He’s trying to run. Cute.
“Pup.”
He halts so fast his sneakers squeak on the concrete. Spins on his heel and plants himself right in front of me, wild-eyed, flushed, vibrating. “Are you insane?!” he shrieks, half an octave too high to be legal. “You can’t say shit like that in front of reporters, SIR!”
I blink down at him. My eyebrow lifts just slightly. “Did I lie, baby?”
His mouth opens. Closes. Opens again. “They called me your wife!!” he whines louder, stomping.
Behind us, Cole howls, feral laughter echoing off the walls.
Elias doesn’t hesitate. He reaches into the front pocket of my jacket, yanks out a pen, and hurls it at Cole’s head with the precision of a man who’s clearly done this before. “You little bitch!” he barks.
Cole ducks and cackles harder. “He said not yet! I’m gonna get a tux!” And he means it. Cole will show up to our wedding in a sparkly velvet suit, probably live-streaming from the aisle, screaming that he called it first. Because under all that noise, he’s the most loyal bastard I know.
“Language,” I murmur, amused.
Elias whips around and glares up at me, jabbing a finger into my chest right over my heart, hard enough that the badge on my coat presses painfully into my skin. I look down at the finger, then back at him, my head tilting as the moment stretches. Brat.
“Did you want me to deny it?” I ask, low and unhurried. “Tell me, pup—did you want me to lie?”
He freezes completely, mouth moving without sound as his eyes dart once before locking back onto mine. “I…” he starts, falters, then tries again, quieter. “You…”
“No, sir,” he finally whispers, the words barely there.
My chest pulls tight, but I keep going. “Do you want me to hide you?”
His stare sharpens. “No, sir…”
“Do you think it’ll affect your career in any way?”
He exhales, long and shaky, like something just drained out of him. “No… sir.”
I wait a beat, watching him. “Then why this little tantrum, baby?”
And that’s when he says it. Soft. Half under his breath. Like he doesn’t mean for it to be heard, but needs it to be. “Maybe I wanted to be your husband…”
Everything stops. My pulse. The hallway. Time itself. He says it like a sin. Like he’s confessing a crime that’s lived in his bones for months. And I swear—if I moved too fast, if I blinked—I’d miss it. But I don’t.
I hear it. And it’s everything. I step in close. One hand finds his jaw, fingers steady, palm warm against his flushed skin. I tilt his face up, let my thumb stroke under his chin once, just enough to hold him still, to make him look at me when I speak. “Then say it like you mean it, pup.”
Elias jerks back like I burned him, curls bouncing, eyes wild. “I want to be your husband.” It’s too soft. Too small.
He means it, but I want the world to hear it. “Louder, baby,” I tease, voice low and cruel and full of heat. “I don’t think Viktor heard you all the way back there.”
Elias narrows his eyes, lip twitching. That dangerous little glint sparks behind his lashes, the one he gets right before a penalty or a blowjob. “I want to be your husband,” he says again, a little louder, a little more feral.
“Baby…” I grin, slow and sharp. “Vik’s old. His hearing isn’t that good.”
Behind us, Viktor snorts. “I’m twenty-nine, you fossil.”
“Exactly,” I mutter.
Elias groans dramatic, loud, dragging both hands through his hair like he might lose his mind if he doesn’t commit a felony soon. He spins, stalks three feet away, and finds a chair that looks half-collapsed from someone’s pre-game nap. He climbs onto it, the too-big jacket flapping around him, arms flung wide. Then he screams. “I WANT TO BE YOUR HUSBAND!! IS THIS LOUD ENOUGH FOR YOU, CAPTAIN? PETROV, CAN YOU FUCKING HEAR ME?!” His voice echoes through the tunnel. Bounces off the concrete. Reaches the doors. The arena beyond.
Cole howls. Shane wheezes so hard he starts coughing. Mats shouts something in Spanish I’m pretty sure translates to finally. And Viktor? Viktor just stands there, deadpan as ever, and mutters, “Heard you fine the first time, Mercer.”
Elias flips him off. Still standing on the chair.
