CHAPTER 74: CHAPTER 74: THE PROMISED KISS

Victor’s hand slipped higher, brushing over the faint curve of Elias’s collarbone.

"You’re warm," he murmured, thumb grazing over the dip of skin like it meant something more than anatomy, like it was proof that Elias was real, here, still his. "Tense, but warm."

Elias exhaled through his nose, slow and tight, as though releasing that breath would somehow release the tension curling in his gut. He tried, briefly, futilely, to summon the usual sharp edge of sarcasm that had always kept Victor at arm’s length, but it faltered beneath the press of heat behind him. "You’re in my bed."

"And you didn’t throw me out."

Victor’s voice was quiet, even, but there was a glint of teeth buried beneath the calm, a satisfaction too refined to be smug.

Elias didn’t respond. He couldn’t, not with Victor so close. Not with the scent of him slowly bleeding into the sheets, the pillow, and the edges of Elias’s self-control. He was already surrounded by it, like air gone too warm in a room too small. He kept his gaze locked on the far wall, unmoving, as if distance could still protect him now.

Victor dipped his head again, slower this time, and the brush of his nose against the back of Elias’s neck was gentle. He paused there, barely touching, then inhaled.

This time it was deeper. Closer to a shudder than a breath.

Elias felt it, the quiet unraveling in Victor’s chest, the way his whole body responded to that scent like it was nourishment he’d been denied. As if this, Elias’s scent, unguarded and alone in the dark, was something he’d been chasing across every border of patience.

"Your scent is mixed with mine," Victor murmured at last, his voice roughened into something darker, heavier.

Elias didn’t speak. His throat had gone tight.

Victor’s alpha pheromones had begun to bleed fully into the space between them now, no longer held back. They rolled off him in slow, possessive waves, thick enough to change the air, sweetened by heat and the low, electric hum of restrained want. The scent of scorched cedar, amber, and rain-heavy stone threaded into the sheets like smoke, and it wrapped around Elias’s skin with a familiarity that left no room for misinterpretation.

Even as a recessive omega, Elias could feel it. The air grew heavier. His skin flushed hotter. His pulse stuttered low in his belly, where the first thread of heat stirred, unwanted but evident.

Victor’s palm flattened against his chest again, fingers splayed, covering the frantic thrum of his heart. Elias was all too aware of every inch of him that touched Victor: the solid weight of his body pressed to his back, the shape of him molded along Elias’s spine, and the unyielding arm around his waist that didn’t so much cage him as claim him.

"You smell like mine," Victor said, softer now, not a boast, but a truth spoken aloud. "Even after I left. Even now."

"Victor..." Elias inhaled to clear his mind, forgetting about the pheromones curling in the air until they reached his lungs. "Your scent marked me."

Victor didn’t flinch at the accusation. Didn’t even blink. His lips brushed the shell of Elias’s ear as he spoke, low and entirely unapologetic.

"I did."

The words sank into Elias’s skin like heat through fabric, slow, impossible to escape. A quiet confession without remorse.

Elias’s pulse jumped under Victor’s palm, and he hated that the man could feel it, could track the exact rhythm of his resistance collapsing inch by inch, heartbeat by heartbeat. The air between them was thick now, oppressive with alpha pheromones that curled through the sheets and clung to Elias’s skin like heat from a brand that hadn’t touched him yet.

"You weren’t supposed to," Elias said, barely more than a breath. "You didn’t ask."

Victor’s mouth hovered at the curve of his neck, his voice so low it felt like a vibration against Elias’s spine. "I didn’t need to ask. You let me."

Elias opened his mouth to deny it, to cut that idea down at the root, but nothing came out. He tried again, barely forming his words through the haze in his mind.

"Let you?" Elias’s voice caught, rough with disbelief. "Victor... I’m recessive. I wasn’t supposed to feel it, until..." He broke off, the breath in his throat stalling.

Victor’s tone was quiet, waiting. "Until?"

Elias’s jaw tightened. "Not until you drown me in them."

Victor went still.

The heat of his breath fanned across Elias’s skin, and the hand resting on Elias’s chest spread wider, his palm pressing with subtle pressure, as if to hold something in place that had just begun to shift.

"Until I drown you in them," he echoed, voice low, rich with quiet reverence and dark satisfaction. "You’re feeling it now."

Elias’s eyes squeezed shut. ’God damn it.’

Because he was.

The haze in the air wasn’t just thick anymore, it was molten, alive, curling down his throat with every breath, saturating his lungs and bleeding into his veins. It tasted like Victor. Like heat and power and ancient power. Something built to devour.

And inside him, something responded.

Low in his belly, a curl of warmth tightened, dragging a shallow gasp from his mouth that he couldn’t quite swallow. His skin burned where Victor’s hand touched him, nerves sparking from every careful stroke, and the ache beneath his stomach, faint and traitorous, started to build into something else.

"I shouldn’t..." Elias started, voice strained, breathless. "This isn’t..."

Victor leaned in, mouth ghosting over the edge of his jaw, his lips barely grazing skin. "You’re shaking."

"I’m not..."

"You are," Victor whispered, and his hand moved again, this time gliding lower. His touch, his fingers slipping beneath the hem of Elias’s shirt with that same unbearable care. "You’re not in heat, Elias. Not yet. But your body’s already listening."

Elias felt like he was dissolving, like something inside him was being slowly unwound by a pressure he hadn’t given permission to but hadn’t stopped, either.

"You scent-marked me," he repeated, the words barely holding their shape. Elias couldn’t believe that the alpha was that possessive. He wanted to ask why and when, but couldn’t form the words.

Victor’s lips pressed against his neck now, just behind the curve of his ear. Not a kiss. Not yet.

"I did," he murmured again. "Because I knew I’d come back. And I wanted you still soft with me when I did."

Elias’s heart twisted.

Victor didn’t ask for much. But when he did, it was always like this: quiet, heavy, and inevitable. He didn’t chase; he waited. And Elias, who had spent years building his spine out of silence and cold steel, was coming undone under that weight.

Victor knew how to hold him without breaking him.

And his pheromones, Gods, they were everywhere now.

The sheets felt damp with heat. The room had no edges. And Elias, fever-warm and wrapped in the scent of scorched cedar and unspoken need, lay still in Victor’s arms... and didn’t pull away.

Victor’s voice, when it came again, was gentler than before.

"You promised me a kiss when I come back."