Page 23 of Her Rustanov Husband (Ruthless Bullies #2)

LYDIA

Even though Yom was a last-minute sub for Pavel, Team Puck Breast Cancer won the charity bout.

By then, Ingrid had rejoined us, and Nadia—my new best friend—was back to playing with my whistle while Billie and I waited in the arena lobby for Chess and Yom to emerge in jeans and Raptor hoodies.

I knew they were going to present a check, and I’d expected them to field a few press questions first, especially on the cusp of the Raptors deal becoming official. But they made a beeline for where we were standing.

As soon as she saw her father, Nadia decided we were no longer besties. I discovered she was shockingly strong for an 18-month-old when she kicked and wrestled out of my arms.

If “Bye, bitch” were a live-action illustration, it would be Nadia running to her father without so much as a look back.

“She barely tolerates sharing him with me,” Billie said with a wry laugh as we watched Chess lift Nadia into his arms like they’d been separated for months, not a couple of hours. “I don’t know what she’s going to do when she has to share him with a little brother.”

I was still laughing when, to my surprise, Yom took my hand in his and led me over to the spot where two reps from the charities both Rustanovs had played for in the Puck Cancer game were already waiting.

Cameras flashed as Yom bent down and pressed a tame kiss to my lips. Not hungry, not possessive like yesterday’s. It was nicely calibrated for public consumption.

A weird deflated feeling followed. One I refused to acknowledge because how many times did I have to tell myself: Just pretend. Just pretend. This is just pretend.

Chess—and by extension, Nadia, who happily grabbed onto the oversized white checks with her chubby brown fingers—presented both cancer org reps with a seven-figure donation from the Rustanov Foundation.

Luckily, Chess did all the talking while Yom—unbelievably photogenic, even in a hoodie—stood silently behind him, his arm around my waist. Which still somehow felt natural.

And good. Old feelings of Yom being my home port swirled in my chest.

Just pretend. Just pretend. It’s just pretend.

After the cameras were gone, there were hugs exchanged and a few more toots on my whistle from Nadia before Ingrid, Yom, and I clamored back into Chess’s Titan, which would be ferrying us to the private airfield while Chess, Billie, and Nadia enjoyed what Chess confidently said “will most definitely be our last family-of-three date night.” As if he were in charge of when his baby boy would arrive.

He wore his superciliousness in a way more charming manner than Yom, but behind that much friendlier smile, he was still a Rustanov.

“Why do you have an emergency training whistle hanging around your neck, again?” Ingrid asked on the flight back to Minneapolis. “Something to do with your job in Canada?”

I kept my face neutral. Relaxed. “Trust me. You never know when you’ll need a training whistle.”

She let out a tinkling laugh. “I suppose so…”

Meanwhile, Yom pulled out his laptop and started typing, the steady tap-tap-tap filling the silence. Not looking at me like a wolf about to eat his dinner. Maybe because he’d already eaten.

I glanced at the woman sitting beside me. Remembering how he’d told her to come him with before the game. What had he possibly needed from my personal coordinator before stepping on the ice?

No. Bad Skye. Don’t go there.

I forced my gaze back to the window, telling myself it would be a blessing if he was getting his rocks off behind my back. I couldn’t—and shouldn’t—have it both ways. This whole arrangement was already enough of a “you can never go home again” disaster.

The nice thing about being the ex-fiancée of a hockey player who hadn’t yet become an international superstar when you split?

Nobody remembered you. After a few years of dodging UM-Gemidgee alumni events, it had been laughably easy to fade Lydia Carrington into anonymity and re-emerge as Skye Nelson, the friendly local who brought therapy dogs to classrooms and nursing homes.

Skye Nelson was anonymous. Skye Nelson was safe. Skye Nelson was too busy to overthink the choices I’d made with Yom. But after this, Skye Nelson would be erased. And I’d have to find some other way to start over from scratch.

But that was Skye Nelson.

On Day 4, Lydia Carrington woke up on her back with Yom’s arm flung around her waist like she was his personal body pillow.

And that night, he slid that same arm around me in front of cameras commissioned by various PR entities at a charity gala for providing sports equipment to underfunded schools.

An auctioneer encouraged higher and higher bids for a Valentine’s Day double date night in the owner’s box with Mr. and Mrs. Yom Rustanov. Even though I’d be long gone by February, Yom still pulled me in for another PR-friendly kiss after the bidding topped out at six figures.

On Day 5, I woke nose-to-collarbone, with Yom’s hand cupping my ass.

That afternoon, I stood beside him at a sneaker store opening, smiling stiffly as cameras clicked while he unveiled a mural for the sports brand that had sponsored him since the start of his career. Another reserved kiss. More flashes.

On Day 6, I was stunned to wake with Yom’s head pillowed on my chest. I hadn’t even realized my hand had slipped into his dark hair until he let out a contented sigh and burrowed his face between my breasts.

What was I doing? I shoved him away and scrambled out of bed.

“Good morning to you, too, zhena ,” he called after me as I fled for my now daily top-of-the-morning, calm-down-girl shower.

That evening, though, I found myself walking hand in hand with him at the Mall of America. I hadn’t even realized “pap walks” were a thing outside New York or LA, but apparently they were here, too—and America’s biggest mall was where they happened.

We stopped in front of a pre-selected storefront for the German athletic brand that had signed Yom his rookie year. And strategically placed photographers “caught” him brushing a dreadlock behind my ear just before kissing me sweetly, like it was some spontaneous romantic gesture.

On Day 7, I thought I’d get a break. Yom had an away exhibition game in Boston. But before I could roll out of bed that morning, he claimed his daily kiss—a long, devouring thing that left me needing a shower colder than the one after Day 6.

I told myself at least I’d get a reprieve from the single-bed situation. But the barricade pillows never reappeared. And the morning of Day 8, I woke spooned into his chest, his hand cupping my breast like it belonged there.

That day, he saved the kiss for another stage: the Companion of the Year announcement at AbleHearts, the service dog org I’d once dreamed of applying to.

Another million-dollar check from the Rustanov Foundation.

Another chaste kiss in front of cameras—this time in a community center gymnasium, where the humble award ceremony took place.

“How many seven-figure checks do you have lying around?” I teased as we walked offstage. Hand in hand—for the cameras. Only for the cameras, I reminded myself.

“Why? Is there another cause you want one for, zhena ?” he murmured, leaning down so close his breath ghosted over my ear. “All you have to do is ask. And I’ll give you anything— anything you want.”

He was baiting me again. I knew it.

But the offer still made my chest ache. “If only that were true.”

I didn’t realize I’d said that out loud until Yom stopped in his tracks and turned to look down at me, his brows knitting together. “Why would you think what I say is not true?”

“Mrs. Rustanov! Mrs. Rustanov!” a voice called out before I could come up with an answer.

A plump older lady with gray hair barely contained in two messy braids came huffing up, waving a paper calendar.

“Glad I finally caught you,” she said, pausing to catch her breath. “We’d love to get you scheduled for our next board meeting while I have you here.”

I blinked. “I’m sorry—what board meeting?”

“Oh, did no one tell you…?” She glanced at Yom, who somehow managed to still look uber-dangerous in a neon-purple T-shirt with a happy golden retriever panting over the AbleHearts logo. “You’ve been appointed to our board. As requested.”

“Say what now?” My eyebrows shot up.

But Yom only told her, “My wife’s coordinator, Ingrid, will be in touch about her calendar.”

I bit my tongue until the rep walked away. Then I reminded him, low and sharp, “I’m only here for ninety days. Not nine years. I can’t commit to sitting on the board of a charity in a city where I don’t even live.”

“Lydia.” One hand curled around my waist, and the other raised to brush his knuckles over my cheek as he solemnly advise, “Perhaps by the end of these first ten days, you will realize the only one stopping you from taking what—anything—you want… is you.”

He was baiting me again with that coded anything . And my heart hammered anyway, wanting all the things I couldn’t possibly have. Not anymore. Not after six years.

“Lydia,” he whispered, mouth drawing closer.

Reflex made me rise onto my toes, closing the last bit of space. But at the final second, I forced myself to say, “You already had your daily kiss.”

His gray eyes flashed, anger and bitterness cutting through sharp enough to bring back the image of him in that barn, torturing my brother.

But, he backed off.

That night, I ate dinner alone in front of Rap Star Wives reruns. And when he finally returned a little after eleven, I was already in bed, determined not to wonder where he’d been.

On Day 9, I woke to his hand simply holding mine across the sheets. Just that. No arm around my waist, no lips brushing my shoulder, no chest pressed to my back. Yet, somehow, it felt even more intimate. Too intimate.

I slipped quietly out for my shower.

But if I thought that signaled a chaste era, Yom disabused me of that notion the same afternoon.

The Minnesota Loons had invited him to throw out the first pitch of the season at CalMart Field. Cameras lined the diamond. Photographers swarmed behind the dugout. Ingrid said the Star Tribune had even requested an interview once the game started.

But in the quiet, ad-lined tunnel leading to the roar of the crowd, Yom suddenly caught my hand and stopped walking.

“You will go ahead,” he told the two Loon PR reps shadowing us.

“But—” the taller of the two started, only to freeze when Yom gave him one of those Rustanov looks that promised big consequences for little infractions.

“We’ll be waiting at the field entrance,” the shorter rep said quickly, dragging his colleague away.

Behind us, I saw Stepan stop as well, holding position.

“What are you do—” I started.

And then my back hit concrete. His mouth crashed into mine, devouring, consuming, until my knees threatened to give way and my hands clawed for his chest just to keep upright.

It lasted forever. Or maybe just one minute.

Then, as if on some inner timer, he pulled back. His thumb grazed my lip. “I’ve been wanting the kiss you denied me since yesterday. I could not hold back any longer. If you wish to go home now that you have fulfilled your daily kiss duty, Stepan will take you.”

With that, he straightened the black-and-red jersey the reps had handed him and strode toward the roar of the crowd, to the spotlight, where he clearly belonged.

Meanwhile, I stood panting in his wake—my lips swollen, my heartbeat unsteady.

And that was when I saw the CalMart Overnight Delivery ad plastered on the opposite tunnel wall.

On the morning of Day 10, I didn’t wake up tangled in Yom’s body.

Instead, his voice dragged me out of sleep. Low. Broken. Pleading in German.

“ Mutti… Mutti… bitte geh nicht !”

My heart clenched. I knew those words, even though I didn’t speak fluent German like Merry.

Mommy… Mommy… please don’t go!

That nightmare. The one he’d told me about once—based on the real memory of his mistress mother leaving him on his married father’s doorstep and never coming back.

Apparently, it was recurring. And so much worse than my nightmares about public speaking and math class.

I froze, torn. Years ago, waking him from this exact dream had cracked him open and led to rough conversations —which was somehow both BDSM and a new level of intimacy.

And the last thing I needed now was more intimacy with Yom Rustanov.

But I couldn’t just crawl out of bed and leave him trapped in the dreamscape of the worst day of his life.

“Yom, c’mon.” I got on my knees and shook him hard. “Wake up.”

His eyes flew open—wild, unfocused. Until they locked on me.

Then, suddenly, I was flat on my back. His mouth on mine. His hands everywhere. His morning erection pressed against my sleep shorts, thick enough for me to feel the rock hard heat of him through the fabric.

He kissed me like a drowning man. Like I was oxygen.

I gasped, tried to pull away, but he hauled me closer, and I… God help me, I kissed him back. Our bodies fused, breaths ragged, heat spiraling until I couldn’t tell which way was up. There was only the wanting—charging through us like electricity.

“Let me back in, zayka ,” he begged between kisses, his voice rough, his hips grinding so hard my folds parted even through the double barrier of underwear and shorts. “Let us have what we both want. Please.”

I had to say no. But I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t stop kissing him back. Couldn’t stop my legs from wrapping around his waist. I was lost, falling.

One more grind and every reason I had for not letting this happen would collapse. I’d?—

A sharp knock rattled the door.

“Sorry to bother you so early, children!” Pesya’s voice called cheerfully. “Downstairs is buzzing on the house phone. Something about two CalMart delivery men here to drop off a bed?”

I froze. Lips swollen. Breath stolen.

Yom lifted his head, the kind of scowl usually reserved for opposing armies darkening his face. His gray eyes stormed over me.

“What did you do, little zhena ?”