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Caterina
Iknow I shouldn’t allow myself to be taken in by it. Viktor is a good talker—he always has been. He’s had to be to rise so high. Even a man like him can’t rule through violence alone, no matter how much the Bratva might like to. He wants my compliance, and perhaps he’s decided to change tactics, to romance me instead.
Seduce me into trusting him, wanting him, maybe even loving him.
It won’t work,I tell myself. But even as I think it, I know that to an extent, it is. As much as I resent my lifelong designation as a man’s trophy, I’m good at the things I was raised to do. I’m good at talking, at entertaining, at making guests feel good, at small talk. I’m good at dancing, at being the most charming person in a room, at all the social graces that were instilled in me from a young age. Maybe it’s not the most progressive thing, but we all like to be good at something. Sofia has her violin…I have making small talk with overstuffed members of crime families.
Everyone needs a purpose in life.
I’ve tried my best to stifle my desire for Viktor. But it was only just last night that he had me spread open on the bed, making me come again and again as he fucked me in every possible way. Just last night that he’d taken what remained of my innocence and made me scream out in pleasure while he did it.
He’s good in bed.Toogood, because he could become addictive. Intoxicating. I already crave more, and the touch of his hand on my waist and the closeness of his body, the scent of his skin and the warmth of him so near, makes me want to beg him to take me back to the loft and strip the velvet dress off of me, run his tongue down my body, to plead with him to lick me until I come and then fill me with every inch of his cock.
I want my husband. It shouldn’t feel so wrong to want that. And yet, in every fiber of my body, it feels as if my desire for Viktor is committing a sin.
When he takes me back to the table, I finish my glass of red wine and then another. The gala feels endless, “business associates” to talk to, their wives and their mistresses, and it’s easy to tell which is which. The wives are always a bit more subdued, a little pinched around the edges, worn down by their husbands’ lives. The mistresses are brighter, shinier, newer, like new pennies, wearing more jewels, talking more animatedly. They have no idea how expendable they are, or maybe they just don’t care. As long as, in the end, they get to keep the jewelry, why would they care?
They’re less interested in me too, looking at me with thinly veiled jealousy, as if I might have designs on the men they’ve caught. The wives are interested in how I’ve settled into the house, how different things are for me, how Anika and Yelena are, if I think I might already be pregnant. The last sends a ripple of something between fear and excitement through me—despite everything, I still want a child of my own. Even knowing what my son will grow up to inherit, a small part of me wants to believe that it will be okay no matter what. That I can have my baby and none of the guilt.
There’s very little jealousy from the wives, though. If anything, they’re jealous of my youth, but none of them fear me stepping in and taking their husbands. If anything, I’d guess they’d be glad for the reprieve. There’s not a single one of them that appears to be happy in their marriage or in love, and I think back to what I was told about Viktor’s first wife, that it was a love match. How unusual that must have been! It makes me wonder even more how she died. But no matter how often the house or his daughters are brought up, everyone carefully skirts around the topic of the first Mrs. Andreyva.
It makes me more than a little afraid, bringing up all those old dark thoughts about what Viktor might have done, how he might have been connected to it. But as the night wears on, and the wine warms my blood, and Viktor’s hand creeps to my thigh, those dark thoughts slip away, replaced by something else.
It’s not until we’re in the car that I find myself unable to hold back any longer. And it immediately becomes clear that Viktor feels the same.
The moment the doors close, I turn towards him, and I see him moving towards me in the same instant, closing the space between us as he reaches for me.
It feels like a dream, his hand on my waist, in my hair, pulling my mouth towards his. He tastes sharp like vodka, and I know I taste sweet like wine, and I tell myselfjust for tonight, just in this place, you can go back to the way things were before when you’re back home.For one night, I want to lose myself in pleasure, to imagine that I’m married to a man who can be mine in every way, who I can be a wife to and never feel conflicted about it, never feel that I’m committing a sin simply by wanting the man I made lifelong vows to.
Til death do us part.It’s such a long time, so many days, so many hours, so many nights between now and when that’s fulfilled.It’s not supposed to be a goal,I’ve heard joked before, and I don’t want it to be. As Viktor’s mouth comes crashing down on mine, his hand fisting in the soft velvet at my waist, I want more than anything to love my husband. To be devoted to him.
To not fear and mistrust him.
Why is that so hard to find?
“Caterina.” He rasps my name against my lips, his hand sliding down, finding the slit in my skirt, slipping beneath it. I feel his callused fingers against my thigh and make a note to ask him about them later, the roughness of his skin, so unlike any man I’ve ever known. When I raise my hand to his face, I feel the hint of stubble scraping over my palm the way his fingertips scrape over my inner thigh. I pull his mouth back to mine for another kiss, just as his fingers slide up to find the edge of my silk panties.
“Are you wet for me, princess?” he asks, all in English now, and I should lie to him, tell him no, but tonight I don’t want to. I want to give myself everything I’ve been desiring and hold nothing back.
Just for now. Just here. Just tonight.
“Yes,” I whisper, my hips arching against his fingers, wanting his touch, wanting more. “I am.”
He groans when his fingers slide beneath my panties, feeling that I’m telling the truth, how wet I really am. I bite back a moan when they circle my entrance, sliding up through my folds to my aching clit, not wanting the driver to hear what we’re doing back here. When he kisses me, I let myself make the sound I’ve wanted to, the moan that rises to a whimper swallowed up as his fingers press against my clit. I reach out, my hand rubbing over the hard ridge of his cock, straining against his trousers.
“Tell me you want me, Caterina,” Viktor groans, his voice rough. “Say it out loud.”
After everything he’s done, it feels depraved, unholy, like the words are coming from the darkest part of my soul. But here, wrapped in darkness in the back of the car, I whisper them aloud.
“I want you.”
He makes a noise deep in his throat that’s something like a growl, his fingers thrusting up inside of me as he pulls my mouth back to his. “Good,” he murmurs, and then his lips are on mine again as my hands go feverishly to his fly, tugging at the buckle and button and zipper, wanting to feel his hot, hard flesh in my hands. “I want you, too.”
Something about that admission in his rough, thickly accented voice drives me wild. I reach for the back of his head with my free hand, pulling him to me, his mouth to mine. My hand finds its way inside of his trousers, fingers wrapping around the hot, pulsing shaft, and Viktor groans against my mouth as my tongue tangles with his.
“My little spitfire princess.” His fingers thrust into me, curling, pressing against a spot that I never even knew was there. I know that he’s going to make me come, I can feel it tensing every muscle in my body, and I want it. I want it so badly.
My hand tightens around his cock, not so much stroking it as holding it, squeezing it. I feel Viktor’s thumb against my clit, rubbing, his fingers thrusting into me and pressing against that unknown spot, and I know I can’t hang on a second longer.
