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“You,” she instantly replied. “I’ll always belong to you, Aleksei.”
It was only a game, wasn’t it? The way she said it made me wish it was real, and that I could be hers in the same way I made her mine. Her gasps turned to cries and at the moment she tightened around me, I spilled my seed inside her with a mighty howl. When I gathered her into my arms after a few moments, as my breathing turned normal, I thought I saw a glimmer of sadness in her eyes.
“What is it?” I asked. She shook her head and buried her face against my shoulder. “Tell me,” I said more forcefully.
She looked up at me with a weak smile. “I don’t want it to be over.”
I laughed and stood up, kicking my pants from around my ankles and across the room. Leaning down, I picked her up, hauling her over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes. “It’s far from over, little one,” I assured her. “You still haven’t seen my bedroom.”
“Show me, then,” she said, laughing as I carried her down the hall.
I intended to. It was going to take a lot for this to be over. I still had so much to show her.
***
It was several hours later when I woke up from a replenishing snooze. We both drifted off after round three. Or maybe it was four. The natural light was almost gone, the room dimly lit. I was the happiest I’d been in a long time, and it took everything within me not to let my shadowy future intrude on that. Everything I needed to be perfectly content in life was asleep beside me, and that realization rocked me to my core. This couldn’t last, and the end was going to hurt. A hell of a lot. I reached for Theresa and stroked her shoulder until her eyes blinked open. Instead of crawling on top of me again, or pulling me on top of her, she sat upright, staring out the window at the dusk rolling in over the ocean.
“What time is it?” she asked.
I lazily reached for my phone on the bedside table. “A bit after seven. Shall we go out to dinner, or would you rather I order in?” I smoothed her tumbled curls off her bare shoulder. “You must be starving.”
She shook her head, eyes wide with something close to terror. “No, I’m not hungry. I have to go.” Those pretty brown eyes narrowed at me, and she yanked the sheet up around her as she glared. “Oh my God, I didn’t mean for this to happen. This isn’t what I wanted.”
I glared right back at her. “It isn’t?” I challenged.
Her cheeks grew red, and she jumped out of bed, dragging the sheet with her. “No, it is. Obviously, it is.” She waved at her naked form as she dropped her covering, stamping toward the bedroom door. “I meant this isn’t what I came for,” she muttered.
Her anger was clearly all aimed at herself, so I leaned back, clasping my hands behind my head, and enjoyed the view. “Oh, I think you got exactly what you came for,” I said. Every one of her orgasms had been very real. She whirled on me, furious now, about to explode when I laughed. She was just so pretty when she was angry. “Stay for a little longer,” I urged, reaching out to her.
For a moment, she faltered. I could see it in the longing in her eyes, just behind the rage. Then her shoulders slumped, and she shook her head. “I can’t,” she wailed, scowling. “I don’t want to,” she amended. I laughed some more, sure she’d change her mind, and got up to pull her into my arms. “Don’t even think about it, Aleksei.”
She scampered out of the room, and I followed, watching as she jerked her clothes on. With one last long look at me, she huffed and stormed out the door. Not even a final kiss goodbye. I stared at the door for a minute, still positive she’d slink back in, and we could get back to our fun. But it seemed like she was serious. Every good feeling she’d invoked in me during our time together fled, gone as if all that happiness never existed. And I’d never get it back, either, not with a lifetime shackled to Sofia ahead of me. My stomach rumbled, unbothered by my sudden dark mood. I was starving after all the exertion with Theresa. I turned toward the kitchen where I saw all of her paintings still spread out on the counter. In her haste to put me in her rearview mirror, she’d forgotten them.
With a bitter sigh, I looked them over, already envisioning two of them in the empty space in my living room. Another would go perfectly in one of my restaurants, and another for my office. The final three I’d find space for. I turned one over, seeing a sticker on the back of the canvas with the name of the painting, the price, and information about a payment app. The rest all had similar stickers and the prices were pathetically low. She was worth so much more. To me, she was worth the whole world.
How I had gone from the happiest I’d been for as long as I could remember to this dark, gut-churning bad mood was beyond me. I downloaded the payment app and set up my bank information. This was more than just a bruised ego at her having left in a huff. I honestly wished she would have stayed, and it made me sink further into bitterness. I tripled the price of each painting and sent the total to her through the app. With my feelings stung by her abrupt departure, I entered a message to go along with the payment.
It was well worth it.
The petty jab didn’t improve my outlook. If anything, it just increased the desolation of how much I already missed her.
Chapter 10 - Theresa
Panicking the whole way back to the hotel, I was certain I’d find my mom staking out my room, demanding to know where I’d been all day. The lack of messages was especially chilling, leading me to believe she was truly angry at my disappearance after I faked an illness to get out of lunch with her and Donny.
When I got back, I was surprised that she wasn’t ready to pounce outside my door, and I reluctantly scrubbed away Aleksei’s scent, put on pajamas and the hotel robe, then padded down the hall to her room. It was time to start working on her to leave Miami so I wouldn’t be tempted again. Aleksei was off limits, was not the key to my freedom, and was far more dangerous than a possible marriage to Donny. Once we were back home, I could make her see reason and get out of that, or devote so much time to selling our art overseas we’d never find time for a wedding.
After pounding on her door, then dragging myself to knock on Donny’s, I finally realized they weren’t back yet to even miss me. I should have just gone to bed so I could start dreaming about Aleksei, but curiosity got the best of me as to why they were still out at eight o’clock. Besides, I was mad at Aleksei for making me forget myself enough to spend the entire day in bed with him, adding more delicious memories, but also more reasons to bemoan what I was going to be stuck with. I was furious with myself when I got halfway back and realized I had forgotten my paintings. Weeks worth of work down the drain, because I’d be damned before I slithered back and begged for him to release them to me.
Mom finally answered, giddy with excitement and brushing off my worry. “We’re better than okay, lovie,” she said. “We met a darling real estate agent at lunch and she helped us find the best apartment.” She gushed about the ocean view, the Japanese toilets, and the copper bathtubs until I could regain my voice to interrupt.
“What do you mean, apartment?” I asked. “How long are we staying here?”
“Indefinitely,” she said. “Why not? Everything’s covered at home, and this is an untapped art scene I want to get a piece of. And we still need to find something that will interest that Morozov man, what’s his name? That family is an untapped goldmine.”
“Aleksei,” I said dully, stunned we weren’t heading home anytime soon.
“Yes, that’s it. Donny and I are going to have dinner in the hotel restaurant, are you joining us?”
