“Mr.?Angeloff?—”
“Hush,” he quietly commands. “Inside.”
He ushers me through the glass doors of his office, palm firm on the curve of my waist. The doors sigh shut behind us, sealing off the silver-tie gauntlet. Only then does he remove his hand. Heart thundering, I take two steps back.
Snow-streaked light drifts through the glass wall, dust motes swirling like restless spirits. I stand in front of his obsidian desk, fingers cramped around the single memo I never delivered.
At last, his voice breaks through the silence. “Your name is no longer on the Christmas List.”
He draws the dreadful black leather ledger from a drawer, flips to the final page, and lifts a gleaming black pen. The point drags through my name, slow, deliberate, final. Relief punches thebreath from my lungs, but an alarming thought follows: what did that stroke of ink cost?
Vlad rests one hip against the desk, ledger still open in his hand.
“But how?”
“Effective this morning,?five percent of Volkov?Industries now sits in an Angeloff holding company.”
I blink, trying to wrap my mind around what I just heard. “Five?percent? You just?bought part of his empire?”
“Call it a family debt repaid.” He taps the page bearing my crossed-out name. “I could’ve leveraged the debt, really made him hurt. But I offered him a deal. You were part of it.”
Relief flows through me, but I’m still confused. “Let me get this straight. Youboughtmy life? I’m safe now?”
“Safe?enough,” he says. “Volkov treasures money more than vengeance when forced to choose between the two. And I made him choose.” He closes the ledger. “You have your life because I bought it,” he adds, making his way around the desk with quiet predation. “And what I purchase, I keep.”
Gratitude collides with fear. “So I’m athingyou now own?”
“Body and soul, Teresa.”
I swallow. “What does that mean, exactly?”
“My protection, which means my rules.” He counts them off. “One: you follow every security protocol I set, no exceptions. Two: your schedule is mine to control until I say otherwise. Three: you relocate tonight to a secured apartment I own. Non-negotiable. Your apartment isn’t suitable or safe.” He hesitatesfor a beat. “Or, you can go back to your place, take that bag you packed, and leave the city.”
“Why would I leave the city? I thought I was safe.”
“You’re off the list, which means you’re no longer the target ofmypeople. But that doesn’t mean Volkov has lost interest in your untimely end. If you refuse my help, then you’d be wise to leave and start over somewhere else.”
Words crowd my tongue—protests, questions—but he lays a fingertip against my mouth, silencing them before they’re spoken.
“Choose,?kotenok,” he murmurs. “Your life at risk, always running, or order and safety beneath my guard.”
The pad of his thumb traces my lower lip before sliding along my jaw and tilting my chin. Memory flares—his dominance, my surrender, pleasure so fierce it bordered on pain. My breath hitches.
“As I told you, fear and desire share a single nerve. I feel yours vibrating.” His gaze waits. “Say you understand, and you stay by choice.”
The words escape me in a whisper. “Yes. I choose you.”
My back meets the cool glass, the skyline smearing into jeweled streaks behind me. One of his hands braces beside my head, the other glides up my thigh beneath the narrow pencil skirt I’m wearing. His fingertips find the lower band of my panties, and my knees buckle, hunger flooding every vein.
The room fills with passionate need, with the whisper of fabric sliding over skin. He stops just shy of indecency—fingers hovering where the heat is most fierce. My hips arch, seekinghim. I fist his silver tie, the soft slide of it adding to the sexiness of the moment.
He lowers his mouth to my ear, speaking in Russian I can’t translate. The rumble of his words vibrates down my spine. I shiver and almost forget my own name.
Then, as quickly as it started, it ends. He retreats. He smooths my skirt and restores my shirt all while leaving my nerves in open flame.
He presses a phone into my palm—sleek, small, obviously encrypted. “Only this line for me or Dmitri. Answer always.” Next comes a manila dossier with a relocation address on the Upper East Side, door codes, and a rotation schedule for the shadow team that will watch me. “Pack essentials only. Be ready by nightfall,” he instructs. “And if you change your mind and decide you want to disappear, do it with your eyes open, ready for the consequences.”
I find my voice, bruised but there. “Yes, sir.”
