaze again to Niko and the prince’s pink lips quirked, like he knew damn well how Niko imagined clutching the back of the vicious bastard’s head and thrusting his tongue into that sharp mouth.
He recalled exactly how Vasili had tasted, all bitterness and sharp edges, and fuck if Niko’s cock didn’t throb at the memory.
Vasili had kissed like he’d hated him, and it might have