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The word scraped across my senses and hit me straight in the gut.

He spoke. Verbally. To me.

The air evacuated my lungs. His voice was deep and gravelly, exuding control but laced with emotion.

Shock swept my attempt at a kiss aside like debris in a flood.

Vuk didn’t talk unless he felt like he had to. Even Jordan hadn’t heard him speak much since college.

So why did he choose tonight to break his silence?

I stared up at him, taking in the strained set of his mouth and the painful grip around my wrist.

Don’t. The tortured sound rang in my ears, and it was in that moment that the truth set in with painful, wrenching clarity.

That wasn’t the command of a man who didn’t want me; it was the plea of someone whodid.

Vuk Markovic wanted me, and it was killing him that he couldn’t have me, even when I offered myself to him.Especiallywhen I offered myself to him.

The knowledge sent a dizzying rush through me. “Vuk…” I breathed.

He squeezed my arm to the point that I almost cried out. He brought his mouth next to my ear, his voice so low and rough it made me shiver.“Kada te konacno budem poljubio, neceš više nositi njegov prsten na ruci.”

I didn’t understand a word he said, but I picked up on the sentiment. It sounded like a threat and a promise all rolled into one.

Vuk released me for the second time that night.

He left me standing there in the dark, breathless with want and aching for more.

CHAPTER19

Vuk

The last bottle exploded into a shower of glass.

I’d beaten my record of hitting all twelve bottles in under a minute, but I didn’t get any satisfaction from it. I was still wound tight, my emotions swinging between fury and regret like some fucked-up pendulum.

It’d been six days since the bachelor party.

Six days of replaying the way Jordan kissed Ayana on the cheek and the way she’d smiled at him in response.

One hundred and thirty hours of remembering the way her body arched into mine.

Eight thousand-plus minutes of revisiting how she’d almost kissed me.

And an eternity of what-ifsover what would’ve happened had I not stopped her.

What the hell had she been playing at, doing that on the night of her bachelorette?

I didn’t believe for a second that Ayana would jeopardize her engagement to Jordan for no good reason. And I sure as hell didn’t believe she’d been so overcome by her sudden desire for me that she couldn’t help herself.

I set up a new row of bottles.

I was in no mood to socialize, so I’d retreated to my makeshift shooting range at home instead of visiting the one at Valhalla. After the bachelor party, I didn’t want to talk to anyone for at least two months.

I was about to start my second round of shooting when the door opened. Sean entered, his expression somber.

My staff had been avoiding me all week. They’d worked for me long enough to pick up on my foul moods, and they knew any human interaction would only piss me off more.