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Her skin, once fair and smooth, looked paler than normal. And bruised. Beneath her turquoise, see-through blouse, a slim red gash traveled just below her elbow, and her wrist spotted a nasty purple-black bruise.
My brows tightened and animosity crawled through me. Her face. There werefuckingfingerprints impressed on her left cheek and eye.
I tore my gaze away. I couldn’t look at her anymore. I didn’t want to. Not when madness and blood-lust clouded my sight, and better reasoning. My head snapped towards Sophia and she retracted her steps, backing farther and farther away, till her back hit the glass doors behind her.
“Wait for me in my car.” I directed to Mariana with my eyes still trained on the petite brunette trembling like a leaf.
She shook her head, her blonde ponytail swishing in the air behind her head as she tried to argue. “Vlad, I...”
“Now,Mariana.”
She flinched. I’d usedthattone with her but, hopefully, she understood what it meant. I didn’t mean her harm.
Quite the contrary, I wanted to shield her from watching blood spill, if it had to. Hesitantly, she nodded and walked away quietly. She skipped over the body on the ground and her shoulders brushed my chest as she headed to my car. And right there, I might have just let go of my mission of dragging Sophia Russo by the hair, to grab Mariana by the waist and kiss her senseless.
Might have.
I pressed my hand against the cold metal stuck between my belt and marched forward to Sophia. Eyes wide and shaking, she held up her hands to protect herself. My fingers curled around her skinny arms and I clamped down.Hard.
I pulled her away from the door and to a corner beside a white steel pole. Her dark eyes brimmed with tears and her hair whisked across her face as I dragged her. “Ow! Vlad...Vlad!” She shrieked and her voice sounded like needles in my ears. “You’re hurting me...”
“Shut the fuck up, right now, before I put a bullet in that fucking hole you call a mouth!” I growled menacingly and roughly tossed her to the side. Her body slammed against the wall and she snatched her arm.
She gritted her teeth and stomped forward. “What, you want to kill me because of that... because of that fucking...”
I drew closer to her, lowering my head. “You really enjoy playing with fire, don’t you? Fucking say it, if you’ve got guts. Go ahead and say it, and I swear, I’ll slice off that tongue of yours and send it to your father as a gift.”
Her resolve wavered and her red lips formed a pout. She splayed her hands on my chest, pushing her flat chest against my torso and playing with the buttons as she gazed up at me. “Vlad, I beg you, don’t do this...”
A tear rolled down her cheeks and she sniffled. “Isn’t it bad enough that you humiliated my family? Look, we can work things out. I can... I can talk to pappa and our families could amend broken ties...”
I snatched her wrist and glowered. “Fuck your ties. If you ever come close to Mariana again, I promise, I’ll kill you,” I said very slowly and enjoyed the fear that danced in her eyes. “I’ll kill you, Sophia, and I’ll look you in the eyes while you squirm, gasp for breath, and slowly wither away.”
I pushed her away and turned around.
“You’ll pay for this, Vlad Vadim!’ I heard her scream from behind me. “I swear, you’ll pay!”
I opened the car door and entered without sparing a glance at the wailing Russo. The engine revved and I pulled out of the small parking lot. Destination? Though I might havedesired a moment with her, alone and on my bed, I had to take her home.
The soft hum of the car filled the silence between us but the hot burn on the side of my face wasn’t discreet enough.
I raised a brow and she shifted on her seat. From the corner of my eyes, I saw her mangle the seatbelt strapped over her shoulder, nestled comfortably between her breasts. “You’re doing that thing again.”
Her voice, soft and silky, replaced the sound of the car hum. I threw her a look over my shoulder. “What thing?”
She sighed and shifted again, twisted, and turned to face me. “That gritting-your-teeth and clenching-your-jaw thing. You still have fire in your eyes, Vlad. You know we can’t talk when you’re like this.”
A picture of her under the streetlight, bruised and scared, came flashing back. My grip on the steering wheel tightened and my knuckles turned white. It wasn’t long before I pulled up at her house. I parked on the concrete sidewalk but neither of us made a move to get out.
If I had not shown up at the time I did, Mariana would have been no more. Iwouldhave lost her for good. I would have never seen those big brown eyes again, or that bright smile of hers that spurred fuzzy sensations down my spine, or heard her voice...
A gentle touch on my arm distracted me. She trailed her finger from the spot she’d held, down my forearm and to my hand, which was still fastened to the wheel in a tight grip. Cautiously, she peeled my fingers off and intertwined her fingers with mine.
I was forced to look at her. At the sight of the small smile on her bare lips, a tingle erupted under my skin and the place she’d touched me burned.
“I’m fine, Vlad,” she said quietly.
I grunted, growing furious again. “You wouldn’t have been. If I hadn’t...”
