Page 10 of Trapped by the Bratva (The Valkov Bratva #5)

DMITRI

I didn’t see Hannah for the rest of that night. I wasn’t sure whether I was bothered about that or pleased.

Mila prevented me from being alone. She stopped in my room to be nosy, but I didn’t mind. I was fond of seeing Alana, and I treasured the chance to see my niece grow up. It was at warp speed, too. She was almost three months old and already so different since her newborn status.

“I wanted to see how you’re adjusting to your new helper.” She raised her brows.

“Helper? That’s what we’re calling them now?”

“The latest individual who is supposed to help you recover,” she clarified.

I shrugged. I wasn’t telling her much. More like nothing at all. I didn’t know how to sum up Hannah, and I sure wasn’t going to explain how tasty her cunt was.

“I doubt she’ll last.”

She crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes. “Why do you think that?”

“Aside from saying that about everyone else who’s tried to help me with therapy and didn’t last?”

She nodded.

“Just a hunch.” I shrugged the best I could. That movement still hurt too much, and I had to consciously refrain from the instinct to do it. Why? Because I made her run out of the room after I gave her an orgasm, Mila. That’s why.

“Because she’s so young?” she guessed. “Because you’re going to assume she’s inexperienced or unqualified?”

Dammit. I didn’t need that mental image to linger. The idea of Hannah being an inexperienced virgin excited me. I wasn’t picky about women. If they could please me, then it was game on.

Something about being the only man to taste Hannah filled me with a primal sense of satisfaction.

“Just go easy on her,” Mila advised.

Too late. I had already been controlling and demanding when I got that young woman to ride my face. And she did it so fucking well.

I furrowed my brow, hating that she was prompting me to think about her like this again. “Did my brother send you to nag me?”

“No. I’m here on my own.” She arched a brow. “She had dinner with us upstairs. You know? The meal in the evening that you can share with your family members?”

I rolled my eyes.

“You’re not locked to the bed. You’re not an invalid, Dmitri.”

“I know that.” And I knew what dinner was.

I wasn’t social enough to want to endure those kinds of gatherings.

Meetings were fine. Those were productive with clear goals.

Meals and hanging out… Hard no. It would take time—according to the doctors, up to a year—before I’d feel more like myself again. Until I did, I preferred my solitude.

“Hannah is a natural with Emily.” Mila smiled. “She was so good at calming her at dinner. Of course, she knew her. She babysat her since she was born, but she was really good with Alana, too.”

I didn’t react. So, she was good with babies. I bet lots of women were.

“So,” she added wryly, smirking at me, “if you’re going to be your usual asshole self, I would think twice. I’d hire her in a heartbeat to tend to the babies in this household.”

In other words, you’ll make sure Hannah doesn’t go anywhere.

I would just have to make the most of it and deal.

And I will. I’ve got more control than she does.

The next morning, when Hannah entered my room, she did so with a bright smile. If it weren’t so early, the radiance of her good mood might have made me return the expression, but I caught myself in time.

“Hello again,” she greeted happily.

I smirked at her chipper tone. I didn’t have enough coffee in me yet for that kind of brightness.

My deadpanned stare didn’t intimidate her.

She popped her hands on her hips, and the gesture made me follow the curves of her hips under her tight yoga-like clothes.

“Ready to get started?” she asked, full smile still on.

I grunted. “With what?”

That’s how this is gonna go? We’re plowing right past the fact that I made you come the last time you were in my room? Sweeping it under the rug?

That felt too easy.

“Start with your therapy.” She cranked up the wattage of her smile without making it look like she was only forcing it.

“I already started it.” I raised my brows. “Five therapists ago.”

She exhaled, almost seeming to crack on her dedication to remaining happy and unbothered. “Wow. Five.” She shrugged. “I guess they weren’t as determined as me.”

Huh. That was a bold statement. She had some grit, after all.

“Are you going to pretend you didn’t soak my face yesterday?”

Her cheeks turned a pretty pink. I wanted to make her flush even more as she stared at me.

“Huh?” I prompted, goading her to answer me.

She seemed completely incapable of speech, flustered like this. Fuck, she was sexy all riled up.

“I’m not sure how I could pretend it didn’t happen.” She cleared her throat. “And I don’t want to pretend it didn’t happen.”

Ooh. I knew she enjoyed it. She came so hard. But understanding that she didn’t regret it turned me on.

She was aware that she'd behaved improperly, but she wouldn’t take it back. A na?ve, good girl who wanted to be bad with me. It was the ultimate temptation.

No. No more temptations. Not with her.

“But that was yesterday,” she said with that infusion of peppiness. “Today is the start of therapy with me.”

Aha. She thought she could dismiss this attraction and call it a clean start. It was admirable, but I wondered if she’d stick with it.

This tension wasn’t a fickle thing.

“Is that right?”

She nodded.

“You’re not going to lecture me about what I need?”

She shook her head, seeming to resist rolling her eyes. “I don’t need to lecture you. I can show you.”

I let her approach, amused with her no-nonsense yet airy attitude. Like nothing could go wrong because she willed it so.

“You’re going to show me what I need?”

She stopped short in reaching for me. “Um. Well, not like you showed me… uh…” Blushing again, she held up the tablet she’d entered with.

“But on here.” She tapped the screen and pulled up multiple windows with information from my medical chart.

“It seems that your shoulder, hand, and ankle are the areas that will need the most maintenance and attention, so we’ll start with that. ”

And so we did.

Her assessment was clinical, devoid of random groping or sensual caresses.

Some of the ways she pushed and probed at me hurt, but not in an altogether bad way.

She didn’t shy away from the areas where I’d had the most reconstructive work done, and as she looked me over and got a better understanding of where I was in my rehab, she furrowed her brow and remained entirely studious.

No flirting. No wayward looks of longing.

Definitely no kissing.

The lack of intimacy was a drastic difference from the first day she was here, but over the next week, I came to realize that Hannah was more than a hot young woman to tease. She was more than the painfully and stubbornly happy, peppy helper.

It annoyed me to admit it, but she was damned smart.

“You’re not a nurse,” I reminded her the following Friday. She insisted on decreasing my pain medication, claiming it wasn’t effective at that dosage.

“No, I’m not,” she replied honestly, but slightly testy about it.

“Then why should I listen to you?”

“Because I know what I’m talking about.”

I scowled. “According to whom?”

She didn’t back down. She never did. “According to your doctors,” she said, showing me the notes they provided at my last checkup.

I shrugged. I wasn’t opposed to lowering my meds, but I wasn’t sure how else I could stave off the anger burning up inside me. With the narcotics, I was calmer. Still furious, but it was a manageable level of rage. Without them, I wasn’t sure how I could vent.

“Why aren’t you a nurse?” I asked.

I didn’t want to know more about her, but it was impossible to stop wondering.

“Because I dropped out right before graduation.”

I grunted as I finished an exercise with an elastic band. Such a simple maneuver, and my shoulder muscles ached and burned. She kept her small hand on my back, though, guiding me through the motions, and her cool skin contrasted the throbbing sensation.

“That’s stupid,” I commented.

She shot me a dirty look and shrugged.

Oh, you won’t talk back when I belittle you? I hated when she didn’t retort or engage with me. It suggested that she was better at blocking me than I was with her.

Damn you. You’re going to make me ask, aren’t you? “Why’d you drop out?”

“Because I had headaches. Migraines.” She frowned, eyes on my shoulder. Immediately, she corrected my posture. “Courtesy of some Mafia thug trying to kidnap Emily and knocking me out when I attempted to stop him.”

She lifted her gaze to mine, making eye contact with a leveled boldness.

“Hmm.” I nodded, lowering my arm with her admission. “It’s better now?”

Fuck. Why’d I ask that? Why do I care? I didn’t want to. I had no room in my life to concern myself with her well-being, but I already had. That very night she was talking about, I had. Without hesitation, I took her to the hospital and waited while she was checked out.

“Yeah. Back to normal, or as normal as anyone ever can be.” She shrugged. “But the recovery couldn’t be rushed. Reading and concentrating on final exams just weren’t in the cards for me. Not then. Just like your rushing your recovery won’t do you any good in the long run.”

I smirked at her snippet of wisdom. She couldn’t understand my desire to be back to my “normal”.

As soon as I was, Erik Avilov would suffer.

“All in good time, Dmitri,” she advised.

I stared at her, curious about what made this young woman so mature and smart. She either had an old soul or she had faced her own hardships to become the hopeful and optimistic person she was.

Ironically, I wanted to know what. I was curious, begrudgingly so, to learn more about this stubborn woman who tested my patience and frayed the tight rein I kept on my desire for her.

Her phone buzzed. She was so close that I heard the vibration. Just like she did every other time it alerted her, she smirked, ever so slightly.

Yet, she never answered. She stood so close to me, assisting me with my balance as I started another rep with the band.

“Not going to check that?” I asked.

She shook her head, focused on watching my arm and back. Her hands remained on me, one at my side and the other on my elbow as she guided me to execute a perfect extension intended to strengthen me.

“Is it always the same person?”

What the fuck? I hated playing twenty questions, and it seemed like I couldn’t stop myself with her.

She shrugged.

“Boyfriend?”

Her cheeks turned pink. “If I had a boyfriend, I wouldn’t have kissed you that first day.”

I licked my lips, triumphant when her gaze dropped to my mouth. Do you still think about it, Darling? Because I did. I didn’t want to, but that memory was a fond one I’d never give up.

“Ex-boyfriend?” I guessed next.

She narrowed her eyes, snapping back to the defensiveness I often summoned from her. “It’s none of your business.”

It wasn’t. She had a good point. We were stuck here together in such close proximity that she was creeping into all my thoughts.

And that wasn’t supposed to happen. I didn’t need her as a complication. I didn’t want her as a distraction.

“Whoa!” She pushed against my elbow as I pulled too hard and lost the correct formation. “Ease up.”

Ease up? Ha. With her, I seemed cursed to want more and more.