Page 19

Anton pauses at the front door and drops his voice low. “Seriously Anya, you don’t have to stay with him. You can come home with me, right now, and leave this behind. We’ll get you a divorce.”

I glance down the hallway at Matvei’s office. “I want to be here. I… I care about him, in some way. Despite how this happened, I don’t want to leave. Not yet, anyway.”

He looks pained, but I know he doesn’t have much of a leg to stand on, not with our family history of marriages.

I might be his little sister but I’m an adult now, and he needs to accept that I can make my own choices, even when he thinks they’re ill-advised.

I feel bolder now, out from under my family’s watchful eye.

Why had I spent so long doing what I was told?

Matvei is right—I don’t have to accept their limitations; I need to take power for myself.

This is a way of doing that. Being married to the head of a family gives me a whole new world of power and opportunity.

It’s a huge step up from being the youngest family in the Milov family, as long as I can keep the Abashins from being wiped out by the Shevchenkos.

Giving up on this, and on Matvei, right now would just put me right back where I started, fighting for every scrap of independence.

“If that changes, you call me, got it?”

I nod. “Promise. Get home safe, and promise me you’ll really look into what I said.”

“I will. For your sake.”

He steps out and I shut the door behind him, then lean against it and take a few deep breaths.

That was intense. When I started hearing their raised voices, I panicked that one of them was going to get hurt, and I just couldn’t handle it.

I’d had to get involved. Now, I just hope Matvei can forgive me.

To be fair, I never promised him I wouldn’t. I hold on to that and make my way back to his office because there’s no point in delaying the inevitable. If he’s going to yell at me, I’d rather get it over with now.

He surprises me, coming out of the office with a look on his face I can’t quite read. Is he furious?

“Look, I know I shouldn’t have barged in,” I hurry to say before he can start, “but it sounded things weren’t going well in there. At all. And Anton can be a total hot head, you know? I was worried he’d do something stupid and then you’d do something stupid and one of you would get hurt. Or worse.”

I take a breath and prepare to go on, but he shocks me with a rare smile. “You were right to intercede. The negotiation would’ve failed without your help.”

“Seriously?” I say, my mouth dropping open. I want to make it him say it again so I can record him. “You’re not mad?”

“Mad?” He steps closer and I can smell the clinging scent of smoke and spice. “No, I’m not mad, princess.”

He’s still unreadable. I study his face, his body, the spark of his eyes. Eventually, I’ll unlock the key to this puzzle. “What are you, then?”

Matvei cups my cheek with his huge hand, thumb stroking along my cheekbone. I lean into his touch. “Proud of my wife.”

Wife. The word sends a frisson of warmth through me, straight down my spine.

This man is still such a mystery to me. I feel like I’m chipping away at a glacier just to uncover one genuine emotion, one smile, one touch.

Beneath the intimidating exterior, I know there’s a man with a good heart.

I’ve seen glimpses of it, and each look makes me want to dig deeper.

I stand on tiptoes and loop my arms behind his neck. His eyes flare with a desire I know is mirrored in my own. He bends just enough to kiss me. It’s slow at first, exploratory, and so tender it makes my toes curl. Like it’s the first time we’ve ever kissed.

He loops one arm around my waist and cups the back of my head with the other, tilting my head back just enough to deepen the kiss. It’s like each dart of his tongue and press of his lips is designed to memorize me, like we have all the time in the world.

I’m already burning for him. I want him right now, right here, but I know enough about this man to know he won’t be rushed.

If I want this, I have to play by his rules.

I don’t have to play fair, though. I press my body against his and marvel again at the hardness of his body, the endless expanse of muscle that I have yet to properly explore. Cramped sex in a car didn’t cut it.

He teases at my bottom lip, nipping and sucking, driving a spike of need into my stomach. I wiggle against him, but his hands remain chaste, and my frustrated sigh draws a soft laugh out of him.

“I want you,” I say, rocking my hips against him, “right now.”

His mouth brushes the shell of my ear. “Patience, princess. I want you properly this time.”

My imagination shuffles through all the things that properly could mean at the hands of this man, and heat floods between my thighs. It doesn’t make waiting any easier. I slip my hands beneath his shirt and trace the ridged line of his chest, scraping my nails lightly through the curls of hair.

When I try to move them lower, however, he catches my wrist and presses a line of kisses along the inside of it, up to the crook of my elbow.

Something that innocent shouldn’t have the effect it does, but maybe it’s the way he’s looking at me with those coal-black eyes as he does it. They’re full of filthy promises.

He sets my arm back around his neck, then grabs the back of my legs and lifts me with ease. I wrap myself around his waist, hooking my ankles behind his back, and start to kiss the stubbled line of his jaw.

“Is it wise to distract me while I’m carrying you?” Matvei’s deep voice rumbles pleasantly through my chest as he walks us down the hall and up the stairs.

I nibble along his throat and feel his hands tighten around my thighs. “It’s worth getting dropped.”

We walk past my bedroom, and I realize we’re heading to his room. I’ve never been in there, and the thought of finally seeing it excites me. Another glimpse into the inner sanctum of my husband.

When we get inside, I’m surprised by the lack of red velvet and dark wood. I was truly expecting the devil’s lair. Instead, it’s tasteful and modern, with a massive bed that takes up much of the space. He sits down on the edge of it with me on his lap, cupping my chin before kissing me again.

I slide my hands beneath his shirt and pull it upward, needing him naked, right now. He yanks it off the rest of the way. God, those muscles. I run my hands up his arms just to feel them.

The strap of my dress falls down my shoulder, and his eyes drop to the bare skin. “Your turn, I think.”

He pulls my dress overhead and drops it beside the bed. My nipples perk at the sudden chill.

“No bra,” he muses. “I’m beginning to think you don’t own one.”

I set my hand on his chest and push him back, and to my surprise, he allows it, lying back on the bed with me straddling him. “Is that a complaint?”

“Never.” His eyes darken as I reach between us and start to unbuckle his pants. “Merely an observation.”

He lifts his hips, letting me tug his pants and briefs down to his thighs.

His cock springs free, hard and ready. But I remember how he teased me in the car, how he made me wait to feel him, and it’s my turn to return the favor.

I slip my panties off and straddle him again, lining it up against my pussy and pressing his cock down.

I’m completely soaked. He skates his hands up my sides to my nipples as I start to slide back and forth along the length of him, coating him in my slick.

Each time it brushes my clit, I draw a ragged little breath.

He draws me down to kiss him, and starts to meet my movements with his own, the angle even better now.

Each time the head of his cock strokes along my entrance I fight the urge to take him inside of me, desperate to feel him stretch me again.

His hands find my hips and guide me, urge me on, until I’m lost in the rhythm and right at the edge of orgasm.

Then, only then, do I press down onto his cock.

It’s so slicked that the first inch slides right in, drawing a gasp out of me.

I’ll never get used to how big he is, how much I have to stretch to take him.

His eyes roll shut, and I can tell he’s using every ounce of restraint not to bury himself to the hilt in a single thrust. He’s so careful with me, but I want to make him lose control.

I want to know what he’s like when he’s lost all sense of restraint.

I slide down a bit further, painfully slow. His fingers tighten around my hips. Another inch.

“Anya,” he groans out, bucking up the barest amount. “Fuck.”

My lips tease along his neck, and he doesn’t have to know it’s more to muffle my own moans than to drive him crazy. “Take me, Matvei. Stop holding back.” I sink him deeper inside of me, halfway down now. “I want you to fill me.”

I slam down the rest of the way in a single thrust. The ache of taking all of him is immense, and for a moment, I can’t move, can only breathe and stretch.

“Careful, princess. Are you okay?”

By way of answer I lift myself all the way back up until I feel the head of his cock nearly slip free, then press back down again. The ache gives way to something sweeter.

“So tight,” he growls into my ear.

“Stop holding back.” I ride him again, slowly dragging my pussy up the full length of him. “Give your wife what she needs.”

Something snaps inside of him. He yanks me back down hard while he drives upward, impaling me so deep my mind goes blank. It’s only the beginning. Matvei wraps his arm around me and rolls us over so he’s on top of me, covering my body with his.

His hips grind against my clit with every thrust and that orgasm I was so close to comes rushing back.

“Mine,” he growls, pressing me into the bed as he sets a brutal pace.

He grabs my wrists in one hand and pushes my arms over my head, pinning me in place—as if there’s anywhere else I want to be.

My body arches up to meet his thrusts like it was made for this, made for him.

With every snap of his hips, he lays claim to my body, and with every moan driven from my lips, I cede it to him.

He’s close. His grip tightens on my wrists and his pace becomes reckless, wild with need. This is what I wanted. To see him undone, out of control, all for me. My orgasm comes quick and hard, each wave more intense than the last as I clamp around his cock.

“Cum for me,” I urge him, circling my hips up to meet his next thrust. “I need you to fill me.”

“Fuck Anya.” He pumps once, twice, then seats himself fully inside of me with a shout, cock throbbing.

I catch his mouth for a breathless kiss, then lie back on the bed. He collapses beside me, and my stomach turns over in fear. Is he going to pull away again like he did after we had sex in his car? This felt different, but what if it only felt that way to me?

“Come here, princess,” he says, lifting his arm in an invitation. “And stop thinking. I can see it on your face.”

I rest my head on his chest and listen to the thunderous beat of his heart beneath my ear. He wraps his arm around my shoulder and holds me close. I’m afraid to move, to breathe, like that little disruption might bring down the shields again.

I curl in closer when he strokes his hand through my hair and brushes his lips to the top of my head, wrapping myself around his body. Mine , he’d said. Had he meant it?