“Oh!” Her face falls and I grit my teeth as though I could take it back by preventing myself from saying more.
“Joke.” I wouldn’t tie her up there. My bed would be preferable for us both. “It’s okay. You can ask. I’ll answer.”
I’m pathetic for this girl. I adore her.
There’s a beat of silence, then she asks, more tentatively, “How did you know I needed help?”
I glance over my shoulder this time. And this is easier ground, because although it was an instinct, a hunch, there was good rationale.
“Steve, the doorman. He was hurt by the men who came after you.”
“Oh no!” Horror stretches her face. “Is he okay?”
I think of the blood on the floor of the doorman’s little office when I went looking for him. “He’s in the hospital. The doctor thinks he’ll pull through.”
“Poor Steve.” Her brow pinches in apprehension. “I’m so sorry. I brought this to your door. Well, and your doorman. I should go. Not put you at risk from the mafia.”
“That’s not a concern.” I can’t keep the wry amusement from seeping through. Me. At risk from the Italian mafia.
Ha.
Bratva bosses are the most feared in London.
“But—”
“Nyet.”
She blinks.
“If you leave this building, they’ll see.” She’s not leaving my penthouse. I will protect this girl whether she likes it or not. “They’ll know you tricked them. You’ll be caught within hours.”
She digests this eminently-reasonable argument silently, lips pouting and twisting from side to side as she thinks. And I hold my breath, waiting to see what she decides.
Three years. Three fucking years I have wanted her. I didn’t believe she’d ever need me, and I was content to admire her from afar.
Until now.
I won’t do anything she doesn’t ask me for. There’ll be no pushing, or coercion on my part. If this girl only needs someone to protect her, that’ll be enough.
But I won’t let her go.
She’ll be my guest, or she’ll be my prisoner.
She’s under my protection. She’smine.
4
CATERINA
There’s a long pause while I think of my apartment downstairs, and how much I don’t want to return to it. I nearly died. I have to make the most of my life.
It’s on the tip of my tongue to ask if I can stay here, or if Brody will find me another apartment in the building when he sighs, and asks, “Is that all your wounds tended to?”
“Yes.” My voice has gone all high-pitched. My anxiety is out in full force despite my resolution.
I’m naturally shy—you don’t make it to twenty-two never having even kissed anyone in a horny way without being painfully introverted—but until this moment I was more focused on my fear of what Brody had saved me from than who he was. Is.
He stands and I’m struck anew by how tall he is. How huge. My eye level is at… Yeah. It’s at his crotch. My heart races. He’s wearing a dark-grey suit that I suppose is wool, as it somehow is more sinister than absolute black. The fabric seems to gobble up all the surrounding light, at his command. Because although I can’t see much more than his outline, that’s easily enough for mine to respond. He’s broad shouldered, and narrow hipped. And there’s a bulge in his trousers that steals my breath.
