Death's Ink Black Shadow (16 page)

Nikolas rolled them, only able to because, once more, Ben allowed it. Then he was on top, and he entered again, but the contrast with his last thoughtless ramming was so marked that Ben swore and laughed as, inch by inch, Nikolas worked himself in. When he was fully buried, Nik eased down to lie on Ben and murmured into another kiss, “Sorry.” Ben smiled and spread his thighs.

Nikolas once more appeared to lose himself inside Ben, his expression one of intense pleasure, but Ben knew that now Nikolas knew exactly where he was and what he was engaged upon and that he was doing it for Ben’s enjoyment as much as his own. But he was still too serious, almost playing a part for Ben’s benefit. Ben lifted himself up and whispered, “Last man I had in this bed was Tim.”

Nikolas didn’t even falter, his strokes continuing just as they both liked them. “Was he good?”

“Different.”

“Hairier, I’m guessing?”

Ben flung himself back onto the bed, arms stretched out in delight. “He had chest hair.”

Nikolas glanced down at him with a frown. He didn’t look too pleased, as if he hadn’t expected his guess to be confirmed. Ben smirked back mischievously and drew the pattern of the T of hair that had been on Tim’s chest onto his own smooth one, nipple to nipple and then down to his belly button then further and then as far as he wanted to go, taking his cock in hand and beginning to beat it.

Nikolas stared at Ben avidly, but grunted, “The idiot was supposed to stop you from even being alone with Tim
aren’t-my-blue-eyes-adorable
Watson.”

“No, Squeezy joined in. Best threesome I’ve ever had.”

“Only one you’ve ever had.”

Ben narrowed his eyes. “I had a life before you, you know.”

Nikolas didn’t even bother to dignify this self-delusion with a reply. He dragged and raised Ben onto his lap and got serious.

Ben lost his ability to talk. He’d lost his ability to think, so talking was out of the question.

He felt himself coming. Everything was tingling, imploding before the great rush of release that left them both breathless. Nikolas had frozen above him, only tiny jerks from his hips and the tight clench of his face giving away that he was coming deep inside Ben. Ben watched his own shots coating his hand as he welcomed Nikolas’s hot spurts inside.

The tension in the body above him uncoiled. Nikolas lay down upon him, and Ben brought his arms up to snag him close and hold him tight. Nikolas murmured something, and when Ben prodded him to repeat it, he claimed slyly, “Jackson was completely hairless—
everywhere
.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Ben was deeply asleep when Nikolas shouted him awake and hit him. Afterwards, Ben forgave him, for he realised they were both involuntary actions, but at the time he woke with a curse and punched Nikolas back.

Nikolas had been asleep and only then woke, but he still seemed in the grip of the dream that had made him attack Ben. He said something in Russian that Ben didn’t understand and only when Ben sat up next to him did he come back to something of himself.

Nik ran his fingers through his rumpled hair and sank back into the pillows. Ben was about to curl back into the warm body when he heard a groan and saw Nikolas fling his arm over his face—a sure sign, Ben knew, that Nikolas was dealing with strong emotions that he wasn’t willing to share. He laid his head upon Nikolas’s chest and could hear the rapid beat of his heart, feel the tension in the muscles. At that moment, Nikolas seemed as fragile as Molly, needing his protection just as much.

He began to stroke his hand around Nikolas’s belly, trailing patterns upon his pale skin until Nikolas caught his fingers. “That tickles.”

Ben propped himself up on one elbow. He brushed away a tear that had settled on Nikolas’s cheek. “What were you dreaming about?”

Nikolas raised his eyes to the tor, visible in the moonlight through the glass above them. “Anatoly.”

Ben had guessed as much.

“He’s just an old man now. He can’t hurt you. I won’t let him.”

He saw a faint smile on Nikolas’s face, but what he said troubled Ben. “You would if you knew.”

Ben frowned and edged closer, one thigh up over Nikolas, shielding him. “Knew what?”

Nikolas sighed. “I dreamt I was back there again. In one of the dachas my father had on the Black Sea. They were all coming for the weekend—his friends, from Moscow.”

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry. Don’t dwell on it. It’s over now. It’s
over
.”

Nikolas shook his head and began to laugh. It was a desolate sound. “You have no idea.” He shifted on the pillow and caught Ben’s gaze. “I used to look forward to it.” At Ben’s immediate look of confusion, Nikolas elaborated, “The presents they would bring me.” He turned back to centre so he could watch the tor once more. “They
liked
me. Sergei liked me.
Me
, Ben, not Nika. Do you see what I’m saying? Initially, he only wanted Nika. You know this. But then he wanted
me
.” He flicked his gaze over. “I made sure he continued to want me. I revelled in the attention. So many presents.” He chuckled. “I was a whore at twelve years old. I sometimes wonder if I have ever been anything else.”

Ben thought about what Nikolas had said for a while then asked the silent figure, “If twelve-year-old you met you now, what would he say to you?”

Nikolas frowned and Ben clarified, “I was thinking about Hayden again. When we were filming
Finding
Peace
, Oliver met his eight-year-old self, but it was all about what Oliver wanted, not what that little boy wanted. What if you could do it the other way around? What would twelve-year-old Aleksey say to you?”

Nikolas nodded slowly. “He’d say
kill them all
.”

Ben sank back onto the pillow next to him. He knew he didn’t need to point out the obvious. He could sense Nikolas pondering things. Sometimes Nikolas’s thoughts were very loud. Ben only added, as he spooned tightly to him, “You survived. I don’t care what you had to do. If I went back and met you then, I’d tell you to do
whatever
it took to stay alive long enough to meet me.”

Nikolas chuckled. “You were just a baby in nappies when I was twelve.”

“Possibly in this very spot.”

Nikolas turned his head once more, his face back to its more characteristic, amused curiosity. “I had forgot that.”

“Fate, see?”

Nikolas laughed again and rose over Ben, blocking out the light from the moon. “We follow some unknown plan, Benjamin. You persuade me of this. You are my fate.”

Nikolas entered Ben gently, opening him up with easy, long strokes until he was ready for more. They didn’t take long, both coming in the warmth and ease of knowing the other so well that familiarity heightened the pleasure.

Ben was almost asleep before he finished coming, feeling a welcome weight descend upon him before he let himself tip over the dark edge of nothingness, secure in the knowledge that he was filled with Nikolas, covered by Nikolas, and impaled upon Nikolas still.

When he woke again, it was still not yet light, and he wondered why he’d woken. Nikolas was now alongside him, breathing evenly, no sign that he was dreaming. Ben listened to the house, wondering if some small disturbance in the balance of the silence had woken him. He climbed out of bed and went across the swim lane to the kitchen. Radulf was standing by the window, staring unsighted out into the dark. He was still, his tail down. Ben clicked his tongue at the dog, who peeled away from the glass reluctantly. Ben gave him a treat and got himself a glass of water, conscious of being naked in a transparent bowl, the feeling always unnerving him.

Radulf returned to his basket to gnaw his biscuit, and Ben headed to the bedroom. He was just about to climb into the hot, mussed bed, when a flicker of light from the study caught his eye. The monitors had come on. Nikolas had left them on sensory mode—they were off until they detected motion. He went in and stood before them. The driveway by the collapsed gate, the hill, the woods, Ulyana Ivanovna’s house. There, a movement. Fox? Deer? Ben leant forward as if that would help him see. A white, ghostly figure moved through the trees near Babushka’s house. He shouted, “Intruder,” and ran into to the bedroom, waking Nikolas instantly. Ben yanked on his jeans and boots, aware that the few moments taken to do this now could make all the difference. Nikolas was reaching under the bedside table and came out with a pistol. He too pulled on jeans and shoes, and they ran toward the front of the house.

Radulf was back by the window, staring sightlessly out again, a rumble like muttering coming from his chest. Ben cursed his own stupidity, the thought ghosting into his brain that the dog was probably scolding,
“Yes! Hello! Anna!”

He clicked his fingers, but Nikolas shut the door before Radulf could join them, his quick, “Too dark for him,” making a complete lie of his frequent claim that he gave Radulf’s welfare no consideration at all.

Ben wished he had a gun as well as they ran over the gravel toward the huge rhododendron bushes that stood between them and the path to the woods.

Under their cover, they stopped, both listening. Ben’s heart was pounding. Terrible scenarios rushed through his mind—Molly Rose taken from Ulyana Ivanovna’s house, kidnapped, held for ransom—or worse.

They could hear nothing except the normal night sounds and so went on together cautiously. The house in the woods was secure—the door locked and no signs of disturbance at any of the windows. It was impossible to tell in the dark exactly where Ben had seen the white figure. Nikolas crouched down, tugging Ben to follow suit. “We will see nothing until it is light. One hour and the sun will be up.”

Ben knew what Nikolas was thinking—this wasn’t the first occasion they’d surprised someone on their property at night, and that time there had been an entirely innocent explanation. They had travelled down from London a few months ago very early in the morning, for they had been at a party and it hadn’t seemed worth going to bed, both looking forward to an early morning drive and arriving in Devon before most people were on the roads. As they’d pulled up in front of the house, they’d seen a man in the bushes.

Training had taken over. They’d exited the car, rolling, coming to their feet and surprising the trespasser, who’d cursed loudly until all was revealed. He was their new gardener.

The previous week, Nikolas had interviewed for a groundsman. Most of the applications had come from landscape design companies, until this one old codger—as Ben had termed him once and the name had stuck—arrived. Rather than sit in the kitchen and present immaculately produced marketing material, the old codger had wandered immediately into the grounds. Whilst talking to Nikolas, he’d actually pulled a pair of secateurs out of his pocket and snipped at a few things, unable to resist. Nikolas had hired him on the spot.

The old codger had come over the morning when they’d discovered him to recce the trees in the dark so he could watch the sunrise—see where the first rays of light struck the garden and thus plan his pruning accordingly.

He wasn’t the only one they found occasionally enjoying their greenery, either. Walkers on Dartmoor sometimes mistook their extensive boundary for the edge of a National Trust property and entered accordingly, clusters of elderly ladies with sturdy boots and rucksacks, seeking tearooms and a gift shop. And the lavatories, usually.

Nikolas took it all in his stride. He was used to ladies in stout shoes with cut-glass accents, and seemed to quite enjoy the attention.

Once, Ben had strolled out of the swim lane only wearing his boxers—and donning them had been a last minute decision—to find Nikolas entertaining the Dartington branch of the W.I. to tea in the kitchen and discussing azaleas with them.

But this, Ben sensed, this ghost before dawn, was different. There had been a level of furtiveness to the movements that worried him. Nikolas tugged his waistband and indicated for them to return to the house. Ben nodded, getting his meaning. They went back into the study, and Nikolas ran the recording back to find the presence Ben had seen. Once they’d located him, it was easy to track his progress.

He’d come in from the moors.

It was possible he was a stray walker, likely even a lost soldier on an exercise from Okehampton Camp, or a youngster on a training weekend for the Ten Tors competition…

Ben was less concerned where he’d come in from than where he was going. The person had paused a while at the new house—where Ben had first seen him—then come toward them. At that point, two other white spectres appeared on the screen—Nikolas and him. They’d passed the intruder only half a dozen feet away as they’d run across the lawn. “Fuck.” Ben couldn’t have agreed more. They tracked the phantom back out over the drystone wall where he was then beyond the reach of their cameras.

“What do you think?”

“Harmless stray.”

Ben wasn’t impressed by this answer. “Why didn’t he make himself known to us then?”

“Would you? Two men with a gun? Maybe he wasn’t entirely harmless. Maybe just an opportunist thief. Did you lock the garage tonight? I didn’t. We have nearly half a million pounds worth of vehicles in there and do we ever lock it?”

Ben frowned, about to contradict Nikolas on the value of their car when Nikolas suddenly dismissed all urgency with a casual, “Anyway. As soon as it’s light we’ll see, yes?”

Ben knew he was being distracted from something, but couldn’t work out what. His nerves were on edge, and he actually jumped a little when Nikolas took him in his arms. Nikolas snorted but challenged softly, “It’s because of Molly Rose. You are suddenly responsible for someone else’s life, and that changes people—so I have been told.”

Ben huffed. “I’ve been responsible for you more years than I care to count.”

“Ah, but I have never been any trouble, have I?” He swatted Ben’s backside and went into the bedroom. Ben thought he was going back to bed, but instead Nik began to dress properly then rummaged under the bed and handed Ben another weapon.

Ben felt a surge of relief.

They still thought alike about things that counted.