The air in the car seemed to still.

Liam’s fingers tightened on Arik’s shoulders.

Arik did not look away.

"The moment you accept me like that," he continued, voice low and rough enough to make Liam’s stomach tighten, "the moment you choose me fully, physically, while clearheaded and wanting it..."

His thumb moved once against Liam’s throat, fingertips sliding under his shirt collar.

Liam stopped breathing.

"It will end with you marked."

The words landed with the force of a vow and a warning.

Arik’s eyes remained on his, bright and devastating in the dim car.

"I will not pretend otherwise," he said. "I will not lie to make myself seem safer than I am. I can hold back now. I can stop now. I can let you climb off me, reopen my work, and return to the palace as if I am not thinking about the taste of your skin."

Liam’s breath left him shakily.

Arik’s hand settled at the back of his neck, fingers threading into his hair with painful care.

"But if you come to me like this and ask me for more, if you choose me past this line, I will mark you." His voice dropped further. "I have wanted you for too long to pretend I will be noble when you are in my arms, clearheaded, willing, and looking at me like that."

Liam’s pulse hammered.

The car felt too warm. Too small.

Too full of Arik’s scent, steady temple stone and caramel turned rich enough to make thought difficult.

"You are warning me," Liam said.

"Yes."

"Very dramatically." Liam swallowed. "And if I said I wanted that?"

A low chuckle escaped Arik’s lips.

"Then we are going to my bedroom right after we stop," he said, lowering his head until his nose brushed into the side of Liam’s neck.

The contact was not a kiss.

Somehow, that made it worse.

Arik breathed him in slowly, as if the scent of saint’s breath had become something he could not quite leave alone. His arms tightened around Liam, drawing him closer until there was no polite space left between them, only the steady line of Arik’s body beneath his and the heat gathering where they touched.

Liam’s scent spiked before he could stop it.

Saint’s breath filled the car, bright and delicate and far too honest.

Arik went still for half a second.

Then his mouth curved against Liam’s skin.

Liam’s fingers tightened in the front of his shirt.

"You are oddly direct for a man leaving out a lot of talk," he said, forcing the words out with a huff because anything softer would have been dangerous.

Arik lifted his head just enough to look at him.

The heat in his eyes did not fade, but something quieter moved beneath it. Something older. More careful.

"I will tell you everything you want to know," he said. "But I need time."

The car lights shifted across his face as they passed beneath the outer wards of the diplomatic palace, gold sliding over his cheekbones, then shadow.

Arik’s hand moved slowly up Liam’s back, settling between his shoulders as if grounding them both.

"Would you wait?" he asked.

Liam stared at him.

The question was not about the bedroom.

Not only.

It was about Amara. The Gate. Kamal. The old language. The way Arik said things like ’for longer than this life’ and then closed the door before Liam could see what stood behind it.

It was about all the carefully phrased omissions.

All the old ghosts Arik carried with him.

Liam should have demanded answers.

He wanted to.

The instinct was there, sharp and immediate, already reaching for the locked room in Arik the same way he wanted to reach for Felix’s blueprints. Understand it. Open it. Take the mechanism apart until it stopped being able to surprise him.

But Arik was looking at him with naked restraint.

Not hiding the want. Not hiding the fear of what the truth might do once spoken, but only asking Liam for patience.

Liam exhaled slowly.

"Yes," he said.

The word was quiet.

It changed Arik’s face anyway, something in his expression eased, just enough for Liam to see the relief beneath the heat.

That was dangerous too.

Arik lowered his forehead briefly to Liam’s shoulder, his breath warm through the fabric at Liam’s collar.

"Thank you," he murmured.

Liam’s fingers remained twisted in his shirt.

"Do not sound so sincere. It makes me uncomfortable."

Arik’s low laugh brushed against his neck.

"You prefer arrogance?"

"It is easier to argue with."

"I can be arrogant."

"I know."

Arik’s mouth touched the skin below Liam’s jaw, soft and deliberate.

Liam’s breath caught.

Outside, the car slowed.

Inside, neither of them moved.

For a moment there was only the quiet hum of the wards, the sealed warmth of the car, and the scent of Arik wrapped around him warm temple stone, caramel and repressed hunger. Liam let himself stay there, just for a little longer, because waiting did not feel like surrender when Arik held him like this.

Then the comm pulsed.

Liam closed his eyes.

"No."

Arik’s arms tightened once, as if he agreed with the sentiment on a spiritual level.

The comm pulsed again.

Marin’s name appeared across the projection.

’Send the channel scans now. And tell the boy in your lap that if he helps you hide the damage from Wrohan’s brooch, I will sedate both of you and bill the palace for inconvenience.’

Liam stared at the message.

Then slowly, very slowly, his mouth curved.

"The boy in your lap," he read aloud.

Arik’s expression went blank.

Liam looked at him.

"He knows."

"Marin often knows things he has no right knowing."

"He is very talented."

"He is very invasive."

"I like him."

"No."

The car stopped at the palace entrance.

For a moment, Liam stayed where he was, still straddling Arik, still held securely in his arms, still warm from the promise he had just made and the one Arik had made back.

Then he leaned in, pressed one brief kiss at the corner of Arik’s mouth, and pulled away before the prince could deepen it.

Arik’s eyes darkened immediately.

Liam climbed off his lap with as much dignity as could be managed after being called out by an old omega physician through secure correspondence.

"This is not over," Arik said quietly.

Liam adjusted his shirt, then looked back at him.

"No," he agreed, his voice softer than intended. "It isn’t."