Cloak & Silence

  Because I've never been in love with a man like this before...

  Ture barely caught those words. They were the truth. He had a hunger for Maris unlike anything he'd ever known. But it was too soon to tell him that. "I don't know. I think it's your fierce aura that intimidates me."

  "My fierce aura?"

  Ture nodded. "It's like being in the same room with an exotic wild beast. You're sleek and beautiful. Every movement is a symphony of grace. And at the same time, I know how easily you can take a life and not blink. How fast you can erupt into a bloodthirsty assassin."

  "I'm not bloodthirsty."

  Ture closed the distance between them to straighten the folds in Maris's shirt. "But I've seen you kill without remorse. And I've had a bad run of people who've hurt me. So...yes, you make me a little nervous. I don't want you to have some bad flashback and kill me."

  He cupped Ture's face in his palm as those dark eyes scorched him with their intensity. "I would never hurt you, Ture." Maris lowered his lips to his and gave him the gentlest kiss he'd ever known.

  Ture closed his eyes and savored being held again. How he hoped this wasn't the mistake Maris feared it to be. "I think my paperwork can wait."

  Maris pulled back with a deep, sweet laugh. "Work first. I'll still be here and I'll still be hard for you."

  His eyebrow shot north at the last bit. It was so out of character for his prim and proper soldier-statesman.

  Maris kissed his brow and stepped back then gently nudged Ture toward his desk. "Quicker you get done..."

  Quicker he could dine on what he hungered for most.

  Biting his lip, Ture went to run the receipts and batch the credit slips while placing reorders for the morning. All the while, his gaze kept wandering over to Maris, who sat on the couch with his link in his hands. "What are you doing?"

  An adorable smile curled his lips. "I'm a fierce gamer. Right now, I'm slaughtering Hauk who's playing against me."

  That surprised him. He would have never guessed Maris was one of those. "You game?"

  Maris shrugged. "It was part of our training when I was a soldier and while I don't relish a real kill, fake body counts entertain me to no end."

  "I would never have thought that of you."

  "I know, right? Underneath all this mountain of incredible sexiness beats the heart of a little kid."

  Ture laughed at the image in his head. A part of him envied Darling for the long past he'd had with Maris. "What were you like as a child?"

  "Brooding. Aggravating. Temperamental... Haven't really changed, now that I think about it."

  "I wouldn't classify you as brooding or temperamental."

  Maris flashed a grin. "No disclaimer on aggravating. Noted."

  Ture laughed again. "You are not aggravating, Mari."

  "Just wait. You haven't seen me in the morning. I assure you, I have PMS until two...sometimes three in the afternoon. Not even Darling wants to deal with that bitch."

  "I've heard sex cures those symptoms."

  Maris looked up from his game. "Excuse me?"

  Ture shrugged playfully. "It's what the women who work for me say. Not that I know. I've never slept with a woman. Have you?" He knew from what Maris had told him a few weeks back that, unlike him, Mari had at least made an attempt. But he didn't know if Maris had ever gone through with it.

  A nice shade of red crawled up from his neck to cover his face. "I was engaged to a woman once."

  That disclosure floored him. Funny how that had never once come up. "Really?"

  Maris nodded as he returned to his game. "I love her still, but not like that. She's more of a little sister. Which is why I couldn't go through with the wedding and how I knew beyond a doubt that I was gay. She wanted children and I didn't want to force her, and them, to live a lie with me. And to answer your earlier question, I had more than my fair share of women. Believe me, I tried everything I could to be straight. I really did. The last thing I ever wanted was to tell my family of blue-blooded ruthless military heroes and assassins that their son wasn't like everyone else. I knew none of them would take it well, and they did not disappoint my fears."

  "It must have been hard for you."

  Maris sighed. "I don't think it's easy on anyone. No one wants to be different, especially not when they're young."

  That was true. Like Maris, he'd done his best to deny it, too. But in the end, it'd been a futile battle. No matter what he did, he kept coming back to the undeniable fact that his body just didn't react to a woman the way it did to a man.

  Neither did his heart.

  "So how did you break it to Darling?"

  Maris laughed. "I didn't. He caught me drooling."

  Cringing, Ture couldn't imagine how frightening that had to be. "Did he hurt you?"

  "No, he couldn't have cared less. That's what I love about him. He told me that it made no never mind to him that I was gay, but that if I ever grabbed his junk, I'd be missing mine."

  Ture arched a brow.

  "It was funnier when Darling said it. Usually I'm funnier, too. But I'm back to that nervousness you evoke."

  Ture left his desk and moved to stand in front of Maris. "I find it hysterical that I make you nervous when you're the one who's been trained to kill."

  He turned the game off and rose to his feet. The heat in his gaze seared Ture. "I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't even be contemplating this."

  "I told you, Mari. I'm a grown-up. I don't play those childish games with people's emotions. I respect what you share with Darling and I always will. All I want is a chance to prove to you that not everyone is an asshole. That I can share you and treat you the way you deserve to be treated."

  He cupped Ture's cheek in his hand. "Don't break my heart, Ture. It's been shattered enough."

  Ture pulled him into his arms so that he could show him just how much he wanted to be a part of his world. Closing his eyes, he breathed Maris in. "Come home with me, Mari. Let me hold you like I've been dying to since the moment I saw you skidding into my cell with both blasters blazing."

  He laughed at that. "All right. Take me home and I'm yours."

  Without another word, Ture locked up the restaurant and led him to his transport.

  Maris was even more nervous than he'd been as he watched the shadows and light play against Ture's perfect features. While his body was still healing from the damage the League had done to him, Ture had very few external injuries left. Maris hoped none of his own healing injuries interfered with his plans tonight. All he wanted was to make love to Ture until they were both unable to walk.

  "What do you do in the rain?" Ture asked out of the blue.

  "Excuse me?"

  "Weird random thought about when you were in the pool. You said that torrential downpours could expose you. What do you do on rainy days?"

  "Try to stay in. If we have to go out, we wear a lot of rain gear and make sure the rain doesn't touch our skin."

  "Have you ever been accidentally exposed?"

  "Not as an adult. The last time it happened, an asshole at school had thrown me outside the locked doors of our gym in a record storm while I was changing clothes. Darling came out to find me and helped me to hide it until I went back to normal."

  "I can see why you love him."

  "Yeah... He's seen me through a lot of hell."

  Ture turned a corner. "I'm amazed, given your uniqueness, that your parents sent you to a school with humans. Is that normal?"

  "Not at all. Most Phrixians never even meet a human. The few who do usually only meet them in battle. I was the unfortunate exception."

  "Why?"

  "League mandate. They wanted a member of the immediate ruling family to study human behavior so that we wouldn't be so warring against them. They couldn't take Kyr because he was heir at that time, so my father held a random drawing for the rest of us, and mine was the name the computer spat out."

  Ture heard the bitterness in Maris's tone. "You really don't like humans, do you?" br />
  "I didn't like my classmates. Humans are all right so long as they're human."

  He couldn't agree more. "Did the League's plan work?"

  "Might have had the gay son not been sent. As it was, my father blamed my personal choice on the exposure to an inferior species at such an impressionable age. In the end, all it did was fuel Kyr to rise up in the League ranks and wage his own war against the rest of the worlds. And my father now hates all humans with an unreasoning madness."

  "I'm sorry, Mari."

  "Thanks, but you didn't do it. I don't know what happened to Kyr. He wasn't soulless until he was seventeen. Something he won't talk about changed him forever. Whatever it was, it killed what little compassion he had and turned him into the monster he is today."

  Ture heard the sadness and regret in Maris's tone. "You still love him?"

  "He's my brother. I'm not the one who disowned him. And even though I don't agree with his actions or opinions, it doesn't sever the blood tie we share."

  That was the heart that had won Ture's affections.

  Ture pulled up to a small parking garage and docked. Maris got out first and waited until Ture joined him. It was a nice apartment building just a few blocks from the restaurant. A uniformed doorman let them in.

  Maris didn't speak as they entered the lift that took them to the top floor. Ture's place was at the end of a long, elegant hall.

  Ture unlocked the door. "I'm hoping Anachelle's asleep."

  "She's not asleep," Anachelle called from a bedroom in back. "But she's closing her door and putting on her noise-cancelling headphones. You two have all the fun you want and don't even think about me being here. My room fridge is fully stocked and I'm locked up for the night."

  Maris laughed. "I really like her."

  "So do I. Let me check on her and I'll be right back."

  Maris stayed in the living room, but he could hear their playful exchange as Ture fussed at her for being awake and not resting.

  "Go mother the boyfriend you don't have and tell him that yes, my feet are up. I'm fine, Grandma."

  Ture was still smiling as he returned, shaking his head. "She's incorrigible." He headed for the kitchen. "Would you like some wine?"

  "I better not. I don't want to be tipsy."

  Ture arched a brow at that.

  "I had a bad drug and drinking problem for a while. Really don't want to go back to it."

  "Sorry. I didn't know."

  Maris draped his jacket over the back of a chair. "It's not something people wear on a scanable collar around their necks. Hey, Universe, I'm a recovering addict."

  "If it makes you feel better, I had a brief bad period myself."

  Maris locked a gaze with his that sent a shiver down his spine. "Doesn't make me feel better for you. It sucks to be all alone in hell."

  "But you always had Darling."

  Maris didn't comment. There had been a brief time, due to his own stupidity, when he'd been alone. But he tried not to think about that.

  And he prayed to the gods that he never had to go through something like that again.

  Ture came up behind him and wrapped his arms around Maris's waist. "I have to say you look delectable tonight, but nothing like what I expected."

  He sucked his breath in as Ture teased his earlobe with his teeth. "I'm not always a flamboyant queen. I do have occasional moments of screaming normality."

  "It makes no never mind to me how you dress, Mari. I adore all facets of your personality." He slid his hand down to cup him while he continued to swirl his tongue around Maris's ear. His breathing turned ragged.

  Leaning back, Maris ran his hand through Ture's hair, and closed his eyes while he savored the sensation of being held and touched again. It'd been way too long. And it made him ache for the one thing that had always eluded him.

  A real relationship with someone who could give as much as he took.

  He was so tired of selfish users. Of people who were even more emotionally damaged than he was.

  His heart pounding, he captured Ture's lips as Ture sank his hand down into Maris's pants to stroke him. He growled at how good it felt.

  "You are really hard."

  Maris smiled. "I've been like this since you called."

  Ture's eyebrow shot north.

  Turning to face him, Maris wrinkled his nose. "I have stamina the likes of which is legendary." He pulled Ture's shirt off then brushed his hand over his muscular chest. "And while you may be master of the kitchen, your skills pale in comparison to what I can do in a bedroom."

  "By all means, let me see these skills of which you speak, my lord." Ture gasped as Maris picked him up and carried him as if he weighed nothing. While Ture wasn't weak by any means, Maris's strength was inhuman.

  Literally.

  Ture guided him to the bedroom. When he started to turn on the lamp, Maris stopped him.

  "I work better in the dark."

  Knowing how self-conscious Maris was about his physical scars, Ture pulled his hand back. "Next time, I want light and I think I'm highly offended that you just called this work."

  Deep laughter rang rumbled in his ear as Maris laid him on the bed. "Fine then, I pleasure better in the dark."

  "That still doesn't sound right."

  "Yes, well, I can use my tongue for speaking to you, or for..."

  Ture gasped as Maris teased his nipple. Chills spread the length of his body as he hardened to the point of pain. "By all means, don't let me interfere with that."

  Another warm laugh thrilled him as Maris made a slow, deliberate and hot trail from his nipple to his abdomen. He expelled a deep breath as Maris tongued his navel while he masterfully undid Ture's pants. Lifting his hips, he allowed Maris to slide them off along with his shoes and socks.

  Then, Maris suckled his toes. His eyes rolled back in his head as pleasure assaulted him. He'd had no idea how good that could feel. Maris ran his fingers and tongue around and between each digit then to the arch of his foot.

  No wonder Anachelle had looked so pleased while Maris massaged her feet. It was incredible.

  Maris nipped Ture's heel with his teeth, then slowly worked his way up Ture's muscular legs. The scent of his skin filled his head, making him drunker than any wine. Since the moment Maris had first seen him, he'd been dying for this. Any man who could have humor while under fire...

  Not to mention, the loyalty he'd given Zarya.

  His heart pounding, Maris brushed his hand against Ture's cock and delighted in the pleasure he saw on Ture's face. Unlike a human, Phrixians could see as well in total darkness as they could in broad daylight-- a courtesy of being amphibious. Since light couldn't penetrate to the depths of the water where many of them lived, they'd developed that ability long ago.

  He nipped at Ture's hipbone while Ture buried his hand in his hair and massaged his scalp. It felt so good to be touched again. So good to be with someone he could respect.

  Starving for the intimacy, he brushed his lips over Ture's tip then drew him slowly into his mouth.

  Ture cried out as Maris swallowed him whole. He shook all over at the sensation of Maris's breath and tongue on his body. Never had anyone been so thorough with him. Maris hadn't been exaggerating his skills in the least. It was as if Maris took his pleasure from giving it to others.

  Careful and slow so as not to hurt him, Ture thrust his hips against Maris's head while Maris's hands skimmed his body, heightening every lick.

  Ture wanted to stay like this, to savor it for as long as he could, but true to Maris's boasting... He couldn't last. Maris wrung too much pleasure from Ture's body. All too soon, he came in an explosion of pure ecstasy.

  And still Maris tasted him. He didn't flinch or pull back. Not until he'd sucked every last bit of pleasure from him.

  Panting and weak, Ture lay there with his head spinning. "That was amazing."

  Maris didn't speak as he slowly kissed his way up Ture's stomach until he reached his nipple again. He seemed to have a fondne
ss for that. His tongue swirled around it while Maris lifted Ture's hips. He pulled back slightly then slid himself inside.

  Ture groaned out loud as Maris thrust against him with unbelievable skill. "Harder, Mari."

  Maris bit his lip as he savored those words. Cupping Ture's cheek, he stared into his eyes. "You're beautiful."

  Ture turned his face so that he could kiss Maris's palm. "I pale in comparison to you."

  There he was wrong. Maris was scarred inside and out. Too many years of trying to live a lie, of trying to please people who hadn't cared about him, had taken its toll. He'd been through hell and had been seared by every flame.

  But right now, with Ture, he almost felt normal. It made no sense to him. Yet for some reason, it was like being home.

  He stared into those intelligent gray eyes and lost himself completely. An instant later, he shook as his own release finally came.

  Ture held him close while he played in Maris's hair. A sweet smiled curved his lips. "When did you take your clothes off?"

  Maris laughed over the fact that Ture hadn't even noticed as he'd slowly stripped in between pleasuring him. "Told you, I'm that good."

  "Yes, baby, you are."

  Maris moved to Ture's side so that he could pull him into his arms and hold him.

  Ture placed his hand over Maris's as he leaned against his chest and threw one leg over Maris's thighs. "I shudder at how many people you've been with to acquire your level of expertise."

  Cringing at something he hated to think or talk about, Maris sighed. Unfortunately, he also knew better than to lie about it. Sooner or later, Ture would find out and either he could accept it or he'd walk. And if he was going to walk, Maris would rather Ture leave now before any more of his affections took root. "You want the truth?"

  "No...but yes. I don't like lies."

  With a deep breath for courage, Maris braced himself for Ture's anger and moral condemnation. "I was a whore."

  "Mari, you shouldn't insult yourself like--"

  "No, Ture. I was a trained prostitute. Bought and sold."

  Ture stiffened. "What?"

  Here it comes...

  "Don't worry. I'm not diseased. I've been thoroughly tested." He ground his teeth as pain surged forward to slice open his heart. "And it was a lifetime ago... When my parents found out I was gay, they disowned me. My father took everything I had and destroyed it. Even my clothes, and the money I'd legally earned and saved. All my assets were seized by the Phrixian government-- beauty of having noble parents with political pull. I had nothing except the battlesuit on my back, and the handful of credits in my pocket. I was too embarrassed to tell Darling...or anyone, for that matter, how they'd done me. Humiliated and wanting to get away from the horrors of my life, I ran. Since I didn't want to sign on as a soldier or assassin, and I had absolutely no other marketable skills, I ended up with the first guy willing to take me in. I thought he cared about me, but he was a slaver, looking for easy marks. Within a week, he'd hooked me on drugs and sold me to a brothel."