Page 8 of Cruel Romeo

If Lev and Luka hadn’t walked in, I don’t know what would have happened.

Or maybe I do—and that’s the problem right there.

I would have backed her against the wall. Seen if her mouth stuttered like that when it wasn’t words coming out of it, but moans instead. I would have run my hands up those hips, slid that blazer off her petite shoulders, tugged her zipper lower, lower, lower.

She would have begged.

And I would have given her exactly what she was begging for.

She was trying so hard to stay professional. To pretend she wasn’t imagining what it would feel like to touch the goods. She didn’t want to want me—and that’s what made it real.

Most women want something from me. In the single week I’ve been in charge of my family’s Bratva, I’ve seen socialites fall over themselves to snatch me up, circling like vultures.

Power, money, status: you name it, I have it. And they want it, badly.

On the other hand, Sima just wantedout.

I picture her against the door. Dark brown hair, cut just past the shoulder. Practical, but charming in the way it fellaround her heart-shaped face. Whoever styled it, they knew they were framing a work of art.

She was enough to send all my blood rushing south.It’s a shame I met her on my wedding day, of all days. Whichever daughter of his that Boris Sidorov stuck me with can’t be half as mouth-watering as those pretty pink lips or that tight, supple body.

A little minx in a cropped blazer and a sleek pantsuit. A fucking temptation with?—

“—tyr? Are you even listening to what I’m saying?”

Lev’s words fly right over my head. It’s the first time since the accident that anything has commanded my full focus like this, and I’m not looking to split it.

Instead, I bend down to pick up the purse Sima dropped. “No,” I answer flatly. “And unless it’s life-or-death, I wouldn’t bother repeating yourself.”

Luka shrinks where he’s standing, even though I wasn’t speaking to him. He’s a recruit, fresh off the streets, with only his six-foot-nine stature to recommend him.

“Your blushing bride’s still in the limo,” Lev says, voice flat. “Been crying for the last fifteen minutes. Ruined all of the makeup artist’s hard work.”

“Pity.”

“She won’t come out, Petyr.” He rounds in front of me, searching for my gaze that’s busy scanning Sima’s dropped belongings. “She says she can’t go through with it. Says she’s not gonna marry you.”

I search through her things. Cheap lip gloss. A folder. A half-eaten burrito.

“Sounds like her problem,” I remark. “Not mine.”

“You’re not hearing me!” A pack of breath mints. A pocket hairbrush. Another pack of breath mints.“It’s over, Petyr. The wedding’s off.”

That’s when I finally lift my gaze. “No, it isn’t.”

“Yes, it is.” Lev looks as exasperated as the day I appointed him as my second. Which, to be fair, was less than a week ago. “Christ, brother. I’m not surprised your future wife decided to become future Mrs. Nothing instead. If this is what was waiting for her, she might have had better luck with a potted fucking plant.”

I should probably take offense at Lev’s tone, but I don’t. Years of friendship tell me he’s only speaking this way because he cares. About me. And aboutthem.

Father. Dimitri.

The two people I swore I’d avenge.

The problem is, I need a bride to do that.

I’ve never met Polina Sidorov. Never bothered to look her up, either. Rumor says she’s soft, spoiled, the kind of girl raised to be more ornamental than useful.

I don’t hold that against her. It’s not her fault her father decided to throw her at me like a white flag in a white dress.