Chapter 14

Damien

Confusion is soon replaced by disbelief, and finally, the last bit of his stifling power evaporates, and the restrictive vise on my lungs is loosened. My age, coupled with centuries of honed skills, makes me an incredibly powerful demon, even without the magic of The Lucifer behind me.

But here, in his domain?

He reigns supreme.

The raw energy that had been coursing from him was as intoxicating as it was all-encompassing. It was warm magic, sparking like tiny electric currents across the top layer of my skin, while telling me in no uncertain terms that he was comfortable holding his place at the zenith of the food chain.

He’s the alpha, and I’d be a fool not to submit to his rule. Even at my peak power, I doubt I could’ve bested him in a direct confrontation.

“What?” he breathes, eyes searching mine. The anger is still there, raw and untamed, the distrust evident, but a flicker of curiosity peeks through the facade, offering me the tiniest glimmer of hope.

“Can we…” I push up on my toes again, trying to close the distance between us, but he doesn’t give me an inch. My fist closes around his shirt, and I wrestle him closer, staring into those stony eyes, before I relent and press my lips to his, but they’re stiff and unmoving.

Disappointment chokes me as I drop to my feet and awkwardly chew on my bottom lip, trying to read his expressionless face. “Can we go somewhere and talk?” His jaw clenches as he grinds his teeth, and I swallow past the emotion in my throat. “Give me a chance to explain, and if you… if you still want me to leave, I will. I’ll leave and I’ll never come back, but I’m begging you to hear me out.”

His gaze flicks up to the room full of demons, not a single one trying to hide their intrigued staring. “And them?”

“Xalreth and Cadbury can make sure everyone stays on task.” His eyes dart over to the corner, another flare of surprise when he sees his number two and mine—well, the demon who used to be mine—standing together amiably, planning the logistics of the workshop. “Nik, please.”

Our eyes lock again, holding each other captive in a silent battle of wills. The seconds stretch into an eternity, until a curt nod, a mere flick of his head, breaks the spell. With a sharp turn, he walks towards his office, leaving me standing there, the sting of his indifference hitting like a slap. Xalreth finds me as I gesture at the hallway to let him know where I’ll be, then hurry after Niklaus.

Orange flames flicker shadows across his imposing form as he sits, fingers steepled in front of him, and I take a minute to soak in his appearance. Dark bags hang under his normally bright green eyes, dull with exhaustion and missing their usual fire. His beard is scruffy, and his hair is wild, like his hands have pushed through it enough to almost make it stand on end.

Guilt claws at me, its tiny teeth sinking into my gut with each accusing glance from his piercing eyes.

He was mine to have, mine to hold on to… until I took it a step too far.

Still, despite how battered he looks, there’s an aura of undeniable power that makes him appear invincible. Like he could be cracked and bent, but never broken. Never diminished or destroyed.

Not like me.

“What do you have to say for yourself?”

Palms sweating and pulse racing, I meet his eyes and take a steeling breath before I lay it all out on the line. “My arrival here was driven by nothing more than sheer boredom and a thirst for something new. Life had turned monotonous, and when another of those candy-striped letters landed on my desk, it was… a convenient distraction.”

“A distraction,” he repeats, his voice flat and emotionless, and I nod, barely able to meet his eyes.

“We got here, and everything was just so… innocent. Corruptible. You have to understand, in Hell, every soul has their own nefarious plans and hidden agendas… even the nice ones. Everyone is scheming and plotting, and there’s constant rebellion and fighting for the sake of conflict. Here at the North Pole, it was organized and, and… peaceful , and hundreds of years of instinct kicked in before I could stop it. There’s no excuse for my actions other than I saw a chance to cause chaos, so I did.”

“By hijacking my elves to make sex toys.” His voice rumbles deep from his chest, his anger escalating with each word as I slowly nod.

“But then we started spending time together, and you were… nice. You didn’t view me as The Lucifer, or a ruler to overthrow, or a tool to gain favor. I wasn’t an opportunity. For the first time in a very long time, you saw me as Damien. Just Damien … just me. And I was so fucking hungry for that, Nik. I was starving for someone to look at me and see the person instead of the position.”

His eyes soften a fraction as he leans back in his chair, his chest rising on a deep breath. “I never saw you for what you could offer me, Damien,” he says quietly, and my heart breaks a little further .

“I realize that now,” I whisper, biting at my lip to fight the sting behind my eyes. “The better I got to know you, the more ashamed I felt about what I was doing. You’re just so goddamned good , Nik. You’re good in ways I could never imagine… in ways I couldn’t accomplish if I dedicated a century to trying. But I wanted to try… I wanted to try for you , and I went to shut it all down because I knew what the truth would do to you.”

Risking another glance at him, I find the same blank slate on his face, and that sting behind my eyes grows to a sharp ache. “You’d hate me, and I couldn’t stand that. I couldn’t fucking handle the idea of you hating me, so I went to put a stop to it, and it was too late. You were there, and you hated me.”

He tracks the rogue tear that’s slipped free, and I furiously wipe it away, unable to hold his intense stare. “I’ve never hated you, Damien.”

“You do,” I insist, despising the break in my voice as I scrub at my face. “You hate me and you’re going to tell me to leave, and I’ll never see you again.”

“You’re no longer The Lucifer?” he asks, interrupting my self-pity party as I glance up and shake my head. “Why not?”

I swallow hard, and slowly, I force the words out. “Because if I’m The Lucifer, I have to be in Hell… and if I’m there, I can’t be here with you.” His eyes land on mine, some of that fire igniting behind them. Rage and frustration or something else, something sweeter, I can’t yet tell.

“Here with me?” he repeats, and still, I’m unable to read him .

“My heart can’t be in the position if it’s trapped here with you, now, can it?” His only reaction is a slight lift to his brow, and he ignores me, which, I won’t lie, really fucking stings.

“If you are no longer The Lucifer, why did the demons follow you here and agree to work? What do they possibly gain from following a former leader?”

I mean, ouch.

Exhausted, a slow sense of defeat has washed over me, and I slump in my chair, giving a vague wave of my hand. “I have been in office a long time, Nik, and despite what you might think about me, I’ve always been a fair ruler. I listen to problems, and, when I can, fix them. The inhabitants of Hell hold a great deal of respect for me, former leader or not.”

He stares at me for a while, face unyielding, and the last tiny spark of hope starts to die in my chest as he takes a breath and pushes out a drawn-out, heavy sigh.

Rejection.

This is rejection, and I can hear it in his breath and taste it in the fucking air between us. It’s rejection, and now… now I’ll have nothing.

Be nothing.

“Come here,” he finally says.

“What?” My head snaps up so fast I’m surprised it doesn’t bounce.

“Come here, Damien.” His voice is soft but insistent, and I force my shaky legs to stand and walk around the desk, never taking my eyes from his as he swivels in his chair to face me. “Closer,” he demands, and I step forward between his knees. He shoves my jacket off and tosses it away, and I somehow find the indignation to scowl. His hands wrap around my thighs, and I have to grab his neck for balance as he hoists me to straddle his lap.

“Look me in my eyes and tell me what you want from me.”

My hands tremble as they hold on to him, inching closer. “I don’t want anything from you, Nik. For the first time in my life, I don’t want to take. I want to give. I want to give you the entire goddamned world, and all I ask in return is that we go back to pretending you could ever love something as evil as me.”

“Pretending?”

“Just let me believe it, Nik… let me believe I’m good enough…”

“Damien,” he breathes, brushing my lips in a kiss. “You think I could fake this?” Sheepishly, I stare at him, before a very unmanly sniffle leaves me. Yeah, we’re going to erase that from this memory like it never happened.

Nik smiles. “Sweet Damien, I started falling in love with you the moment I first glimpsed that snarky smile and saw straight past that mask you wore. You might think you have the world fooled, but I’ve seen your heart. You have been it for me from the day we met.”

“But I fucked it all up,” I whisper, another stupid tear breaking free as my frustrated hand goes to erase it, only to be caught mid-air in his giant fist .

“You did,” he agrees, kissing the salty trail off my skin. “And now you’re going to have to work hard to make it all better.”

A ragged sound climbs from my throat, desperate and relieved, as I push my lips to his, a hint of salt on top of all that sweetness. And like it set off a chain event that can no longer be stopped, we’re touching everywhere. His hands in my hair, mine on his shoulders, chests and hips moving together, and tongues twisting as we fight to get even closer.

“Can you forgive me?” I ask, breathless, against our kiss, and he nods, but doesn’t separate us long enough to answer. My palms land on his chest and I force myself back. “Words, Nik. I need to hear this. I need you to tell me I haven’t lost you.”

A smirk spreads over his lips as he nudges his nose with mine. “I know you aren’t trying to dom me right now.”

My mouth twitches in a tiny smile. “Never.”

“That’s my boy,” he whispers, the sound a low rumble in his throat, before his gaze turns intense, his fingers idly tracing the outline of my lip. “I won’t insult you by lying to you and pretending you didn’t hurt me, Damien. I may not be as old as you, but I consider myself to be an extraordinarily reasonable man. Until you come into play, and then logic abandons me altogether. But mark my words,” he says, and my heart thuds again at the warning in his voice, “if you are using me, or if this is a new game you’re playing, there will not be another chance. This is it, Damien. ”

“I won’t need another chance.” Tucking my face into his neck, I throw myself against him. “I won’t waste this one, I swear it,” I whisper.

“My little prince,” he purrs, and goosebumps rise on my skin from the warning in his tone. “Just know that I would search every corner of the realms to hunt you down, and there wouldn’t be a single shadowy corner that would protect you from my wrath. Don’t forget that.”

Holy fuck, the threat should not be so sexy, but my cock bucks in my pants at the growl of his voice.

Our mouths find each other again, and my fingers work their way under his shirt, running my palms and fingertips along the heated skin of his abdomen as I rock into him. A pitiful whimper leaves me when he grips my hips and pushes me back, my lips chasing his. Reluctantly, I climb to my feet at his sharp glare.

“Pants off, Damien,” he commands, undoing his button and zipper and pulling his thick cock out as he waits for me to obey.

“Are you not going to be naked, too?” I pout, yanking my shirt off and working on my pants.

His grin is downright filthy as he strokes himself. “You like how slutty it makes you feel when I take you with my clothes on. It’s alright, Damien, you can be my little whore, and I’ll fuck you raw without even bothering to get undressed.” I whimper as I shove my pants to the ground, and his eyes immediately zero in on my cock .

“You never took it off?” I glance at my dick, trapped inside the cage he put on me days ago, a drip of pre-cum leaking between the wires.

“I’m not supposed to take it off until Daddy says I can.” I walk over, standing between his knees again as he strokes himself with one hand and reaches up to drag his fingers over my cage with the other.

“Well, Daddy says it stays until I’m done watching you come while wearing it.” I climb onto his lap, and he finally releases his cock, both of us staring as it lands in the crease of my thigh. I lean forward, my movement causing his face to twist in a contorted expression of pure pleasure. He grabs the lube from his desk drawer and holds it against my hole, and I can’t help my moan when he squeezes it and shoots the gel inside me.

“Such a needy thing,” he murmurs as he sets it aside and catches the dripping lube, using it to slick me up with a teasing finger.

“Fuck, I’ve missed you inside me,” I moan as I rock on his finger, tossing my head back and letting my voice ring free at the pleasure that slingshots through my body.

He moves that finger with maddening slowness, each inch feeling like an eternity, so I try to speed things up by bearing down and pushing back, almost bouncing in my eagerness. “Someone’s sensitive today.” Nik leans forward and licks up the column of my neck, sucking on the skin around my Adam’s apple so hard I know he’s leaving behind a mark .

So much pleasure and anticipation coil in my muscles that I start to lose control of myself, gasping and moaning as I ride on his hand. He trails down to the curve of my shoulder and starts on another mark as a second finger stretches into me. Both fingers pull back until they’re barely inside me, catching my rim as he slams them forward. Soon, he’s thrusting into me in a steady, forceful rhythm.

My body is on fire as I press backwards into him, chanting his name as he sinks his teeth into my shoulder. “Nik!” I shout, and he freezes as my ass squeezes around his fingers, my cock pulsing and trying to fall over the edge. “No, no, no,” I wail, rocking faster. He only allows a single second of this before he stops me with his other hand and pins me in place.

“You haven’t been given permission to come yet.”

“Please, Daddy, please,” I beg, fighting to move against his iron grip.

He clicks his tongue and leans in, scraping his teeth over my ear before whispering, “If you think you’ll be allowed to come without my cock buried inside that ass, you’re sorely mistaken, sweet prince.”

I whimper as his hand cracks across my ass cheek. “Who does this ass belong to?”

“You, it belongs to you.”

Another slap, a harder one, causes me to shout. “Wrong answer. Whose ass is this?”

“It’s Daddy’s ass,” I whine as he places his palm over my reddened cheek, soothing the sting .

“That’s right… it’s Daddy’s ass. And what can Daddy do with this ass?”

“Whatever he wants.”

“Such a good boy,” he purrs, sliding his fingers from me and notching the head of his cock at my hole. There’s a sting as he pushes forward a few times, my rim stretching for the sledgehammer he tries to call a cock. I drop my weight, loving the sweet ache as my body opens for him, and I slide down until he’s fully seated. “God, I’ve missed this ass. This hole that’s only mine.”

“Only yours,” I agree, lifting off him until just the tip kisses my hole, then sinking back down with a wet suction as we both moan.

“Damien,” he gasps as he grabs my hips so hard they’ll bruise, thrusting up into me as I clutch his shoulder so tight my nails dig into his flesh. I’ve never seen him lose control like this, tendons in his neck drawn and sweat beading on his forehead. His mouth sags open as he fucks me, digging and clawing at my skin with such force that I can only hang on.

My cries are so loud that I’m sure they can be heard down the hall, but neither of us care as he pounds into me harder. I gasp, scrambling to grab his shoulders as he stands and drops my back onto his desk. His body canopies over mine as his palm lands on my throat, cutting off my air supply and making my brain go fuzzy.

“That’s my good boy,” he grunts, every word punctuated with the thrust of his hips that sends papers and pens flying into a flurry. “God, look at the way you take my cock.” His fingers tighten around my neck as he uses it for leverage, skin slapping as he drives me straight to the edge.

“Nik,” I rasp against his grip, “Nik, I’m gonna…” My head throws back as my spine makes a perfect arch off the desktop, and my shout is strangled as the tension all explodes out of me all at once.

“Fuck!” he shouts, cutting off my air completely as he fucks me rough, and it only heightens the orgasm that’s blasting through my system. Cum shoots from between the wires of my cage, pouring in a river down the metal bars. He curses once more then bottoms out, filling me up with a long, low moan.

He releases my neck, and I suck in a loud breath, still whimpering as my sensitive cock twitches inside the restraint of the cage. When his whole body slumps and he pulls out of me, cum drips down my skin, rushing out of my worn hole in a filthy stream. We stay like this, face-to-face, as he reaches up and pushes my curls back off my sweaty forehead.

“You’re staying?” The vulnerability in his eyes splays me wide open.

Oh, my heart.

“If you’ll let me.”

“I’m pretty sure I’ve made it clear by now that I’ll let you do just about anything.” I smile as he leans in for a sweet kiss. “There is… one thing we need to come to an understanding about.”

Sudden nerves bite at my stomach at the serious tone in his voice. “Oh… okay. ”

“I am burning that ugly fucking jacket.” Relief swarms through me and I bark out a laugh, and soon he joins me, resting his forehead against mine. Still grinning like fiends, he swoops me off the desk and carries me to his bathroom, where he fawns over cleaning me for the next half hour.

And as we climb into bed together, spooned up and holding on for dear life, I let myself believe that maybe, just maybe, the devil might find his happy ending after all.