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“A lot of good it did since it only took me hours to find you, break into your secured house, and take a knife to your throat.”
“All things evil.” Dots of color pop into her cheeks. “You should definitely keep the paintings. Let them be a constant reminder of who and what you are. I wish I’d seen through your bullshit façade back in Kiev. Now my daughter is stuck with your deranged psycho blood running through her veins.”
“Your blood is just as tainted.” I drop my keys into a ceramic bowl on the dining room table, never moving my eyes from her face.
“At least there’s no blood on my hands,” she seethes through clenched teeth. “Yours are probably so stained, the strongest bleach could never get them clean.”
“I don’t like your tone. I thought I told you what would happen if that mouth didn’t learn to stay shut.”
“I’m not afraid of you. And don’t think because you made up some paranoid excuse to take me away from my family that I’m going to let you control every word that I speak.”
“Would you rather be dead? Because that was your other alternative.”
“You don’t know that someone was trying to kill me. My brothers have enemies, too. And so do you.”
“You came willingly. That tells me there’s a seed of doubt about the killers’ target.”
“The only thing I know for sure is that you are a crazy, twisted lunatic.”
“And you begged to jump into bed with me without even knowing my name. What’s that say about you?”
“At least I have morals. I do legitimate and rewarding work, unlike you who commits murder for a living.” The flush that colored Larysa’s face creeps down the sides of her neck and spreads into her ears. I can practically see smoke puffing out of them and damn, I wanna fuck that rage out of her.
“How could you just break into someone’s house to kill them without even knowing for sure that they deserved it? You were about to slit my throat and I’m innocent. What kind of a sadistic monster does that make you?”
A rush of fury bubbles deep in my chest, ready to erupt and incinerate everything in its path. “Your innocence is irrelevant. Your associations were enough reason for me to kill you. Revenge is like a vicious game of chess. You make a move, there are consequences to be paid. Unfortunately, you became a consequence when my mother was killed.”
“But my brothers didn’t kill her.” Her voice wavers, conflict swirls in her fear-filled gaze.
“And you know that for sure?”
When she doesn’t respond, I close the space between us. Reaching around to the back of her head, I draw my fingers through her dark hair before fisting it tight.
“A lot of people are about to suffer for the sins they’ve committed against my family, Larysa. If you don’t wanna become one of them, then you’d better learn your place.”
My words slice into the air like the sharpest razor blades. A gasp slips from her lips as I tug her head backward to make sure she knows exactly who’s in control.
Her evident panic is the most sensual aphrodisiac. I drink it in, letting it infuse and intoxicate me. My lips curl upward as her expression morphs into one of sheer horror.
If she doesn’t obey, she’s gonna find out the hard way that “her place” is right here with me. And that will be more dangerous for her than any act of revenge could ever be.
Chapter14
Larysa
“My place?Did we just travel back in time to the freaking Dark Ages? I am a grown, independent woman with a job and a family to raise. I’m not going to be your ‘kept woman’ or your spoils of war.”
Words can’t explain how badly I want to launch a fist at the angular jaw that looks as if it could have been chiseled by Michelangelo himself, and if I wasn’t holding Daniela, I’d do just that.
What a cocky freaking bastard, telling me I need to learn my place.
Although, speaking of places, I can definitely think of one in particular that I’d like my knee to become intimately acquainted with.
Blood simmers in my veins, perspiration pebbling the back of my neck as I continue my muted tirade. “And you don’t get to dictate how I act or what I say. I’m not your property.”
I try hard not to jostle Daniela who is breathing deeply in my arms despite the fact that my heart must be pounding like the percussion section of a symphony right now.
“But until you can prove otherwise, you’re still my enemy. Guilty by association.” Malice glimmers in the depths of his turbulent irises. “And because of that, you deserve to be punished for your family’s sins against mine.”
