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Yes. No. I don’t know.
He pulled her into his arms, hating how good she felt, how perfect.
Like she had been made for him.
“Just shut up, Kira. For the love of god, just shut up.”
She sank into his arms with a sigh.
Like she was happy. Like she’d missed him.
They were things he couldn’t afford to contemplate, couldn’t afford to believe. He closed his eyes instead and gave in to the undertow of sleep.
34
He was gone when she opened her eyes the next morning, but she was surprised to find she was still in his bed. She’d half-expected him to carry her to her room after she’d fallen asleep.
She didn’t know what had gotten into her, why she’d demanded he look at her, kiss her. Maybe she was just tired of being punished for the crime of leaving him, for the crime of allowing the guilt over her father’s death to eclipse everything else, including what they’d come to mean to each other.
Now she wondered if she’d made a mistake. If on their game board, Lyon saw something she didn’t see, if that’s why he’d given in.
She was a decent chess player. She’d learned at her father’s knee, had spent hours playing with him in the library from the time she was small, and yet she had the distinct feeling that she’d made a mistake. Forcing Lyon to look at her while he fucked her, to kiss her while he was inside her, called his bluff on the indifference he’d shown her since she’d been back in Chicago.
But it had called her own too. She couldn’t think of him as a monster when his mouth was on hers, when he stroked her hair back from her head while his tongue slid against her own (she hadn't imagined it, even if she had been out of her mind with desire).
Last night she’d caught a glimpse of her Lyon, the man she’d fallen in love with before her father’s murder. It was like finding the object in one of those optical illusions, the kind you had to stare at for a long time.
Once you saw the hidden image, there was no unseeing it.
She stretched and got out of bed. She had no idea what time it was — she’d left her phone downstairs — but the sun was streaming into Lyon’s bedroom, the lake glittering beyond the glass. He was either out for a run or he’d left the penthouse for work.
She gathered her clothes and cracked open the door. When she was sure the hall was empty, she hurried to her own room. The birds chirped their excitement, oblivious to her walk of shame, and she hurried to feed them before getting in the shower.
Her body was sore in the best of ways, and she stood under the hot spray for a long time, replaying her time in bed with Lyon, the way his cock had throbbed and expanded in her mouth. He’d been crazy with need, a need that had matched her own, and she couldn’t help hoping it had further lowered the barriers between them.
Foolish. Lyon wasn’t a schoolboy. It would take more than one fuck — as extraordinary as it might have been — to soften him.
She dressed in a powder-blue jogger and went downstairs. She was suddenly ravenous and desperate for coffee.
She chose a cup and started the coffee machine, then went looking for her phone in the living room. She remembered the way Lyon had looked at her the night before, the thirst in his eyes as the firelight flickered over his face, and felt herself grow wet in spite of her soreness.
When she picked up her phone, she was surprised to find a text from Annie Kamenev.
I heard you’re back in town. Fancy breakfast?
A week ago, Kira wouldn’t have been up to it. Lyon had seemed to openly hate her, and her position as his wife had been tenuous at best.
Nothing had really changed, and yet it felt like something had shifted between them. Maybe it was living together under the same roof again for the past two weeks. Maybe it was working together on the Syndicate (despite Lyon’s reluctance, she could tell he’d been pleased with the meeting).
She didn’t know, but it felt like they’d turned a corner.
Maybe. Or they were getting ready to turn a corner.
She texted Annie back and they arranged to meet at a cafe in West Town. It would be nice to get out of the house, to do something normal like have breakfast with a friend.
Not that she and Annie were friends, per se. They hadn’t gotten that far before Kira left Chicago.
But she was one of the few women in the bratva who was near Kira’s age, and Kira had always liked her. It would do Kira good to have someone to talk with about their world. Plus, when Annie’s brother Borya was promoted to the Spies, as Kira had arranged, they would be able to share even more confidences.
