Page 133 of Dance of Devils

“Why…” I stop and shake my head. “Sorry, that’s none of my?—”

“Of course it is,” he murmurs, his arms tightening around me. “I’ve made all of your lifemybusiness. It’s only fair that you’re free to know all about mine.”

I chew on my lip, my eyes tracing over his gorgeous face.

How is this real?

“My father ran the Nikolayev family, back when it was little more than a ragtag street gang. Then the crackdowns happened. After my mother and uncle were killed, my father went to work for the rival family who had sold us out to the authorities, in order to safeguard my life, and my sister's.”

I blink. I didn’t know he had a sister.

“She’s dead now,” he says quietly, as if reading my thoughts. “But her son, my nephew, is alive and well.” He smirks. “Damian’s a lunatic, but he’s found his way. He’s in Japan: he married into a Yakuza family. He works for them now.”

I shake my head and then lower my mouth to kiss his chest. “I’m sorry about your family.”

“I’m sorry about yours.”

I exhale against his chest as his arm wraps around me, his hand moving a lock of blonde out of my eyes.

“So, Moscow, to a Siberian prison camp, to…Oxford?”

“Prison camp toboarding school, to Oxford.”

I shake my head. “That’s quite a journey.”

“I could say the same about yours,” he murmurs. “Perhaps now you can see why I was holding back before when it came to you and I.”

I frown quizzically, and he exhales with a smile.

“I’ve got scars older than you are, babygirl.”

I blush as he cups my jaw, leans in, and kisses me, slow and deep.

32

BROOKLYN

Annnd just like that,there's another shift in my life.

One day, I’m technicallynotfucking the man twenty years older than me who owns the ballet company I dance with. The next day, I am.

Very muchso.

And “frequently” doesn’t even cover it.

There’s no slow easing into it, either. I still have all my things in my room, but immediately after that first time, I spend every night in his bed, in his arms.

Under him. On top of him. With my back arched before him as he fucks me to hell and back with hisperfectcock.

I wake up to his mouth or fingers on me, or I wakehimup by pushing my ass back, raising one leg, and guiding his morning stiffness into my drenched pussy. Usually, he fucks me again at the breakfast table, or in the shower, or both.

Usually at rehearsal, if we have a break while Madame Kuzmina works with a small group of dancers, I still end up sitting with my friends or doing some conditioning. But there’s been twice in the last week where I took a “short break” and stepped outside to bolt down the alley to Kir’s waiting car, after which he drove us to a secluded parking garage and fucked my brains out in the back seat.

At night, after I get home from the theater, we take our time.

Usually, he ties me up or surprises me with some new, pulse-pounding binding device.

Ilikethis new shift in my life.