Page 21 of The Brutal Arrangement (The Ivanov Syndicate #2)

DAMON

B y the end of the third day away from Lucy, I was impatient to get back to her.

I hadn’t planned to leave her locked away this long.

I’d seen what a toll that took on Maxim.

He employed that tactic with Sloane after he’d kidnapped her.

His reasoning was that the longer he left Sloane to stew and rest up, she’d be more likely to talk to him and quit the silent treatment she’d given him.

Lucy wasn’t overly chatty either, but it wasn’t like I’d had much time to speak with her.

She hadn’t come here as a kidnapped captive, either. She’d shown up under her own decision to marry me.

And I saw how miserable and tense Maxim was to deny himself from Sloane.

That wasn’t my intention. I’d planned on checking in with John and Hugo about Nik after I left her that morning.

Then, I headed into the dungeon to supervise what was going on there.

Business. That was what I’d counted on seeing to after I left Lucy in my room.

She had no permission to leave, but I hadn’t told anyone to bar her in my room until I returned.

Unfortunately, it had taken me longer than I thought it would.

After seeing to business, Father had another stroke-like incident and I’d gone along with Maxim, Saul, and Anastasia to be with him in the more equipped room at the hospital.

Once he was brought home the following night, I was led on a false tip about Nik.

And then yesterday, I was caught up in a chase across town that ended with a terse stakeout for a Romano spy who’d tried to kill one of our bosses near Brooklyn.

That was the nature of my “job”. Being one of the Ivanov brothers meant no two days or nights were ever the same. In that regard, I couldn’t blame Maxim for not wanting to be the boss in Father’s place. He had Sloane to enjoy and marry soon. He had a baby on the way he wanted to prepare for.

Knowing Lucy was waiting for me kept me anxious, too, but it wasn’t like what my brother had with his fiancée.

He knew her. He was familiar with her. I didn’t know Lucy, and I was secretly excited to learn about my wife.

Now that I knew she wasn’t Katerina and someone who was familiar with my darkness, I couldn’t wait to exploit this newness between me and Lucy, especially since she was mine to do with as I pleased.

I returned to my room and tugged on the knot of my tie. Without a clue where she would be and what she was up to, I was pleasantly surprised to see her on my bed.

The moment she sat up and realized I’d entered the room, I felt my pulse kick up a few degrees. Having her gaze on me so directly like this was similar to gripping a live wire.

My exhaustion from the last three days vanished. I was awake now, too thrilled to be able to experience more with her. The one who was stuck with me.

Her plump lips parted as she looked at me, but she clamped her mouth shut, seeming to think twice about speaking. Curiosity might’ve won out another time. I did want to learn about her and question her. A conversation would be handy to achieve that.

But right now, as I stalked toward her on the bed, I wanted to feel her. I wanted to educate myself on just what it was that made her so aroused on our sham of a wedding night.

Lust broke through all the other emotions clouding my mind. I wanted her. Now. Right here. And I’d be damned if she tried to say otherwise and deny me.

“I—”

“Quiet,” I replied, tugging my tie off.

She furrowed her brow as she started to scoot back a little bit onto the bed. I would cage her in if she would try to stand and evade me, but it seemed that she was hoping to roll to the side and dodge away from me like that.

I was faster, looming over her and catching her with my fingers wrapped around her upper arm.

“I—”

Again, I leveled her with a stern look to shut up. “Quiet,” I repeated. Bringing my hand forward, I let my tie dangle in my hand as a warning.

She lost the furrowed-brow look and full-out frowned now. Still, she obeyed, not protesting or yapping about something.

“I told you that you’re my wife,” I reminded her.

“I know?—”

I lifted the tie higher as I began to unbutton my shirt.

She huffed a hard breath through her nose and stared at me evenly.

“You’re my wife, and if I want you to be quiet, that’s what you’ll do.”

Her gaze lowered to the progress I’d made on taking my shirt off. Pleased that I could distract her with a show of my skin, I tried not to get too far ahead of myself.

The mere thought that I had a woman waiting for me was plenty to keep me on edge every minute I was away. Now that I had her under my touch, close enough to fuck, I felt like I’d explode if I tried to make this last.

Fuck now. Learn more later.

Maxim probably wouldn’t approve of that mentality, but I was too far gone with desire to slow down now.

“Are you going to be quiet?” I asked as I shrugged off my jacket, leaning back enough to give her room to stand.

“I—”

I grabbed her by the neck. Closing my fingers around her throat under her jaw gave me a chance to feel the fast tempo of her pulse. If she wasn’t scared, she was just as aroused as I was.

Goddamn…

If she was into my acting like a brute and taking her roughly, then that was how it’d be.

Putting a little more pressure on her neck without actually injuring her, I stared into her eyes as I unzipped my pants. “Quiet,” I reminded her, using whatever order I could over her to get her into that doe-eyed look of submissive vulnerability again.

A faint nod followed my instruction. She couldn’t move much, but I felt the barest movement of her head going up and down.

“Good. Now strip,” I ordered. Releasing her neck, I dragged my hand down, snagging the low V of her blouse. As I pulled my hand lower, brushing my knuckles against her breasts barely covered by her thin bra, I forced the fabric to rip and give way to my hold.

Breathing faster now, she lifted her hands to resume taking off the rest of her clothes.

It couldn’t have been easy to keep her gaze locked on mine, but I liked that she did.

She wasn’t hiding. She wasn’t trying to cower behind a mask at all.

Staring right back at me as I took off my clothes, she showed me her fear.

Her surprise. I wondered if she realized she was revealing how fucking turned on she was, too.

As soon as she was naked, before she could stand fully again, I picked her up and tossed her onto the bed. Even though she was compliant up until now, something about that movement snapped something in her. “Wait. I?—”

Again, I took hold of her. Placing my hand back on her neck and choking her slightly, I forced her to lie flat on the mattress.

I scooted closer, wedging myself between her legs so I could fit into her as I squeezed her neck.

Feeling her pulse thunder quicker under my fingers turned me on even more.

Like the sick bastard I was, using pain and force earned me a twisted bit of pleasure.

Because it was one more sign of who held the power.

Of who was in charge.

I was. I held the power. No one else. And so long as that stayed true, nothing could hurt me.

“Quiet,” I reminded her with a final tightening of my fingers on her neck.

Her chest heaved as she stared at me, breathing faster and harder as I raked my gaze over her naked body.

Roving my hands lower, I paused at her breasts to cup the generous globes.

She didn’t speak, she didn’t protest, watching my hands as I touched her, but when I rolled my fingertips over her hard nipples, she arched her back and cried out at the pinch.

“Ah!”

I put my hand right back on her neck to give her another reminder to be quiet, but at the same time, I grabbed my tie to gather her hands together.

Fighting more now as I maneuvered over her, she growled instead of speaking.

Feeling the rumble of her growl in her throat nearly made me come.

Even though I told her to be quiet, I relished her resistance.

I wanted the challenge to overcome. She had to protest so I could feel like I was conquering her, but I wouldn’t let her get away while I was in charge.

Turning us until she was on her knees in front of me, I used my hand under her chin to force her face toward mine. As soon as her hot breath whipped on my face, I dipped lower and claimed her lips in a hard kiss.

I silenced her with the force of my mouth over hers, but as I devoured her lips and demanded entry for my tongue inside her mouth, I used both hands to wrap my tie around her hands.

I wanted her to fight, but without any means to do so.

I wanted her to struggle, but without any real reason to want to get away.

With her hands bound, I reclaimed her neck to put pressure on her throat again. As she cringed, realizing how bound she was, I pushed against her until she was higher on her knees.

“Put my dick inside that pussy. Now.”

She glared at me as she tried to lower and use her bound hands.

It wasn’t an easy position for her to maintain, but she tried.

Falling over slightly and wobbling, she had to bend over to grab my cock with her cool fingers.

It had her hunched over, almost presenting her ass to me, and I thrust up into her hands.

Her grip tightened a little, and I couldn’t tell whether she was losing her balance or trying to tease me. As she adjusted herself against me, she blindly tried to line up her cunt over my cockhead.

The second I felt her entrance, so slick and soft, I couldn’t wait to sink into her all the way.

Giving up this chokehold, I grabbed her hips and thrust up until I was sucked into her tight heat.

“Ahh!” She cried out again at the full drive of my shaft into her. We hadn’t accomplished much foreplay, but with the suctioning sounds of her juices as I pulled back out and pounded in again, I knew she was wet and ready for me.

“Quiet,” I growled, grabbing her by the neck again.

Lifting up off my haunches a bit, I kneeled behind her as she more or less sat impaled on me. With her back to my chest, my hand on her neck, I slid my free hand to find her clit and rub it.

“Now fuck me, Wife.”

She had to arch forward and work with me against the chokehold of my fingers on her neck. If she moved too slowly, I squeezed harder. But between my hand on her neck quieting her and choking her, my finger on her clit, and my dick slipping in and out of her pussy, she managed it all.

My sexy wife didn’t just manage it. She reveled in it.

Moaning. Gasping. Mewling. Panting. I felt every one of her reactions with my hand on her neck.

No matter how clumsy she was, she kept at it, riding me until tears streamed over her cheek as she came.

The first clenches of her pussy on my dick nearly ruined me.

Strangled and squeezed by her inner walls, I had to focus on waiting for her to come before shooting my load into her.

“Fuck.”

She felt too damn good.

She gloved me too perfectly. Submissive and silent, she gave me just what I wanted after that absence I hadn’t counted on.

Turning her face toward me again, I kissed her hard and tried not to think too deeply about the fact that I wanted to taste her submission on her lips.

I wanted to choke her breath from her like this, too, kissing her and sliding my tongue with hers as I roared with the impossibly fierce orgasm that plowed through me and made me wonder who really had the power here.

No woman had ever gotten to me like she could.

But that wouldn’t last.

This was just sex.

She was my wife.

My woman to fuck. To choke. To bind up. To conquer, all so I could question her for the sake of keeping my family safe.

She would never be anything more. I’d never let her be someone who could overpower me in any lasting way. She had to respect that I was in charge, and only when she understood that would I trust that she was giving me everything she had, including any intel and secrets.

Women made even the strongest man weak, but so long as I reminded myself that she would submit to me , I would stay in charge between us.

I had to.