Chapter 14: Echoes of Want
The silence of Vil’s penthouse was a physical presence. It pressed against his eardrums, thick and complete after the chaotic warmth of the Kingscholar villa. He stood in the center of his living room, all minimalist lines and curated art, his suitcase abandoned by the door. The air smelled of lemongrass cleaner and emptiness.
His phone, switched off for the flight, felt like a live wire in his pocket. He powered it on.
The notifications bloomed like a digital wildfire. Work emails from his agent. Calendar reminders. And then, the social media alerts. Dozens. Hundreds. Tags, mentions, trending topic symbols.
His thumb hovered over his professional Instagram. A cold, professional curiosity won out. He tapped it.
The first photo stole the breath from his lungs.
It was them. On the beach, under the fairy lights. Leona had just pulled out his chair. The angle was long-lens, grainy but unmistakable. Leona’s hand was on the back of the chair, his body inclined towards Vil with an attentive tilt. Vil himself was caught mid-sit, looking up at Leona. The lantern light caught the half-smile on his own face, a private, unguarded expression he didn’t even remember making. The caption from some sleazy gossip page screamed: ROYAL ROMANCE CONFIRMED? Prince Leona’s Omega Dines Under the Stars!
He scrolled. Faster.
Another. This one was from the water’s edge, just after dinner. It was a silhouette against the violet twilight, two figures locked together, the ocean swirling at their feet. The kiss. His own hands were on Leona’s face, Leona’s arms wrapped around his back, pulling him close. It was achingly, undeniably intimate. SEA-SIDE SMOOCH! Sources say it’s getting serious!
Another. Falena, Eric, and Cheka laughing over painted canvasses, the family together. FAMILIES MEET! Is a Betrothal Next?
The photos were everywhere. Reposted, analyzed, dissected. Comments sections were a warzone of swooning emojis, cynical dismissals, and feverish speculation. The narrative had crystalized overnight: their fake courtship had just graduated to a very real, very public love story.
A sharp, acrid taste flooded his mouth. Panic, but colder. Dread. This was the plan, a voice in his head reasoned, icy and logical. Public validation. The pressure alleviated. Mission accomplished.
So why did he feel like he’d been caught committing a crime?
His fingers were numb. He swiped to his messages. One from his agent, timestamped two hours ago: “Darling, check your headlines. The optics are impeccable. Call me.” Another from his father, simply: “The photos are lovely. You look happy.”
The last word seemed to pulse on the screen. Happy.
He wasn’t happy. He was… hollowed out. The performance had been too good. They’d believed their own publicity, just for a few days. And now the evidence was plastered across the internet for everyone—including Leona—to see. What would Leona think? That Vil had orchestrated this? That he’d tipped off the paparazzi for a career boost? The thought made his stomach twist.
He needed to do something. To reassert control. He went to his kitchen, movements automatic, and poured a glass of water. He didn’t drink it. He just held the cold glass, staring at the perfect, still surface.
His doorbell rang.
The sound was a shockwave in the silent space. He flinched, water sloshing over the rim onto his hand. He wasn’t expecting anyone. His publicist would have called. A delivery would have been announced.
He set the glass down with a click and went to the door, peering through the discreet security screen.
Leona.
He was just… there. Leaning against the wall opposite Vil’s door in the hallway, hands shoved deep in his jacket pockets, head down. He looked like he’d come straight from the car, maybe from the airport lot. He hadn’t even gone home.
Vil’s heart performed a brutal, painful slam against his ribs. He disarmed the lock and opened the door.
The hallway air was cooler. Leona looked up. His green eyes were shadowed, unreadable. He looked tired. Not lazy-tired, but a deep, etched fatigue.
For a long moment, they just stared at each other. The space between them hummed with everything unsaid: the memory of sand and saltwater, the feel of sheets, the finality of a car door closing.
“You saw,” Vil said. It wasn’t a question.
Leona pushed off the wall. “Couldn’t avoid it. My brother called. He’s ‘thrilled with the positive press coverage.’” He mimicked Falena’s enthusiastic tone perfectly, but the delivery was flat, dead.
“I didn’t…”
“I know,” Leona interrupted, his voice low. “The angles. They were from the resort side. Probably a staffer with a phone. Not your style.” He said it like he was stating a fact about the weather.
“It changes the calculus,” Vil said, stepping back to let him in. He needed to be professional. Analytical. That was safe.
Leona walked past him into the sterile expanse of the living room. He didn’t sit. He stood in the middle of the room, a wild, restless energy contained in his still form, so out of place amid Vil’s curated calm. “Yeah. It does.” He turned to face Vil. “Falena’s already talking about a public appearance. ‘Capitalize on the momentum.’ His words.”
“A joint appearance?” Vil folded his arms, a defensive gesture he immediately regretted.
“He suggested a charity gala. In two weeks. Black tie. The whole… thing.” Leona’s gaze swept over him, lingering for a fractured second on his mouth before snapping back to his eyes. “We’d have to sell it. Hard.”
“We’ve sold it before.” Vil’s voice sounded brittle to his own ears.
“Not like this.” Leona took a step closer. The distance between them shortened, charged. “Not after those pictures. They’re not looking for polite distance anymore, Vil. They’re looking for what they saw. The…” He gestured vaguely, as if grasping for the word. “The whatever that was.”
The kiss. The touch. The look. It hung in the air, unnamed.
“So we give it to them,” Vil said, lifting his chin. The actor emerged, donning the armor of a role. “It’s just another scene. A longer one.”
Leona stared at him. A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Is that what it was? Just a scene?”
The question was a trapdoor opening beneath Vil’s feet. He couldn’t answer it. To say yes was a lie that felt like betrayal. To say no was an admission that could destroy the fragile, functional fiction they were built on.
“What else would it be?” Vil countered, deflecting. “We had a script. We followed it. The audience responded. Now we have an encore.” He turned away, walking towards the floor-to-ceiling window that looked out over the city’s glittering grid. He couldn’t have this conversation looking at him. “It’s what we agreed to.”
He heard Leona move behind him. Not closer. Just a shift of weight.
“Right,” Leona said finally. The word was heavy, final. “The agreement.”
The silence stretched. Vil watched a plane’s blinking lights crawl across the night sky.
“I’ll have my agent coordinate with your office,” Vil said, his back still turned. “For the gala. Wardrobe, arrival time, the… expected interactions.”
“Fine.”
Vil’s dismissal hung in the air, a formal and fragile end to the conversation. The city lights twinkled, indifferent to the quiet wreckage in the room. He heard Leona’s stillness behind him, a presence as solid and unsettling as a standing stone.
He expected the sound of retreating footsteps, the click of the door. They didn’t come.
The silence stretched, pulled taut between them. It was different from the comfortable quiet on the beach. This was a waiting silence, thick with unsaid words and the ghost of touch. Vil finally turned from the window, the professional mask settling perfectly over his features.
Leona hadn’t moved. He was staring at the abstract painting on Vil’s wall, but his gaze was unfocused, turned inward. His shoulders were set in a rigid line.
“Was there something else you needed?” Vil asked, his tone cool, rehearsed. The perfect host.
Leona’s head swiveled slowly toward him. The movement was predatory, deliberate. His green eyes cut through the dim room, landing on Vil with an intensity that made the air feel thin. He looked like he was staring down a problem he couldn’t solve, a equation with too many variables.
“Yeah,” Leona said, the word rough. He cleared his throat. He shifted his weight, the first sign of unease Vil had seen in him since he arrived. “There’s… another clause. For the contract.”
Vil tilted his head, a silent prompt. His heart began a slow, heavy thud against his ribs.
Leona ran a hand through his tawny hair, messing it further. He glanced away, then back, his jaw working. “The… physical acclimation part. From the trip.” He paused, searching for words. “It served its purpose. Obviously.”
“Obviously,” Vil echoed, his voice barely a breath.
“The photos. The gala.” Leona pushed on, his words coming faster now, like he was forcing them out before he changed his mind. “The act needs to be… consistent. In private and public. To be convincing.”
He was floundering. Vil watched, a strange detachment settling over him. He saw the pulse beating rapidly in Leona’s throat, the slight tension in his knuckles where his hands were now clenched at his sides.
“Get to the point, Leona.” Vil’s own voice sounded distant to his ears.
Leona’s eyes snapped to his, holding them with a desperate, blazing honesty. “I want to add sex to the contract.”
The statement landed in the quiet room with the blunt, shocking weight of a dropped stone. Vil didn’t breathe. He didn’t blink.
Leona barreled forward, the words tumbling out in an awkward, uncharacteristic rush. “I know you’re attracted to me. I’m… fucking attracted to you. We proved that. It could be another… beneficial aspect. Mutual. Efficient.” He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “It wouldn’t be emotional. Strictly physical. An extension of the… arrangement.”
He looked like he was proposing a hostile takeover, not a physical liaison. Vil remained perfectly still, his actor’s control the only thing holding him together. Inside, something was fracturing.
“There’d be more compensation, of course,” Leona added quickly, a businessman sealing a deal. “A significant increase. For the… additional services.” He finally stopped, his chest rising and falling with a shallow rhythm. His eyes searched Vil’s face, waiting for a reaction. “If you’re uncomfortable with it, it’s fine. We can forget I said it.”
The silence that followed was absolute. Vil processed the clinical, terrible logic of it. The raw, clumsy honesty beneath the transactional language. I’m fucking attracted to you. Ever since the vacation, I’ve been going insane. He hadn’t said those last words, but Vil heard them in the strained tenor of his voice, saw them in the tight cord of muscle along his neck.
It was the worst possible idea. A messy, emotional complication that would blur every line beyond recognition. It was a grenade rolled into the center of their carefully constructed fiction.
Vil looked at Leona—the proud, stubborn alpha prince reduced to this stumbling, propositioning mess—and felt a surge of something dangerously close to tenderness. It was immediately chased by a hotter, sharper spike of pure, undiluted want. The memory of Leona’s weight, his mouth, his hands, flooded him. He’d lain awake in this very sterile apartment for nights, chasing that feeling, tortured by it.
This was a terrible, transparent, human solution. A way to have the heat without the heart. A way to have Leona in some form, any form, even if it was just a clause in a contract.
“Yes.”
The word was out of Vil’s mouth before the thought had fully formed. It was too quick, too devoid of negotiation. It hung between them, a naked admission.
Leona stared, his eyebrows lifting slightly in shock. He’d expected a negotiation, a refusal, something. Not this instant, unqualified agreement.
Vil saw the surprise flash in his eyes and immediately cloaked his own in practicality. “The logic is sound,” he said, turning slightly to gesture toward his kitchen, a meaningless movement to disguise the tremble in his hands. “Consistency in the performance is key. Physical familiarity will sell the public image more effectively.” He forced himself to meet Leona’s gaze again, channeling every ounce of his professional detachment. “And the additional compensation is… acceptable.”
He was justifying it to himself as much as to Leona. It’s just another performance. A more intimate one. You’re an actor. He’s a client. It’s business.
Leona’s surprise hardened into a narrow-eyed scrutiny. He took a step closer, crossing the space Vil had tried to create. “Just like that?”
“Were you expecting a drawn-out negotiation?” Vil countered, lifting his chin. “You presented a reasonable addition to our existing terms. I’ve accepted.”
“Reasonable,” Leona repeated, a low, disbelieving sound. He was close enough now that Vil could see the flecks of gold in his green eyes, could smell the faint, familiar scent of him cutting through the sterile apartment air. It was the same scent that had been on Vil’s sheets, on his skin. “You think this is reasonable?”
“I think it’s a solution,” Vil said, his voice dropping to a murmur. “To a… mutual problem.”
That finally broke through Leona’s stunned expression. A slow, dark understanding dawned there. The mutual problem. The attraction that was a live wire, strung between them since the first door-slam kiss, now finally acknowledged in the cold light of a contract addendum.
Leona’s gaze dropped to Vil’s mouth, then back up. The air crackled, all pretense of business dissolving. “A solution,” he echoed, his voice a graveled whisper.
He didn’t move to touch him. He just stood there, a breath away, his proposal hanging in the space between their bodies. The new terms of their agreement were set. They had just formalized their own undoing, and both of them knew it.
They stared at each other in the silent, gleaming apartment, two people who had just agreed to use each other, and in doing so, had confessed everything.
They stared at each other in the silent, gleaming apartment, two people who had just agreed to use each other, and in doing so, had confessed everything.
The air between them was a live wire, humming with the unsaid.
Leona’s controlled composure shattered.
Since Vil gave full consent, Leona wasted no time and pinned him against the wall, crashing their lips together with a desperate hunger he’d been holding in since the trip. It wasn’t a kiss. It was a claiming, fueled by weeks of denied proximity and the raw confession of their terrible agreement. The impact jolted Vil’s spine against the cool drywall. Vil gasped against his mouth, shocked at the sudden violence of the action.
But he responded with equal fervor.
His hands flew to Leona’s jacket, clutching at the leather as he kissed back just as fiercely. It was all teeth and grasping need, a direct conduit for the frustration that had simmered since the car door shut. Leona’s tongue plunged into his mouth, a hot, desperate invasion that Vil welcomed with a muffled groan. The professional facade evaporated, leaving only this raw, physical truth.
They were a tangle of desperate motion against the wall.
Leona’s big hands framed Vil’s face, holding him still for the onslaught of his mouth before sliding down to his shoulders, his back, his hips. He couldn’t touch enough. Vil tore at Leona’s jacket, shoving it off his broad shoulders. It fell to the floor with a heavy thud. “Off,” Vil panted against his lips, his own fingers scrambling for the buttons of Leona’s shirt.
“You first,” Leona growled, his own hands finding the hem of Vil’s thin sweater.
They peeled layers in a frantic, uncoordinated dance. Fabric ripped. A button pinged off the floor. Vil’s sweater went over his head, catching for a moment on his watch before being discarded. Leona’s shirt was pushed from his shoulders, revealing the familiar, corded muscle and warm tan skin Vil had traced in the dark. Vil’s hands flattened against Leona’s bare chest, feeling the frantic, pounding heartbeat beneath his palms.
“Leona,” Vil breathed, the name a plea and a curse.
Leona didn’t answer with words. He dipped his head, his mouth finding the pale column of Vil’s throat. He bit down, not enough to mark, but enough to make Vil cry out and arch into him. The sensation was electric, a direct line to his core. Vil’s head thumped back against the wall, his fingers twisting in Leona’s tawny hair.
Their remaining clothes were a nuisance.
Leona made quick, rough work of Vil’s trousers, pushing them and his underwear down over his hips in one impatient shove. Vil kicked free of them, his own hands fumbling with the fastening of Leona’s jeans. The denim was stubborn. “Fuck,” Leona muttered, pulling back just enough to tear the button open himself.
They were both bare then, pressed skin to skin against the wall. The cool surface was a stark contrast to the heat burning between them. Leona’s erection pressed hard against Vil’s stomach. The feel of him, thick and hot, made Vil’s knees weaken. He hooked a leg around Leona’s hip, pulling him closer, grinding against him.
“Bed,” Vil managed to gasp. “Now.”
Leona didn’t need telling twice.
He gripped Vil under the thighs and lifted him effortlessly, turning them from the wall. Vil wrapped his legs around Leona’s waist, kissing him again, deep and messy, as Leona carried him across the open living space. They didn’t make it to the bedroom door. Leona veered toward the large, low sofa, dumping Vil onto the soft cushions before following him down, covering his body with his own.
The weight of him was everything. Vil spread his legs, making room for Leona to settle between them. The friction was maddening, not enough. Leona braced himself on his forearms, looking down at Vil spread beneath him. His hair was a wild halo on the cushion, his lips swollen, his violet eyes dark with pure want.
“Look at you,” Leona said, his voice a rough scrape. “Perfect. My perfect fucking princess.”
The pet name, so absurd and possessive, shouldn’t have worked. It sent a fresh, sharp thrill through Vil. He reached up, pulling Leona down for a searing kiss. “Don’t talk,” Vil breathed against his mouth. “Just fuck me.”
Leona chuckled, a dark, warm sound. “So impatient.” He trailed his mouth down Vil’s jaw, his neck, lower. He took a nipple into his mouth, sucking and teasing with his tongue until Vil was writhing, a broken stream of pleas falling from his lips. Leona’s hand slid between them, wrapping around Vil’s aching cock, stroking him with a firm, knowing twist.
Vil choked on a sob, his hips bucking into the touch. “Leona, please—”
“I know what you need,” Leona murmured, his mouth against Vil’s sternum. He released him, his hand drifting lower, fingers tracing through the wetness already gathered between Vil’s thighs. He pushed one finger inside, then two, working him open with a focused, relentless rhythm that stole the air from Vil’s lungs.
It wasn’t enough. Vil wanted more. He wanted him.
“Now,” Vil demanded, his voice shaking. “I’m ready. I need you now.”
Leona withdrew his fingers, lining himself up. He pushed the head of his cock against Vil’s entrance, his gaze locked on Vil’s face. There was a question in his green eyes, a final moment of suspended reality.
Vil answered by dragging him down into a desperate kiss and lifting his hips, taking him inside.
The stretch was exquisite, a burning fullness that tore a ragged cry from Vil’s throat. Leona went still, buried to the hilt, his forehead pressed against Vil’s. They were both shaking, connected in the most fundamental way. Vil could feel every heartbeat, every tremble, inside his own body.
“Vil,” Leona groaned, the single syllable fraught with too much feeling.
Then he moved.
He set a deep, punishing pace from the start, each thrust knocking a punched-out sound from Vil’s chest. It was claiming, it was worship, it was a physical argument they’d been having for weeks. Vil met every one, his nails scoring down Leona’s sweaty back. The sofa creaked beneath them. The only other sounds were skin on skin, wet and obscene, and their mingled, gasping breaths.
It was too much. It wasn’t enough.
Vil pushed against Leona’s shoulders. “Wait,” he gasped.
Leona stilled immediately, his body taut with strain. “What?”
“I want…” Vil panted, shifting beneath him. “I want to ride you.”
A slow, dark smile spread across Leona’s face. He pulled out, a sudden emptiness that made Vil whimper, and lay back against the cushions. He was a breathtaking sight—spread out, fully hard, watching Vil with heavy-lidded eyes. “Show me, princess.”
Vil climbed over him, his movements fluid despite the tremble in his limbs. He straddled Leona’s hips, lowering himself slowly, taking Leona inside again with a gasp that was pure relief. He seated himself fully, hands braced on Leona’s chest, and just… stayed. Let them both feel it.
Leona’s hands came up to grip Vil’s hips, his thumbs digging into the bone. “Fuck, Vil.”
Vil began to move. Not a frantic bounce, but a slow, sensual roll of his hips. A deep, grinding rhythm that dragged Leona’s cock against that perfect, sensitive spot inside him with every undulation. He leaned forward, capturing Leona’s mouth in a slow, dirty kiss as he moved.
They savored it.
Time blurred into the slick slide of their bodies, the exchange of breath, the desperate clutch of hands. Vil set the pace, a slow, devastating undulation that had Leona cursing fluidly, his head thrown back against the arm of the sofa. “You’re so beautiful like this,” Leona rasped, his hands sliding up to cup Vil’s face. “Taking me so deep. My perfect, gorgeous princess.”
The words, filthy and tender, unraveled Vil further. His rhythm stuttered, grew more desperate. Leona sat up, wrapping an arm around Vil’s waist to hold him close as they rocked together. His other hand found Vil’s cock, stroking him in time with their movements.
The coil of pleasure pulled taut, unforgiving.
“Leona, I’m—” Vil’s warning was a broken whisper.
“Come for me,” Leona commanded, his voice guttural. “Let me feel you.”
It was the permission Vil needed. His climax ripped through him, white-hot and shattering. He cried out, his body clamping down around Leona in rhythmic pulses, his release streaking across Leona’s stomach and chest.
The intense, pulsating squeeze was all it took. Leona’s own control snapped. With a raw shout of Vil’s name, he thrust up once, twice, burying himself deep as he found his own release.
The world dissolved into sensation and weight.
Vil collapsed forward, boneless, his face buried in the sweat-damp hollow of Leona’s neck. Leona’s arms came around him, holding him close as they both shuddered through the aftershocks. The only sound was their ragged breathing and the frantic beat of their hearts.
Slowly, the room came back into focus. The cool air on Vil’s overheated skin. The feel of Leona’s hands, still tracing slow circles on his back.
It was just a physical act. A clause in a contract.
Vil knew, with a sinking clarity that felt more real than the body beneath him, that it was so much more than that. He’d mapped the reverence in Leona’s touch, heard the unvarnished truth in his own cries. This had crossed a line from which there was no return.
He didn’t move. Neither did Leona.
They clung to each other in the silent aftermath, the terms of their new agreement etched into their skin, the lie they were living now deeper and more dangerous than ever before.