Page 21 of Arranged with Twins

Sienna

T he car turns into Leo’s private garage before he bothers to inform me where we’re going. The engine cuts off, and silence fills the space between us like a living thing as the driver and Ilya hastily exit, perhaps sensing a storm brewing between us.

“You’re staying with me tonight.” His voice carries that familiar note of absolute authority that makes my spine stiffen reflexively. “For safety.”

“Excuse me?” I turn to face him in the dim parking garage lighting, anger flaring hot in my chest. “You don’t get to just decide where I sleep. I have my own apartment, my own life, my own?—”

“Your own what?” Leo’s voice cuts through my protest with surgical precision. “Your own na?ve belief that you can handle whatever Adrian throws at you next?”

The mention of that name again sends ice through my veins. “Who is Adrian? Stop dodging the question.”

Leo steps out of the car without answering, leaving me to follow or sit alone in a parking garage. I scramble out after him and struggle to keep up with his longer stride.

“Leo.” I grab his arm, forcing him to stop near the elevator. “You can’t just drag me to your apartment and refuse to explain what’s happening.”

He turns to face me, and something in his expression makes my breath catch.

There’s anger there, yes, but underneath, I see something that looks almost like fear.

“Adrian Petrov used to work for me. Now he wants me dead, and he’s willing to use you or any other weakness against me to make that happen. ”

The words make me flinch. “Use me how?”

“As leverage, a target, or whatever serves his purposes.” Leo’s jaw clenches as he speaks. “Tonight proved nowhere is safe when you’re with me. At least here, I can control the variables.”

“Control.” I repeat the word scathingly. “That’s what this is really about, isn’t it? Not my safety, but your need to control everything and everyone around you.”

“If keeping you alive means controlling your environment, then yes.” He steps closer, close enough that I can smell his cologne mixed with the metallic scent of dried blood. “I won’t apologize for that.”

“I’m not some helpless princess who needs rescuing.” My voice rises despite my efforts to stay calm. “I’m not a pawn for you to move around the board whenever it suits your strategy.”

“Then stop acting like one.” The words come out harsh and cutting. “Stop pretending you don’t understand the danger you’re in. Stop believing that your parents’ connections or your expensive education will protect you from men like Adrian.”

The accusation stings because there’s truth in it. I have been na?ve and sheltered, living in a world where money and social position provide safety. Tonight shattered that illusion like brittle glass.

“You think I don’t know that?” My hands shake as I speak, adrenaline, fear, and frustration combining into something volatile. “You think I don’t realize everything I believed about my life was a lie? That I’m completely out of my depth in your world?”

“Then let me protect you.” His voice softens slightly, but the intensity remains. “Let me keep you safe until this is over.”

“And then what? You’ll decide when it’s safe for me to go back to my own life? When I’m allowed to make my own choices again?” I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. “That’s not protection, Leo. That’s just another cage.”

We stare at each other in the elevator, tension crackling between us like electricity before a storm. When the doors open on his penthouse floor, he steps out first, leaving me to follow.

His apartment is exactly what I expected and similar to mine in layout but more lavish. It’s elegant, expensive, and completely impersonal. Tall windows offer a view of Manhattan that probably costs more than most people make in a year. Everything is tasteful, sophisticated, and utterly cold.

“Your home is very...” I search for the right word. “Pristine.”

“I don’t spend much time here.” Leo moves to a bar cart and pours himself a scotch. “Drink?”

“No.” I wander toward the windows, needing distance from the intensity radiating off him. “Do you spend time anywhere? Or do you just move from one business meeting to another, one public appearance to the next, and one shady event to another?”

“Is that what you think of me?” He doesn’t sound offended, just curious. “That I’m some sort of machine programmed for profit and control?”

I turn to face him, studying his expression in the city lights filtering through the glass.

There’s something vulnerable in his question that doesn’t match the man who ordered my life rearranged without consultation.

“I think you’re afraid.” The words come out before I can stop them.

“I think you’re terrified of not being in control, so you build walls around everything and everyone to keep them safe. Including me.”

“Maybe I am afraid.” He sets down his glass without drinking. “Maybe watching my parents die when I was seventeen taught me that the people you care about become targets.”

The admission hangs between us, raw and honest in a way that makes my chest ache. This is the first time he’s really talked about his parents and the first glimpse behind the carefully constructed facade.

“I’m sorry.” My voice comes out softly though I’m still angry with him. “I can’t imagine losing them so young.”

“Vincent and Katherine took me in afterward.” Leo’s smile holds no warmth. “For three months, while I consolidated power and eliminated the men responsible, they offered me a safe place to land and regroup. Your parents saved my life, and now, I’m trying to save yours.”

The revelation reframes everything I thought I understood.

Our engagement, his protection, and even his cold distance are about repaying his debt to my father and honoring an obligation that goes back to the worst period of his life.

He doesn’t care about our social connections.

That’s just a pretense that gives him an excuse to proceed with the merger between us, to help my father save face.

Knowing that softens my anger but not my irritation with the whole situation. “That doesn’t give you the right to make all my decisions.” I step closer, drawn by something in his expression I can’t name. “I’m not seven years old anymore. I can handle the truth about what’s happening.”

“Can you?” He moves toward me, eliminating the space between us until I feel heat radiating from his body.

“Can you handle knowing Adrian tortured three people to death last month? Or that he’s building an arsenal specifically designed to destroy everything I’ve built?

That being engaged to me makes you a target for every enemy I’ve made in twenty years? ”

Each word is terrifying, painting a picture of violence and danger I never imagined.

Yet instead of sending me running, it makes something fierce flare in my chest. “Yes.” My voice doesn’t falter despite the fear coursing through me.

“I can handle it because I’m stronger than you think and stronger than my parents raised me to be. ”

He seems surprised, but there’s a hint of respect in his expression too. “You’re not what I expected.”

“What did you expect?”

“Someone who would break under pressure and run at the first sign of real danger.” He reaches up to touch my face, brushing his thumb across my cheekbone. “Someone who wouldn’t stand here arguing with me when most people would be begging for mercy.”

“I’m not most people.” The words come out breathless as his touch sends heat spiraling through me. “I’m tired of being treated like I’m your property, and I have no reason to need mercy. You’re protecting me, not hurting me.”

The air between us charges with something electric and dangerous. I should step back to maintain the distance we’ve carefully built over the past nine weeks. Instead, I lean into his touch, drawn by something I can’t resist. “This is a bad idea.” My words contradict my actions as I move closer.

“Probably.” He settles his other hand on my waist, pulling me against him. “I seem to make a lot of bad decisions where you’re concerned.”

“Like what?”

“Like thinking I could keep you at arm’s length or believing this arrangement could stay purely business.” He rests his forehead against mine, and his breath wafts against my lips. “Like pretending I don’t want you every time I’m in the same room with you.”

The confession breaks all my careful restraint at once. “Leo...”

He kisses me before I can finish the thought, and I respond instantly, months of suppressed attraction exploding into something urgent and desperate.

This isn’t the careful, public kiss from our early appearances together, or even our private kisses we shared earlier.

This is raw, honest, and completely inevitable, with a new urgency that is more obvious than our last time having sex.

When we break apart, both of us are breathing hard. “Are you sure about this?” he asks against my lips. “Because once we cross this line again?—”

“I’m tired of lines.” I cut him off, fisting my hands in his shirt. “I’m tired of pretending I don’t want this and don’t want you.”

That’s all the permission he needs. He lifts me easily, carrying me toward what I assume is his bedroom while I wrap my legs around his waist. The hallway seems endless, filled with tension and anticipation that makes my skin burn.

His bedroom is as impersonal as the rest of the apartment, with more expensive furniture, neutral colors, and nothing that reveals a thing about the man who sleeps here.

It doesn’t matter. All that matters is the way he sets me down beside the bed and looks at me like I’m something precious and dangerous.

“Last chance.” His voice is strained with the effort of holding back. “We can stop here and go back to pretending this is just business.”

“I don’t want to pretend anymore.” I reach for his shirt, working at the buttons with urgent fingers. “I want this. I want you.”