Reign of Darkness (The Prince's Assassin #2) - Ariana Nash Page 0,38

heart racing. “Your keys.” He set the keys on a sideboard. Niko straightened to leave, but instead, his gaze roamed Vasili’s casually poised grace.

“Will you stay?” Vasili asked, still gazing out the window.

“Stay?” He almost choked on the word. “Why?”

Vasili looked down, perhaps considering his reply. “Why do most men seek the company of others?”

Niko’s heart thudded too loudly, pounding its way up his throat. Was this a trick? Was he talking about company or company? He wasn’t smiling. His face was a mask, unreadable. No tick of the lips meaning he was amused, no glint of slyness in his eye.

“Yasir left some wine.” Vasili moved to the nearby sideboard and removed a dark bottle. “Share it with me.” Two crystal glasses came next, pinched between his long fingers. He still hadn’t looked over.

This was a terrible idea. Niko should leave. Now. “I’m tired…”

Vasili hesitated, the bottle poised over one glass. “Of course, from your evening carousing.” He poured the wine for himself, scooped up the glass, and finally peered at Niko over its rim while drinking.

The lace-lined eye-patch gave him an air of mysterious elegance. That and the stare clearly designed to hook Niko in had Niko rooted to the spot.

In all the time he’d known Vasili, the prince had never asked him to stay. He’d never told him he trusted him either. Until today. Bizarrely, something else Vasili had said days ago came back to him now. About Niko not being astute, about him being many “wonderful” things. At the time, Niko had been too flustered to notice how the pertinent word in that sentence hadn’t been astute at all. His occasional glances, like when he’d been alone in the waterfall pool and noticed Niko watching him. Maybe they’d been signs of a prince who was desperate for company but didn’t know how to ask for it. What was he really asking for here?

Or was this something else? Something more insidious. Vasili was nice only when he wanted something.

Niko’s gaze fell to the empty glass and back to Vasili’s guarded face. Ah, now it made sense. “It’s poisoned.”

Vasili carefully set his fragile glass down. He spread both hands on the sideboard and bowed his head between his braced arms. “I swear you were put on Etara’s earth to torment me.” His shoulder blades flexed, like he was holding himself restrained.

“Torment you?” Niko blurted incredulously. “And you only have yourself to blame, Your Highness. You forced me into your service, remember?”

“How can I forget when you insist on bringing it up during every conversation?” He straightened but stared at the wall behind Niko, cheek twitching.

“We don’t have conversations. You bark orders and I obey, like the dog I am—”

Vasili was in front of him suddenly, a wall of satiny shirt and untied collar. His pulse fluttered at the thin skin of his neck. His fingers danced up Niko’s cheek, and all the words stalled on Niko’s lips.

Vasili bowed his head. His mouth hovered so close that Niko forgot how to breathe.

“I have hurt you,” the prince whispered, his usually smooth voice suddenly hoarse, “and I will never be sorry.” His words teased over Niko’s lips. “Because it brought you to me.”

Soft, warm lips brushed Niko’s. Fingers locked in Niko’s shirt.

He shouldn’t do this, shouldn’t yield. Vasili was poison. He’d crush Niko’s bruised heart. He’d hurt him again and again. It was who he was. But by the gods, Niko wanted to feel that hurt if it meant feeling Vasili come undone with him.

Vasili’s lips teased his open. His tongue fluttered in, and Niko let it. The moment was brittle, easily shattered. There was no spice between them. No excuses. No denials. Niko gently slid his fingers over Vasili’s hip, testing for the moment he’d snatch all this away, but he didn’t.

Niko carefully returned the kiss, reining back the building urgency. The effort to restrain himself made him breathless, made him tremble. Vasili’s hands pressed against his chest, as though to hold him back, but he didn’t push.

The kiss heated, Vasili’s tension unraveling as his mouth took everything Niko gave.

Oh, by the three, this was everything Niko had dreamed, everything he’d so desperately ached for. To feel Vasili surrender—not fight, not rage, just relax his guard and open up. This was the Vasili Niko couldn’t think around, couldn’t resist, the Vasili hidden from a world that would disparage and shun him for surviving.

Niko walked him back, and Vasili bumped against the sideboard, rattling the wine glasses. The sudden stop pressed