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Sophia takes the bottle without a word, flipping the top off and taking a long drink. She shifts, and I think I see the shape of something beneath the skirt of her dress.

Something that looks distinctly like a gun.

“Sophia.” I pause, looking at it again. “Are you—” I tilt my head, trying to make sense of it. “Are you carrying a gun?”

She pauses, the bottle at her lips. I can see the wheels in her head turning, considering whether or not she should try to lie. “Yes,” she says finally.

I narrow my eyes. “Do you want to explain why?”

She rolls her eyes, setting the water bottle down. “After our last trek out here, shouldn’t it be obvious? We ran into a lion last time. I didn’t want to depend on someone else to protect us.”

I stare at her, trying to wrap my head around this woman I’ve married. It seems like every day, quite literally, something pops up to throw me off. “You could have asked me if I had one to bring,” I say as calmly as I can manage. “But that’s not reallywhat I was asking. Why do you have a gun at all, Sophia? And why did you bring it with youhere? On the trip?”

She hesitates. Her fingers curl around the edge of the bed, gripping it. “I wanted to feel safe,” she says finally, her eyes hesitantly meeting mine.

“Fromwho?” I stare at her. “The resort is supposed to be extremely safe. I know there was an incident last night, but we couldn’t possibly have anticipated?—”

A possibility runs through my head, one that brings me up short. Slowly, with measured steps, I walk toward my wife, stopping just in front of where she’s sitting on the edge of the bed. I reach down, sliding two fingers under the edge of her chin as I tilt her face up, forcing her to look at me. “Sophia, did you bring the gun because you were afraid ofme?”

Something inexplicable crosses her face. She licks her lips nervously, and I feel her go very still. I can see something calculated in her gaze, as if she’s weighing her options and deciding what to say.

“You didn’t want to marry me,” she says finally.

I stare at her, shocked. “That doesn’t mean I’d—” I shake my head. “I’d never hurt you, Sophia. Whatever my feelings about this marriage, whatever reservations I have or boundaries I’ve drawn, I’d never, everharmyou. And I’d never allow anyone else to do so either.” Abruptly, without thinking, I sink down onto my knees in front of her, so that I’m eye-level with her. “You’re safe with me, Sophia. I promise you that. I can’t promise you love or passion or romance, but for fuck’s sake,devochka, I can promise you that you willalwaysbe safe with me.”

Her eyes widen, ever so slightly. Something that almost looks like guilt passes across her face, her teeth sinking into her lower lip, and I look down at her mouth—that fucking mouth.

Everything about Sophia Moretti is dangerously, temptingly beautiful. But her mouth was made for pleasure. To pressagainst a man’s lips, to wrap around his cock, to feel against his skin. I’ve been aching for her mouth since the night I met her.

The wind howls against the tent, the sides bowing in against the force of it, but I hardly notice. In the soft lamplight, with the howling night all around us, I can feel my control slipping.

This was a bad idea. All of it.I know that, but as my hand seems to move of its own volition, rising to brush against Sophia’s knee, I feel my pulse thudding in my veins, desire flooding me in a drowning wave.

My cock swells as I cup the side of her knee. I brush the silky fabric of her dress to one side with my thumb, exposing the smooth skin there, and I lean down, grazing my lips just above the curve of her knee. Sophia gasps, and I swear Ifeelthe sound as my cock throbs, stiffening to full, aching hardness as she shifts, her knees sliding apart.

“Fuck,” I breathe, cursing in Russian beneath my breath as I lift my head. Sophia’s green eyes are dark in the lamplight, her gaze fixed on me, and I can see her shallow breathing as her hands tighten on the edge of the bed.

She doesn’t move. I push her dress up her legs, slowly, exposing the gun in its holster. With a quick movement, I undo it, letting it fall into my palm as I set it down on the floor next to the bed.

She doesn’t stop me. She doesn’t do anything other than sit there, frozen, her chest rising and falling in a quick rhythm as I lean in. I capture her face once more, with my hand curved against her cheek this time… and I kiss her for the first time.

God, her fucking mouth.It’s soft and full and everything I imagined pressed against mine, giving in to me in an instant, her lips parting on a soft moan as her tongue darts out to slide against mine. I can feel her surrendering to me already, all of her eagerly reaching for what she’s wanted since our wedding night, what I’ve denied her that night and every night since.

And why? I can’t remember any longer. All I can think about is the softness of her mouth against mine, the hot, quick slide of her tongue, the sugar and violet scent of her perfume filling my senses. My cock throbs, straining painfully against my zipper, aching to be freed, aching to fill her mouth. I want to know what her lips feel like wrapped around it so fucking badly.

But I want to taste her first.

My hand slides to the back of her head as the wind whips against the outside of our tent, nearly drowning out the soft sound of Sophia’s moan as she arches her back, leaning into my touch. I cup the back of her head as the kiss deepens, grows rougher, into something as hungry and desperate as the howling storm outside.

She tastes like dust and water and dry wine, and I slide my tongue against hers eagerly, wanting to drink her down. My hand on her knee pushes her legs further apart, urging her back on the bed a few inches as I finally break the kiss and drag my mouth along her jaw.

Sophia gasps, her legs parting fully for me as I push her skirt to one side, my hand sliding up her inner thigh. Her skin is soft as silk, her leg taut with muscle, hot under my hand as I slide my hand up to the edge of her thin panties. The moment I touch the fabric, I groan, my cock pulsing dangerously as I feel that she’s soaked through already.

“God, you’re wet for me,devochka,”I murmur, nipping lightly at her neck as I hook my fingers under the edge of her panties. The moment I touch her bare skin, it takes everything in me not to rip her panties away, fling her back on the bed, and free my cock before burying myself to the hilt in her.

She’s shaved smooth, her skin as silky there between her thighs as everywhere else, and she’s fuckingdrenched. She’s hot and slick against my fingertips, and she gasps the moment I dipmy fingers between her folds, her hips pushing up eagerly for more as her head falls back.

“Greedy girl,” I murmur thickly, reaching down with my other hand to undo my belt. I’m not going to fuck her just yet, but my cock desperately needs to be free. I’m hard to the point of pain, straining against the fabric of my pants. I dip my fingers into her entrance as I do, and I feel her clench around me immediately, her tight pussy trying to draw me in deeper to give her what she needs. “You need to be filled up, don’t you? Fucked by my big, thick, hard cock?”