Page 52 of Possessive Mafia Bodyguard

“What is this?” Her eyes narrow like I fed her poison dressed up like supper.

“Potato, flour and⁠—”

She swallows without chewing and washes it down with a mouthful of black coffee.

“What’s wrong?”

“I don’t eat potatoes.” She sets her fork down on the plate and pushes it away from her.

“Are you allergic?”

“No.” She refuses to look at me. “I’ll get my clothes and go.”

She stands up, but I’m already on my feet and circling the counter to reach her side. I try to take her hand, but she pulls it away.

“You don’t have to leave, Tamara. I want you to stay.”

She peers up at me from beneath lowered lashes, and her pupils swallow the green and amber flecks of her hazel eyes. “You don’t know anything about me.”

Isn’t that the fucking truth!

“I want to learn. I don’t care if it takes the rest of my life, but I want to know everything there is to know about you. If you’ll let me.”

“Why?” She rubs her arm as if she is cold. “Why me?”

I step closer. “You don’t get it, do you?” I tuck a lock of her thick black hair behind her ear, tracing a line down her neck to her collarbone with my fingertip. “I’m all yours, mo féileacán. You can push me away, and you can run and hide if it makes you feel safe, but I will always find you because I love you.”

Tears fill her eyes, and she shakes her head. “This is why I can’t stay.”

“Because you can’t love me back?” I move closer still, so close that she has to tilt her head to look into my eyes. “I’m not asking you to love me, sweetheart. I’m asking you to stay. Tonight. As long as you want. I want to be the one who catches you when you fall. The one who holds you when you need holding. Who keeps you warm when you’re cold.”

She is silent for what feels like an eternity. Then she whispers, “Potatoes make me think of the orphanage where Ivana and I stayed,” so softly I strain to hear the words. “The food always tasted of rotten potatoes.”

The statement lands straight through my chest like a blunt spear. “I’m so sorry, Tamara. If I’d known…”

She doesn’t avert her eyes. “We were sold to Russian child traffickers. Leonid discovered us in a shipping container at the Port of Chicago and gave us a home. We were the only two left alive out of twenty women and children.”

Jesus fucking Christ. If there truly was a God, he would not allow this to happen; now I understand a little more clearly why the nuns always scared the fucking life out of me. They were holding God’s secrets close to their chest while beating the devil out of the Catholic communities at the same time.

I fold my arms around her and kiss the top of her head, and she curls up small against my chest.

Fuck this. I’m not letting her walk away from me until she truly understands that I didn’t use her to get information about her Pakhan’s organization, and that I love her just the way she is.

Ignoring her protests, I pick her up and carry her through to my bedroom. Her clothes are folded neatly on the nightstand beside the bed, her guns and blades on top of the pile for easy access. I lay her down gently on top of the comforter, and stretch out alongside her, one arm still cradling her shoulders, her head tucked into my neck.

Neither of us moves. I stare at the ceiling and fill in the blanks of the horrific story she just told me until I can almost smell the stench of the rotting corpses in that container, and the fear of those two little girls.

“No potatoes,” I say finally. “I can live with that.”

I sense her smile against my neck before she twists her head to peer up at me. “What about your tattie biscuits?”

“Scones. They don’t even come close to knocking you off the top spot, sweetheart.”

She wriggles in my arms, shuffling her body up the bed so that her head is on the pillow level with mine. For the longest time, she studies my face, and then, when I can resist the urge no longer, I cup her face with my hand and kiss her.

Tamara kisses me back. The hot frantic urgency of our previous kisses is gone, replaced by something mellower, something that almost makes my heart believe that she might one day learn to love me back.

I feel her fingers tugging at my shirt buttons, and I don’t stop her. She opens the last one and then her fingers move down to my pants zipper, sliding it down and slipping her warm hand inside my boxers. My erection knocks against the palm of her hand: hello!