“Are you two having an affair?” Nate blurted.
Zane grunted. “That implies that we’re cheating on you, and I just got done explaining that I came first.” Before Nate could react, he snorted. “But no. We’re not having an affair. We’d have to have been in a romantic relationship for that, and Kazimir doesn’t do boyfriends.”
“I’m his boyfriend,” Nate stated.
“Let me rephrase.” Zane slipped his arms through his dress shirt and began to deftly do up the buttons as he looked Nate square in the eye. “He doesn’t do long-term. You seem like a nice enough guy, Nate. Save yourself while you can.”
He quirked a brow. “You really trying to spin this as you’re just attempting to help me?”
“As opposed to?”
“You flaunting the fact that you’ve slept with my boyfriend and know the layout of his place like the back of your hand,” Nate said. It was probably wiser to back down and wait for Kaz, but a thread of anger was blooming amidst the confusion and feelings of hurt, and he decidedly didn’t want to twiddle his thumbs.
Zane grew quiet for a moment, and all that time spent in the other Devil’s company helped make what he was doing obvious. Accessing the situation. Searching for weakness and another angle.
Which meant Nate had hit the nail on the head.
“Do you like him?” he asked. If they’d been sleeping together for that long, it made sense if Zane had developed some sort of attachment toward Kazimir.
The corner of his mouth twitched but didn’t lift. “Like is a strong word. Besides, I’m not sure it’s possible for anyone to truly like him. We’d all need to forgive him first, and I don’t know about you, but personally? I’m not willing.”
“Forgive?” He frowned again. “For what?”
Zane heaved a sigh. “This is just a guess, but was your first time against your will?”
Nate didn’t respond.
“Did he force you to submit?” he added. “Make you come for him enough times that by the end, you were begging just for it to stop? Just for some reprieve from the constant torture?”
Torture. That’s what Nate had thought of it in the past as well. Sexual torture.
“He uses that thing between his legs as a weapon,” Zane latched on, clearly having seen the crack in Nate’s façade just now. “Our first time? He caught me alone in one of the private study rooms at school. I fought him, but I wasn’t well trained in hand-to-hand combat then, hadn’t been raised for battle the same way he had. Kazimir had me bent over the desk, pants down at my ankles within minutes. He made sure it didn’t hurt though. As if that was something I should be appreciative of. And you know what?”
Nate wanted to stop him from talking, but couldn’t seem to get his own voice to work anymore.
“I was.” Zane smoothed down the wrinkles on his shirt. “We screwed like that in secret for about a year before he snuck into my dorm room pretending to be a robber and fucked me in front of an audience.”
“What?” Oh, his voice worked, after all.
Zane nodded. “Messed up, right? I was terrified before I realized who it was tying me up, spreading me open…Slipping inside.”
“Enough.” He so didn’t need the details of their sex life. Though, from the sounds of it… “Are you saying it’s never been consensual?”
“Why? Would it matter if some of the time it was and some of the time it wasn’t?” Zane cocked his head. “Is rape only bad if it occurs more than once?”
“Of course not!”
“No? Since the two of you are dating, I figured that sort of thing didn’t matter to you. Wasn’t abhorrent enough to scare you away. Typically, normal people run the other direction from the man who sexually assaulted them. What’s keeping you around, Nate? Usually, if someone walks into an obviouslydangerous situation calm and collected like that, it’s because they know they can handle it.” He swept his gaze down Nate’s body, his judgment apparent. “You look even less capable than I was back then in that study room.”
Nate wasn’t going to win any fights against a Brumal member, or someone from the Retinue either, sure. But he could hold his own long enough for help to be called. Or, at least, he’d believed that before the event in the bar bathroom with Kaz…Except…
“You’re mistaken about something,” he clipped, continuing once Zane lifted a thin dark brow at him. “Our first time? I didn’t fight.” He sort of had, a little, but since he was being forced to face it anyway, might as well finally acknowledge the massive elephant of truth in the room. “I wanted him to pin me down and fuck me. Our second time? We were making out while he carried me to my bedroom.”
A tiny part of him was stumped over why he was defending Kaz right now. Sure, everything he was saying was a version of the truth, but it wasn’t the whole truth. There’d always been coercion on Kazimir’s side. Blackmail and threats. He’d painted Nate into more corners than he could count, all so he could get his way, and yet here Nate was, staring another Devil down, telling him all about how he’d wanted it all along.
Had he?
Truly?
