“Taken.”Fancy word for kidnapped.“Bullshit. You staked a claim on me?—”
“Of course. But it was no longer about agreeing to hide her involvement in your father’s death. You became mine to protect when my enemies thought they could take you with no consequences.”
“So, your feelings for me are brotherly?”
His gaze lands on me. “Hardly.”
My fingers dig into my palms. Red-tipped nails, selected with him in mind, burrow into the tender flesh as I strive not to lose my patience.
Fuck, it’s hard.
BeforePapapromoted him into his guard, Maxim used to be my driver. Low down the rungs. But he was playful, not creepy. He treated me like a child.
It was what had shocked me the most about his agreement with Camille.
I know full well there are men who want children. Maxim isnotlike that.Abramovicz, the man who’d “taken” me, was one such beast.
But this Maxim is different to “Max.” Max drove me to school and threatened a teacher for making me cry. When a friend wanted me to wear a bikini for a pool party and I refused, then humiliated me—something he witnessed as my guard at the shopping mall that day—he got in her face and told her that kids should wear clothes for kids, not for women.
When he spoke on the phone, it was in brisk and loud Russian, peppered with curses and slang from the streets of Moscow.
Now, he speaks in English.
Collected English. Passionless. Curse-free.
He’s had elocution lessons…
In my mind’s eye, I see the years pass by. The handsome young man of before, a foot soldier, given orders he had to obey, becoming this inveterate general who doles them out now.
Control has turned his features into a hardened mask that I long to see crack…
Has it?
Was that what that shower scenario was about?
Did my dress work as I’d hoped it would when I’d picked it outforhim?
They say to never pull a tiger by the tail, but I really fucking want to.
He’s so beautiful. Shay would say that men aren’t, but that’s because he’s two-point-four percent gay.
Now, with Max’s hair damp from the shower and the curl he normally tames twisting and turning atop his head, Iwantto run my fingers through it.
His olive-green eyes have amber striations that fluctuate when he looks at me. I never want him to stop. Iwantthem on me forever.
A mustache sits atop his upper lip—something I tend to hate in guys, but not on him. Iwantto run my finger along it.
His jaw is as pugnacious as that nose of his. It amazes me that it’s still never been broken.Or if it has, he had it fixed straight. Iwantto kiss it.
As for his mouth, Iwantto bite that bottom lip and suck on it.
I am so ready for more.
“What do you expect in turn?” I ask formally, aware that for the first time, I lower my guard and allow the longing for his attention, for his mouth on mine, his hands on me, to ebb and flow into the question.
His head whips to the side, eyes lighting up with an unholy gleam.
His scorching hot gaze trips over me, along the deep square neckline, the tight corset-like bodice, the slimline cut of the skirt, and my slippers. Slippers that he bought for me to leave here, at his home. That aremine.
