Page 20 of Bratva Daddy (Underworld Daddies #1)

Alexei

T his morning, everything felt different.

Clara sat curled in the corner of my leather sofa, knees drawn up, that massive Russian novel open in her lap—Bulgakov, The Master and Margarita.

Her eyes tracked the same line over and over, never turning the page, while she watched me pace by the windows through her lashes.

The morning light caught her profile when she tilted her head, throwing shadows that made her look older, sadder, more beautiful than any twenty-three-year-old had a right to be.

I'd been walking the same path for twenty minutes—window to bookshelf, bookshelf to window—trying to find words that would rebuild the wall I'd demolished yesterday when I'd pulled her over my lap, when I'd let her call me Daddy, when I'd kissed her like a drowning man finding air.

My suit felt too tight despite being perfectly tailored, my skin too hot despite the climate control keeping the penthouse at exactly seventy-two degrees.

The ghost of her mouth haunted me. Vanilla and desperation, the way she'd ground against me, the soft sounds she'd made when my hand had connected with her ass through that silk nightgown.

I'd jerked off twice in my office afterward, coming to the memory of her crying out "Daddy" as she shattered across my lap, and still woke up hard enough to hurt.

I turned from the window, catching her watching me openly now, those hazel eyes dark with something I didn't want to identify. Time to be the pakhan, not the man who'd almost fucked his captive on his couch.

"Yesterday was inappropriate," I said, voice formal enough for a board meeting. Each word measured, controlled, empty of the heat that threatened to consume me. "I crossed a professional boundary. It won't happen again."

She closed the book slowly, marking her place with a finger like she might actually return to it.

Professional.

The word hung between us like a bad joke. Nothing about kidnapping a woman and making her follow twenty-three rules was professional, but I needed the fiction. Needed distance between us before I did something irreversible.

"You kissed me back," she said quietly, setting the book on the coffee table with deliberate care. "Rather enthusiastically."

The memory of it—her tongue seeking mine, her hands fumbling with my shirt buttons, the needy sounds she'd made—sent blood rushing south. I clenched my jaw hard enough to crack teeth.

"A moment of weakness." The lie tasted like ash. "You're under my protection, which means you're off-limits."

Something flickered across her face—hurt maybe, or disappointment. She pulled her knees tighter to her chest, making herself smaller in the corner of my couch, and I hated that I'd put that look there.

"Your protection?" Her voice carried an edge sharp enough to cut. "I'm your prisoner."

"No." The word came out harder than intended, and I forced myself to move closer, to sit in the chair across from her.

Close enough to have a real conversation, far enough that I couldn't smell her vanilla bodywash.

"A prisoner would be in chains. You're here because your father created a situation that requires resolution. But while you're here . . ."

I paused, searching for words that would explain without revealing too much.

How did I tell her that somewhere between her throwing plates and calling me Daddy with tears in her eyes, she'd become something precious?

That the thought of her father paying his debt and taking her back made me want to burn down half of Manhattan?

"You called me something yesterday," I said carefully. "During your punishment."

Color flooded her face, pink spreading from her chest up her throat to her cheeks. She looked away, studying the skyline like it held answers. "That was just—"

"I need you to understand something, Clara." Her name on my lips was a mistake—too intimate, too soft. "What you asked for, what you called me—that's not a game. It's a dynamic that requires trust, communication, and care. Things that can't exist in our current situation."

She turned back to me, eyes wide with something that looked dangerously like hope. "Why not?"

Because I'm already too attached. Because if I let myself be your Daddy, I'll never let you go. Because if we go there, I won’t own you because you’re my prisoner, I’ll own you because you’re my everything .

"Because that dynamic requires complete honesty," I said instead. "The dominant partner—" I paused at how her breath caught at the word, "—holds all the power, which means they hold all the responsibility. To protect, to guide, to know what their submissive needs before it's asked for."

"Submissive," she repeated, tasting the word like expensive wine.

"The submissive partner has to trust completely," I continued, needing her to understand what she was asking for. "To be vulnerable, to let go of control, to believe they'll be caught when they fall. It's not just about spanking or rules or calling someone—"

"Daddy," she supplied, and Christ, the way she said it—soft and questioning and without any of yesterday's desperation—made my cock throb.

"Yes." My voice came out rough. "It's about being cherished.

Protected. Guided. It's about someone caring enough to provide structure when you need it, softness when you need that.

It's about creating a safe space where you can be completely yourself, where your needs matter more than anything else. "

She uncurled slightly, leaning forward. "That sounds..."

"Terrifying?" I suggested.

"Perfect," she whispered, and the admission hung between us like a confession.

I stood abruptly, needing distance before I crossed the room and showed her exactly how perfect it could be.

How I'd worship her body while enforcing my rules, how I'd punish her infractions then hold her while she cried, how I'd teach her that submission to the right person was the ultimate freedom.

"It can't happen," I said, the words physically painful. "Not while you're here under these circumstances. Not when the power imbalance is this severe."

"The power imbalance?" She laughed, bitter and beautiful. "Alexei, you have all the power anyway. At least if I called you Daddy, if we had that dynamic, I'd have some say in it. I'd be choosing it."

The truth of that hit like a bullet. She was right—I held all the cards, controlled every aspect of her life.

But if we entered into that dynamic, she'd have the ultimate power.

The power to say no, to establish limits, to trust me with her submission.

It would make her equal in ways she wasn't now.

"Think about what you're asking for," I said, moving toward my office before I could do something stupid like agree. "Really think about it, Clara. Because once that line is crossed, there's no going back."

F or the next few days, we didn’t talk about the Daddy/Little stuff. I was busy, and Clara clearly wanted to draw up some boundaries. She spent her time reading, exercising, and—a little annoyingly—following all my rules to the letter.

Having her in my life became a beautiful part of my routine. Mornings were especially blissful.

I got to know her coffee order. The mug weighed exactly eight ounces empty, twelve ounces full with her precise preferences—two sugars, oat milk, the expensive beans from that place in Brooklyn she'd mentioned loving.

"Morning, little one," I'd say when she opened the door, hair a disaster, pillow creases on her cheek, wearing whatever silk pajamas she'd chosen from the collection I'd provided.

She'd take the mug with both hands like a child accepting a gift, and the small, sleepy smile she'd give me was worth more than every construction contract in my portfolio.

This morning—Thursday, day eleven of her captivity if anyone was counting, which I definitely wasn't—she wore the pale blue set that made her eyes look like winter ice.

She hummed when she took the first sip, a sound that went straight to my cock, and I had to look away before I did something stupid like push her back into that bedroom and show her exactly what that sound did to me.

"Clothes," I said, moving to her closet with the same purposeful stride I used in business meetings. She followed, sipping her coffee, watching me select each piece with an attention that felt like touching.

"The cashmere sweater," I decided, pulling out the cream one that would make her skin glow. "The black wool skirt. The knee-high boots."

"It's seventy degrees outside," she protested mildly, but she was already reaching for the sweater.

"You're not going outside." I turned to leave, then paused. "Arms up, little one."

She set down her coffee and raised her arms without hesitation, letting me pull the silk pajama top over her head.

The moment stretched, dangerous and electric—Clara standing there in just silk pajama bottoms and a barely-there bra, me holding her shirt, both of us breathing too carefully.

My fingers ghosted across her collarbone as I helped her into the sweater, and she shivered despite the warm apartment.

"I can dress myself," she whispered, but made no move to take over.

"I know." I smoothed the cashmere over her shoulders, letting my hands linger for just a moment. "But this is better."

Better was a dangerous understatement. This was torture and paradise combined—touching her in ways that stayed just barely appropriate, feeling her skin warm under my fingers, watching her pupils dilate every time I got close. I was playing with fire, but I couldn't stop. Wouldn't stop.

Breakfast had become another form of exquisite torment. She'd push food around her plate, and I'd watch like a hawk, cataloging every bite.

"You're too thin, Clara," I said this morning, adding another piece of toast to her plate. "When did you last have a proper meal before coming here?"