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“What are you thinking about right now?”
“My thoughts are private.”
“Not from me.” His thumb grazing across my cheek.
“You’re not mad at me?”
“No.”
“Cara did say you were best friends. Have you ever been … together?”
“God, no. Ugh. So fucking disgusting. I get that she loves sex and she runs one of the best damn brothels in the city, but no. She’s a friend and a colleague. Nothing more.”
“Wait? A brothel?”
He laughed. “You didn’t figure that out.”
“No!” I drew out the o. “How?”
“There are men and women, and if you’ve got the right price, you can have anything you want within reason. People are addicted to what they can’t have and others find a way of putting a price on what they want. Sex is one of those products. Kind of like drugs. You get a taste and you can’t stop.”
“I can’t believe I was in a brothel. Does that mean I owe her money?”
“It was free of charge.”
“That’s not funny.”
“If you’re me, it’s hilarious.”
“I don’t think you’re funny at all.”
He winked at me and I couldn’t help but smile.
“This is nice,” I said.
“What?”
“Talking. Not being afraid to say the wrong thing.”
“I scare you that much?”
“No. I think this life scares me that much.” I shrugged. “People die. Men, women, children, it’s all part of this world. There are times I sit and wonder what it would be like to be a normal person. How they can go out and live their lives. Be free.”
“You are free.”
I averted my gaze.
“Why don’t you feel free?”
“I couldn’t even go on a shopping trip. You’re always around,” I said. “You’re waiting to find me a guard.” I blew out a breath. “College was a big no as well.”
“You wanted to go to college?”
I nodded. “My dad said no.”
“What would you have studied?”
“Business, I think. I like numbers. English as well. I love to read.”
“You’ve done a lot of reading while you’ve been here.”
“True, but then I haven’t done anything else.”
He stroked a curl back from my face. Slavik didn’t look as dangerous or as scary as he stroked my cheek. I started to feel his cock swell inside me.
As she touched me, Cara had told me to be honest with Slavik. He needed to know what I wanted in order for him to be able to give it to me.
Staring at him now, he no longer seemed scary.
“I don’t want to hate this marriage,” I said. “I … I don’t want you to hate coming home or to regret marrying me.”
“I don’t regret it.”
“I know it’s the peace treaty, but I know I’m not your first choice. Do you think it would be possible to make this work?”
He stayed silent.
Had I made a mistake?
Had Cara given me really bad advice?
I felt sick.
Panic flooded me.
“Touch me,” he said.
“What?”
“I don’t like to repeat myself.”
I rolled my eyes and put my hand flat on his chest. I felt the scars beneath the ink and I waited.
“I don’t want to hate this marriage either,” he said. “How do you suggest we change this path that we’re on?”
“We … on our dates, you don’t look at your cell phone. You talk to me. We communicate through words.”
“I can do that.”
“I…” I held up my wrist. “I’m loyal to you. To Volkov. Is there any way you can trust me?”
Slavik stared at my wrist and said nothing.
I knew it was a long shot.
Why would he trust the woman he married? I wasn’t a choice for him. He didn’t care about me. I was just another job to him. One he needed to keep alive because his boss told him to.
This was never going to work, and I was a fool for believing it would.
He took my hand and pressed a kiss to my inner wrist. “Trust is earned.”
“You expect me to trust you? You haven’t earned it.”
“Yes, I have.”
“How?”
“I never once hurt you. Sex does not count. I could have hurt you, but I didn’t.”
“You took me to your boss in order to torture me at the attack on the benefit,” I said.
“You were there to be questioned, not tortured.”
“I have to earn everything with you?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“This isn’t fair.”
He shrugged.
Silence rang between us.
The orgasm he’d given me, the sex, it all seemed empty, hollow. “You want to have a crap marriage?”
“No,” he said. “You didn’t marry a fool, Aurora. I don’t give an inch for anyone. You want my trust, you earn it. You want me to believe a single word you say, don’t lie to me. I’m willing to work to make this marriage between us bearable, but don’t for a second think you will get a submissive man. It will never happen.”
With that, he pulled out of me.
I felt his release leak out of me as I watched him walk away.
Tears spilled from my eyes and I hated myself for caring. Cara had been wrong.
