Page 30 of Cruel Demands

Taylor’s eyes search mine, and she moves her head slightly to free her hair from her shoulder. I sweep it forward over her chest. Her lips are red from my kiss and smeared lipstick, and her tongue prods her cheek curiously. “Yes,” she says finally.

I remain still. “I thought manners impressed you,” I growl. Her eyebrows slide together, and I lean forward so that my lips touch her ear. She groans when I roll my hips, pressing harder against her despite the layers between us. I murmur against her ear, “Skazhi pozhaluysta.” Say please. Then I catch the lobe gently between my teeth.

Her fingers tighten around my tie. “Yes, pozhaluysta, Mikhail.” Yes, please, Mikhail.

There it is again. My name. Curious in the bar. Careless in the car. Now breathless in my house. I lower my forehead to hers. This is the moment I should end it. I know that. I know it with the last clean part of me. I feel that clean part of me slink away when I smash my mouth against hers again instead of listening to it.

The water sits untouched on the console table near the sitting-room doors. The food grows cold beside it. I don’t know when my maid brought it, my body too focused on Taylor to hear her enter or leave. I can’t remember the last time I was not split in two by noticing, both as a politician and as a pakhan. As a politician, it is my job to notice when someone’s mood changes or when the ice melts in his drink, lest he refuse to sign the bill I need signed. As a pakhan, it is my job to notice the door, the weapon beneath a jacket, the moment fear turns into betrayal.

Tonight, I notice nothing except Taylor.

By the time I carry her down the hallway, I have stopped pretending to have any restraint left in me. I am ragged breathing and a straining cock, and she is red all over and somehow more coy the closer we get to my room.

“Your house is creepy,” she says, looking over my shoulder at the empty corridor.

“You called it emotional support.”

“For you. Not for me.”

“You came willingly.”

“I make mistakes.”

“I noticed.”

I carry her into my room and kick the door shut behind us. The room is as severe as the rest of the house, dark wood and gray walls, heavy curtains, nothing decorative that does not serve a purpose. I lower her onto the edge of the bed and stand between her knees.

Her hands are shaking. Not much. Enough.

I take her chin between my fingers. “Do you want to leave?”

“No.”

“Do you want me to stop?”

“No.”

“Do you know what you want?”

She glances down at the front of my trousers. “I have a general idea.”

I laugh and kiss her again.

In my room, she is all sharp tongue and shaking hands, all laughter that breaks into silence when I touch her, all defiance until wanting makes her honest. I push the straps of her dress from her shoulders but leave the shirt beneath it in place. I kiss the line of her throat, the hollow above her collarbone, the warm skin just below her ear.

She pulls at my tie impatiently. “You’re wearing too many clothes.”

“So are you.”

“That sounds like your problem.”

“It is becoming one.”

She tugs the knot loose and pulls me toward her, pressing her warm lips to the side of my neck. Then she pulls back. “Mikhail, you’re bleeding.” The teasing is gone from her voice. She pushes my hair away and touches the skin behind my ear.

I glance at my reflection in the mirror on the wall and wipe the driver’s dried blood from behind my ear with my thumb. She looks at me with concern. Genuine concern. As though the blood must belong to me. As though it has not occurred to her that I may have arrived here wearing someone else’s. Of course it has not.

“We should get you a bandage.” She starts to rise from the bed, and I push her back onto the mattress by her shoulders. She bounces once, and a startled laugh escapes her before I cover her body with mine. “What are you doing?” she asks.