Page 90 of Dark King Daddy

“I never said it did.”

“No. But you are asking me why I don’t act on what I want. I am telling you that what I want is not the only question.”

I stepped closer. One step. The wind moved between us.

“You’ve made every decision for years,” I said. “You decided to carry Sergei out before that building exploded. You decided to accept the role of Pakhan. You decided to accept my conditions. You decided to make me macaroni and sit in a chair and say nothing. You decided all of it. And now you’re hiding behind restraint because wanting me frightens you.”

The words landed. I watched them land. I watched his face change—not dramatically, not the way another man’s would. A tightening along his jaw. A fractional narrowing of his eyes.

“You’re hiding behind the political marriage,” he said. “Because wanting me frightens you.”

The accuracy of it went through me.

I wanted to hit him. I wanted to shove him. I wanted to do something violent and physical because the alternative — standing still while he named the thing I had been refusing to name—was worse.

I kissed him.

I stepped into him and rose onto my toes and put my mouth on his.

He held still.

Not pulling away. Not pushing forward. His body was rigid beneath my hands—I had gripped the lapels of his coat without deciding to, my fingers curled into the heavy wool, and I could feel the tension in him, the controlled force of a man who was holding himself in place through discipline alone.

I kissed him and he let me. His mouth was warm. Firm. He did not open it. He did not respond. He stood perfectly still and allowed me to control the contact.

It was not enough.

I pulled back. My hands stayed on his coat. My mouth was a breath away from his. I could feel the heat of him in the cold air, the solid wall of his chest beneath the wool.

“It’s dangerous,” he said, “to kiss a man like me.”

“Oh? What could happen?”

“This.”

His hand came up and cupped my jaw. His fingers spanned the side of my face, his thumb resting against my cheekbone. His palm was warm. His grip was firm. Not rough. Controlled—but the control was different now. It was not restraint. It was direction.

He pulled me against him.

His mouth came down on mine and the world narrowed to the place where our lips met. He kissed me without hesitation, with the absolute certainty of a man who had decided. His other arm wrapped around my waist and drew me in until my body was flush against his, until I could feel the hard planes of his chest against my breasts, the ridge of his hip against mine, the heat of him burning through two layers of clothing.

He angled my head and deepened the kiss. His mouth opened mine. His tongue touched mine and I made a sound I did not intend to make—low, involuntary, the sound of a woman who had wanted this for years and was finally, finally feeling it.

His hand shifted from my jaw to the back of my neck. His fingers slid into my hair. He gripped—not hard enough to hurt, hard enough to hold. To keep me where he wanted me. The pressure of his hand in my hair sent a bolt of heat through my body that gathered low and sharp between my hips.

I clutched at his coat. I pulled him closer. I wanted more. I wanted his mouth on my throat, his hands on my skin, the weight of him pressing me back against the railing. I wanted the careful, controlled, infuriating man who had made me macaroni and refused to use it against me to stop being careful and stop being controlled and take what I was offering.

He pulled back.

Not far. An inch. His mouth was still close enough that I could feel his breath on my wet lips. His hand was still in my hair. His arm was still around my waist. His body was still pressed against mine.

His eyes were dark. The pale blue had been swallowed by something hotter, something that looked at me from behind the composure and said, without words, that the restraint had cost him more than I would ever know.

We stood there. Breathing. His chest rising against mine. My hands still fisted in his coat. The sea black behind me. The wind cold against the heat of my mouth.

“This changes nothing,” I said.

My voice was wrecked. The polished, articulate woman who had dismantled a timber supplier that morning could not produce a single convincing syllable.