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He sighs, massaging my hip now with a lazy thumb. “I must spend some time in my office downstairs making phonecalls.”
“Towhom?”
For a few quiet moments, he seems to be cataloguing my features. “I am not a man who is accustomed to working behind a desk, Anya, but when I met you and decided to build the house, it became obvious I would need to pursue a more…practical line of work.” Humor twists his mouth. “I will be checking on myinvestments.”
A giggle climbs my throat. “My hit man has been makinginvestments.”
“Da.Lucrative ones.” His dark eyebrows draw together. “I was not sure if you were aware of the duties I performed for your father at night. Or back inRussia.”
“I’m aware.” I slide closer and rub my breasts against his hairy chest, gasping when he yanks my hips closer to his. “I’d love you no matter your profession. But I’m grateful you did something outside your comfort zone. Forus.”
“There is nothing outside my comfort zone, Anya.” He rolls one massive shoulder. “Except, perhaps, Justin Bieberconcerts.”
I break into a fit of laughter, and after a couple beats, Sasha joins me. It’s a heavy, rusted sound, but it’s amazing and I wish I could roll around in it forever. A pang catches me in the middle when I remember what must be done. What I have to do this morning in order to set the correct boundaries between us. If my heart were the only thing in charge, I would never leave this bed or my husband. My brain is on board, too,though.
When our amusement dies down, a serious look crosses Sasha’s face. “Anya, I need you to know. These men I handled for your father and in Russia…they are not good people. I would die before letting a single one of them cross yourshadow.”
My fingertips trace his mouth, his cheekbones. “I trustyou.”
Intensity radiates from his gray eyes. “My God, I love you, littleangel.”
Dread twists in my chest. “I love you, too.” Perceptive as ever when it comes to my moods and emotions, Sasha gives me an assessing look, so I search for another topic. Something to explain my sad tone. As it turns out, thereissomething that has been on my mind, and this is the perfect opportunity to discuss it. “Will you do something for me,please?”
“Tellme.”
I run the arch of my foot up and down his calf, my fingers playing with his chest hair. Between us, his erection thickens, his breath accelerating. “While you’re in the office today, will you call my father and explain that we’re together now?” His body stiffens, but I press on. “I know he hasn’t been there for me, Sasha. Raising me has been left entirely to you…” I lower my voice to a whisper. “My realdaddy.”
“Anya,” he groans. “Say itagain.”
Our tongues meet and lick. “You’re my real daddy,” I murmur. “But…I don’t want to hide us from him. I want the whole world to know. Especially myfather.”
His stubbornness tries to surface, but he visibly fights it off. “Verywell.”
“Really?”
“Da.” He studies me. “When I asked, instead of demanded, that you marry me, I found that things went much smoother. Perhaps I am learning tocompromise.”
Tell him. Tell him you still want to attend college. He hasn’t cancelled it yet.The words won’t emerge, though. Because while Sasha is starting to compromise on some small things, I’m skeptical that he will agree to me being away from him full time, every day. With strangers. Unknowns. In a nutshell, he would lose his shit. No. I have to stick to theplan.
And the plan is this: let me go to college or loseme.
Knowing Sasha will be able to read me like a book, I roll over on my back with a pout. “Who do I have to marry to get some scrambled eggs aroundhere?”
With a wink and a laugh, Sasha climbs from the bed, his hard - as - nails ass flexing as he leaves the room. I gather as much courage as I can for the fight ahead, then get up toshower.
* * *
Sasha
Having completed allmy other phone calls, I can no longer put off the finalone.
I do not want to do this distastefulthing.
Perhaps Anya believes I am merely a possessive beast when it comes to her. So possessive that I would steal her away from her own father, just so I can be the only male in her life. And while that is most certainly true, there is more to it thanthat.
When Anya was much younger, I spent many nights pacing the hallway outside her bedroom, wishing to comfort her as she sobbed on the other side of the door, missing her mother. I was not capable of holding her in my arms yet, though. I was too hardened, then. Still recovering from the brutal life I’d lived in Russia. To have the angel in my arms at a time when I was so raw? I couldn’t be certain that I wouldn’t feast on the offering she presented. So sweet, so pure. The opposite of everything I’d everknown.
Her cries would torture me in those early days, make me tear at my hair. I would call her father and explain his daughter needed to be reassured. And often I would find him consoling himself with women or alcohol. He never came home.Never.
