“What?” Lucas’s eyebrows rose and he glared down at Kai. “Why in the hells did they fill your head with that drivel? You listened to a servant? Males are not defective.” Lucas’s tone was outraged and Kai shrank away from him a little.

Kai shrugged. “Naturally, you would say so…”

Lucas passed a big hand over his face. “So you mean to tell me…” his voice was deliberately calm. He took a deep breath. “You mean to tell me you pretended to be a female because you didn’t want to be thought of as defective?”

“Yes, partly.There were other reasons, of course.”

“Which you won’t share with me.”

“I can’t share them with you, no. But we had our reasons. Can’t you just let it go at that?”

“No!” Lucas shouted. He scooted up in bed and put his back against the headboard. “A Lycan mate tells their alpha everything. There should be no secrets between us.”

“I’m sorry. I know I’m a disappointment to you.”

Lucas shook his head glared at him again. “So you had no idea what I was doing to your cock in there?”

“My what? You mean this-this flesh between my legs?”

Lucas just looked at him and then tilted his head. His eyes got even narrower. “You’re fucking with me. You have to be.”

Kai looked down at himself. “I-I don’t think so. I don’t think I’m doing anything.”

Lucas took his flesh in his warm hand. Almost immediately, that weak feeling came over him again and he shuddered with excitement. “This…is your cock,” Lucas said. “Your penis. Understand?”

“Yes. I’m not stupid, just ignorant of your name for it.”

Lucas didn’t answer—just glared at him.

“Well, I’m sorry,” Kai said a bit sharply. “I don’t know any of this. No one ever told me.”

Lucas raised his eyes toward the ceiling and seemed to be counting. “From now on,” he said. “Ask me things you don’t know, and I’ll tell you.”

“All right,” Kai said quietly.

“We’ll start…” Lucas said, rolling back toward him. “We’ll start with how a man makes love to another man.” He moved his big hand to Kai’s stomach. “Now pay attention and we’ll go slowly.”

Chapter Three

“First, Kai, you have to realize exactly what it is we’re going to do. We’ve gone through your wedding ceremony on your planet, and I’ve agreed to be your husband. You say you want to honor your vows. Understand that this is an irrevocable step. Once we’re mated, I won’t be able to release you—not ever.”

“I understand.”

“Do you want to do this? Do you fully understand what it means? I’ll claiming you as my mate.”

“I understand, but-but I thought you despised me. You said we tricked you.”

Lucas regarded him silently for a few seconds. “Despise is too strong a word. I’m angry, yes. I don’t like being made a fool of, Kai. And I hate deceit of any kind. I still don’t think I know the whole truth, and so far, neither you nor your mother has been willing to tell me.”

Kai shifted his gaze. He would never expose his mother’s secrets to this Lycan if he could help it. Merrial had told him Lycans were powerful leaders in the Planetary Alliance. She said they’d be furious and outraged if they knew the truth about the boy babies on Scythia. His mother might be arrested and killed, even though she was only following the ancient ways of their people, established long before the Alliance came into being. He had to protect her, if he could.

Lucas was still looking at him. “Do you want to tell me now why your mother didn’t just admit who you were? You may have been ignorant of what a man was, but she surely couldn’t have been with two children. Why didn’t she send you to live with your father?”

“My father died, as I told you.”

“His people then.Damn it, didn’t she realize she could have damaged your mind, making you think that men are all defective? Making you act like a girl?”

“Do you think I’m damaged?”

Lucas let out a long breath. “I don’t know, Kai,” he said softly.

The words made Kai’s stomach clench, but he nodded sadly. “I will release you from any vow you made to me. I’ve already told you.”

Lucas glared at him. “I don’t want to be released. I only want the truth.”

Kai shook his head. “I can’t.”

Lucas looked disappointed and disgusted, and it hurt Kai’s heart to have to keep telling him no. Lucas turned his head away, and Kai reached out to touch him gently on his cheek. He turned his head in surprise and stared down at him for a long time before his eyes finally softened.

“You’re so damned beautiful. So desirable,” he said, almost as if he were talking to himself. “I don’t think I can resist you—I don’t think I want to.”

“Don’t,” Kai said softly. “I-I want you to be my husband. In every way.”

Lucas groaned and pulled Kai into his arms. Lucas kissed him for a long time before gazing down at him and giving him a little bite on his bottom lip, then licked it. Kai was beginning to associate this strange combination of pain and pleasure with his mate. It was very disconcerting. “Are you sure you understand what’s going to happen, baby? You’ll be a Lycan mate. Do you know what that means?”

“No,” Kai said with a little shake of his head. “But if it means I can stay with you, then I want it.” And Kai was almost surprised to find that it was true. This huge, frightening man was oddly fierce yet gentle. He’s already made him feel things that excited him more than anything he’d ever felt before. Even though he’d been taught to find women’s bodies more visually appealing, this gorgeous creature’s body excited him.

“Teach me. Please, Alpha.”

Lucas moaned and buried his face in Kai’s throat. “Gods, you smell so sweet.”

Getting to his knees, he looked down on Kai. “This will hurt, Kai. This first time at least. I’ll try to make it as good as I can for you, but you’ll be so tight. I don’t want to hurt you anymore.”

“I want you to be my husband. In every way.”

“Balenescu mates need to be with their husbands all the time. They can’t ever be intimate with another man once they mate with their husbands—it would be physically impossible for them to get satisfaction. Do you understand?”

Kai shook his head, and Lucas sighed. “This is so difficult to explain when you know so little about things.” He tried again. “Your cock—this piece of flesh between your legs—will never get hard for anyone but me, ever again. Do you understand?”

Kai nodded and smiled. “But that’s as it should be, isn’t it?”

Lucas’s eyes softened again, and he seemed to shiver. “Sweetheart. Yes, that’s as it should be.” Slowly, he rolled Kai over to his stomach, lifting his hips to pull pillows under them. Kai watched his every move from over his shoulder. He took some oil from the table next to the bed and splashed some on his fingers. “I’m going to put this on you, baby. It will help when I enter you.”

He put one oiled finger at Kai’s hole and Kai tensed immediately. Gasping, he looked up into Lucas’s face. “W-What are you doing?”

His hard fingers began to massage oil gently into his crease and ghosted over his hole as Kai shivered. “This is where I’ll make love to you. You have to open to me, love. I’ll try not to hurt you.”

Very gently, he eased one finger inside this most intimate place in Kai’s body. Kai hissed in a breath and tried to squirm away, but Lucas held him firmly in place. “Easy, Kai.Try to relax. I’m showing you what men do together.”

Kai nodded and tried hard to relax his body, opening his legs even further, but he was beyond amazed by this turn of events. Lucas stroked his back and with an oiled finger gently probed inside Kai’s hole. No one had ever touched him there, and it felt strange and burned a little. The finger slowly pressed further inside and when Kai tensed against the burn, Lucas leaned over him and kissed his ear, licking at the nape of his neck until he relaxed again. He whispered in his ear as he slowly moved the finger in and out. “Have you ever touched yourself here, love?”

Kai shook his head, and Lucas gave a soft chuckle as he kissed his ear. “Good. This is mine, and you’ll never feel anyone else’s touch here again.” Those whispers in his ear were driving him crazy and he arched his back. He couldn’t decide whether to lean into the fingers or pull away. He felt another finger go inside him and he groaned at the stretch of those fingers within. They only moved in deeper and Kai cried out, trying to get away from Lucas’s strong hand on his hip until the fingers suddenly brushed against something inside him. It was a spot so sensitive he couldn’t decide at first if it hurt or if it felt incredibly wonderful. The fingers brushed over the spot again and again until Kai was whimpering for more, thrashing his head wantonly and pushing his ass up into the air to get it.

Suddenly the fingers pulled away and Kai almost sobbed in frustration and need. Was it over so soon? Then he felt something else nudging his hole, something larger, and he felt a moment of panic. Before he could move away, Lucas’s hand pushed under him and closed around his flesh, pulling down and back up hard several times in a row. He couldn’t decide whether to arch forward or back—he needed more pressure, more sensation. He whimpered in confusion and Lucas whispered to him.

“Shh, baby. Try to relax. Push out when you feel me. Let me take care of you.”

The fingers pushed in at his hole again, and the pain was back. Lucas took his time, pushing in slowly, a tiny bit at a time and then pulling out just a little until all of Kai’s focus was on this one incredible thing that was happening to his body. “Relax for me. Don’ forget to push out a little,” Lucas instructed and when he did, it began to feel a little better. He still felt tight and full, and it still burned, but the burn was getting less and the pleasure was overriding it. Lucas’s other hand continued to work the flesh between his legs until he thought he’d lose his mind. He couldn’t decide if he should beg him to stop or beg him to do it harder.