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I swing toward him, and I see him flinch. “You think this resort would bring in the kind of clientele that it does if snakes randomly found their way into guests’ beds?”

A muscle twitches in the guard’s jaw. “No, sir.”

“Then what the fuck do you think happened?”

There’s a flash of fear in his eyes.Good. “I don’t know, sir. We didn’t hear anything?—”

“Of course you don’t know. Because you weren’t fucking doing your job.” I jerk the gun back toward the dividing door. “Get the fuck out.”

I’ve never seen anyone leave a room so fast. I shove the gun into my waistband, striding past the destroyed snake to where Sophia is still against the door. I can see her pulse beating at the hollow of her throat.

It’s the first time I’ve ever seen her really look afraid.

“Are you alright?” I cup the side of her face, stroking her cheekbone with my thumb. “Afraid of snakes?”

“A little.” She swallows hard. “Not my favorite animal, that’s for sure. And there wasn’t anything I could do?—”

“I took care of it.” I rub my thumb along her cheekbone again. “You’re safe, Sophia. You’re safe with me.”

She looks up, and the expression in her eyes threatens to shatter some long-held protection, the last of my walls that I keep up around my heart. She looks like no one has ever said that to her before. Like, she doesn’t quite believe me.

“Come on.” I reach down, taking her hand. “We’re going to go talk to management about this. And then we’re going to get new rooms.”

She nods, biting her lip. I lean in, and when I kiss her this time, it isn’t hot or hard or hungry. It’s soft, almost sweet, as I graze my mouth over hers, holding her face in my hand.

I want to kiss her forever. And Ican.

Sophia Moretti is mine.

My wife.

16

VALENTINA

Istare up at the ceiling of our new luxury suite, listening to the faint sounds of the savannah outside, the only other sound in the peaceful night other than Konstantin’s steady breathing beside me.

His hand is resting on my bare hip, broad and warm. The weight of it should feel suffocating—it always has before, with other men—but not this time. Not with him.

What am I going to do?

I look at my bag on the other side of the room. My gun is inside. So is my knife. I should have found a place to put both for easy access later, when it came time to finish the job. The knife first—the gun for backup if the knife failed. Shooting Konstantin would mean having to deal with his security in the next room over too, but I could handle it. I’ve done it before—taken out security guys assigned to marks. It’s always a white-knuckle escape, and once or twice it’s been much, much closer than I’d like for it to have been, but I’ve always gotten out.

But instead, Konstantin and I fell into bed the minute we were inside our new room. The way he touched me was intoxicating—frantic, almost desperate, like he realized howclose it was tomebeing the one bitten by the snake. Like the brush with my mortality and his left him reeling, and he couldn’t wait to remind himself that I was still alive, and so was he.

If I’m being honest, it left me reeling, too. I’ve faced attempts on my life before, but a snake waiting in bed is a new one. We ended up fucking on the desk in the new room because I couldn’t go to the bed without stripping it first, and Konstantin couldn’t wait to be inside of me.

Once we’d both come and he was able to check the bed, we ended up there not long after.

I draw in a deep breath, and heat floods me. All I smell is him—his scent, his sweat, the mingled scent of sex on the sheets. We can’t keep our hands off of each other, and I can’t pretend that I’m just playing a game to draw him in.

I want him as badly as he wants me. And I don’t want this to end.

I’ve never felt anything like this. The way Konstantin desires me is captivating, addicting, the kind of lust that I could lose myself in—that Ihavestarted to lose myself in. He makes me feel like I’m the only woman he’s ever wanted, like he’ll never get enough of me, like there could never be anyone else. He makes me wonder if maybe, for him, itislike that.

After all, he thinks this marriage is real.

I need to kill him tonight. The jet will be coming back for us tomorrow. We’ll be leaving by late afternoon—nighttime at the very latest. Konstantin might have been willing to spend one more night before the snake, but now I know he’ll want to leave as soon as the jet lands. And if I haven’t killed him by then…