Page 15
Katya’s presence has thrown every plan to shit. It’s so bad that I don’t even give a fuck about guarding my own heart. What worries me is sparing her the knowledge of my background. My position in the mafia. I won’t hesitate to protect my woman, and God help whoever thinks they can take her from me.
I will decimate anyone who so much as looks her way or tries to hurt her. But what I’m scared of is me hurting her. I feel guilty knowing that I’m bringing a beautiful twenty-five-year-old woman who has apparently had a rough childhood into my world.
She should be experiencing the beauty of life with someone less dangerous, but the thought of it fills me with cold rage. Mine…she’s mine. Yet, the thirteen-year age difference between us suddenly feels like nothing and everything at the same time.
She is young enough to make me question whether I have any business wanting her this badly, but there is nothing childish about Katya. She is confident, intelligent, capable, and stubborn enough to march into my house and demand answers from a man she’d never met.
If anything, she has more backbone than most women twice her age. And I like that. I like everything about her. I can’t let her go. I step closer and smooth a strand of dark hair away from her face. She goes perfectly still, her eyes lifting to mine, and something inside my chest gives an unfamiliar fucking twist.
“Have dinner with me tonight. At the main house,” I state.
Her lips part. “Dinner? I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”
“I didn’t ask if it was a good idea.”
Her brows lift, and I almost smile. There she is. My stubborn girl. “I noticed.”
“Then you know I usually get what I want.”
She studies me for a long moment before sighing. “You’re very domineering.”
“I know.”
The honesty seems to catch her off guard, and I brush my thumb over her cheek before pressing a slow kiss to her mouth. Unlike the hungry kisses we’ve shared, this one is gentle, deliberate, almost affectionate, and the softness of it surprises even me.
“I’ll see you tonight, Bella.”
She nods, and I leave before I can change my mind and stay.
***
By the time Katya arrives at the main house for dinner, I have finished setting the table. I watch her pause in the doorway with an expression that makes me want to laugh. She looks beautiful in a flowy black silk dress with thin straps and a hem that stops above her calves.
Her shiny dark brown hair drapes over her left shoulder, framing her beautiful face, bright tawny eyes, and perfect red lips. Everything about her draws my attention. She sends me a smile that goes straight to my cock.
Fuck, it’s going to be a long night.
As she takes in the candles, the food, and the fact that I am standing in my kitchen wearing an apron, she asks, “You cooked this?”
“I did.”
She glances at the table again. “All of it?”
“Do you think I have a chef hiding somewhere?”
“I don’t know what to think about you anymore.”
“That makes two of us.”
Her laugh is soft, and I realize I want to hear it again.
I pull out her chair, and she sits. “Why did you do all this?”
I pour her wine before answering. “Because for some reason, I want to take care of you.”
Her expression changes.
I don’t know why I said it so plainly. Perhaps because it is the truth, and I am tired of pretending I don’t understand what is happening to me. I have never wanted to take care of a woman, but Katya is already becoming important.
