"You listen to me now."
Sebastian’s fist remained twisted in Nero’s collar, holding him close enough that every breath carried smoke, blood and the dark heat of his pheromones between them. The highway stretched empty for several hundred meters in either direction, broken glass glittering under the lights of the ruined cars while the smaller Saharian city burned softly against the horizon.
Nero did not move.
Sebastian could feel the restraint in him through the hand at his waist, every finger held deliberately still against the green fabric as though he no longer trusted himself with movement.
"I know what you did," Sebastian said, his voice rough from the crash and everything that had followed it. "I know what you manipulated, and I am still furious enough that tomorrow I may decide to make you regret surviving this road."
A faint change crossed Nero’s face, something between pain and acceptance.
Sebastian pulled him lower by the collar.
"But I am still here."
Nero’s eyes searched his.
Sebastian swallowed, tasting blood where his lip had split.
"This is the last chance you get to choose me without choosing for me."
The smoke around them shifted.
Nero’s pupils widened.
Sebastian saw the exact moment instinct understood before the rest of him did.
"If you want it," Sebastian said, fingers tightening at the back of Nero’s neck, "mark me."
Nero’s teeth were against his neck before Sebastian finished breathing.
One moment Nero stood rigid beneath Sebastian’s grip, and the next his arm locked around Sebastian’s waist and lifted him completely from the ground.
Sebastian barely had time to catch his shoulder.
"Nero—"
The damaged hood of the older car met the backs of his thighs.
Nero set him onto it with enough control to spare his injured ribs despite the speed of the movement, spreading one hand across Sebastian’s lower back while the other came up behind his neck.
The metal beneath Sebastian was still warm.
Smoke drifted across them in uneven waves, and somewhere near the opposite car something hissed beneath the ruined engine.
Nero bent over him.
Sebastian felt his breath against the side of his throat.
His body knew what was coming.
The reaction was immediate.
Every muscle tightened.
Something ancient and furious surged beneath his skin, the remnant of the dominant alpha he had been for more than half his life recognizing another dominant at his throat and reacting with absolute violence.
Sebastian’s hand shot into Nero’s hair.
His nails scraped against Nero’s scalp.
A growl tore out of him before he could suppress it.
Nero stopped for less than a heartbeat.
Sebastian’s chest heaved.
The instinct inside him clawed upward, demanding he shove Nero away, bare his own teeth, fight the position even while the rest of him had chosen it.
He forced his fingers to loosen in Nero’s hair.
"Do it."
Nero bit down.
Pain flashed through Sebastian’s neck.
His entire body jerked.
The old alpha instinct exploded hard enough that his heel struck the side of the car and his hands clamped around Nero’s shoulders, every surviving fragment of dominance screaming against submission to a mark.
Nero held him through it.
His pheromones flooded Sebastian at the same time, smoke and dark spice pouring over him with such force that the night seemed to vanish beneath it.
Sebastian’s breath broke.
The pressure was everywhere. Against his skin. Inside his lungs. Deep beneath the glands that had spent months restructuring themselves into something new.
His body shook violently.
Nero’s teeth sank deeper.
Sebastian tipped his head back.
The movement exposed more of his throat even while a low, furious sound remained trapped behind his teeth, half instinctive refusal and half pain.
His eyes burned.
Tears slipped from the corners and disappeared into his hair.
The alpha inside him was still fighting.
Sebastian could feel it like an animal trapped beneath his ribs, throwing itself against every change that had already happened to him, against the omega glands, the altered scent, the reproductive organs slowly developing inside his body, against Nero’s mouth at the side of his neck.
It had spent thirty-one years believing no one would ever stand above it.
Now Nero’s mark cut through all of it.
Something hot spread from the bite.
Sebastian gasped.
His hands lost strength against Nero’s shoulders.
The heat moved beneath his skin first, branching across his throat and chest before sinking deeper, following pathways that had not existed months ago.
Nero’s pheromones changed with it.
Sebastian had always been able to smell them.
Now he could feel them.
Smoke curled somewhere behind his sternum.
Dark spice settled along the back of his tongue.
Heat moved through his bloodstream with every beat of his heart.
And beneath all of it was Nero.
Sebastian’s eyes opened.
Nero was still pressed against his throat, pale hair spilling over Sebastian’s shoulder and chest, one hand spread protectively around the back of his neck while blood from the mark ran warm beneath his collar.
Sebastian felt the fear inside him.
Nero’s fear.
It was so enormous that Sebastian forgot to breathe.
Years of it.
The loneliness of wanting someone who kept walking away.
The terror beneath every act of control.
The obsessive, impossible certainty that losing Sebastian would be worse than anything Nero could do to prevent it.
And wrapped around all of that was love so dense it almost hurt to touch.
Sebastian’s fingers tightened slowly in Nero’s coat.
Something inside him answered.
The bond snapped into place.
A violent internal pull, as if an invisible line had been drawn through both their chests and suddenly tightened, closing a distance neither of them had ever managed to eliminate.
Nero tore his mouth from Sebastian’s neck with a broken inhale.
For several seconds they only looked at each other.
Blood stained Nero’s lips.
Sebastian’s tears continued sliding silently down his face.
Neither seemed capable of pretending this was ordinary.
Nero lifted one trembling hand toward Sebastian’s cheek and stopped before touching him.
Sebastian caught his wrist and pressed the palm against his face himself.
Through the bond, Nero’s fear changed instantly.
Sebastian closed his eyes and leaned into the touch.
His neck throbbed.
His ribs hurt.
Both cars were destroyed behind them, and tomorrow there would be consequences neither of them could avoid.
Tonight, Sebastian could feel Nero inside the space where there had always been distance.
He opened his eyes again.
"This was your last chance."
Nero looked at him as though the words had entered somewhere deeper than hearing.
Sebastian slid one hand behind his neck and pulled him closer until their foreheads touched.
"Do not waste it."