“No. I guess not. Come, let me take you back to bed. You need rest.” She frowns at my statement but doesn’t argue.
I carry her back to the room, towel-dry her hair as best I can, then pick up my T-shirt and carefully guide it over her head and down her body. Once she’s dressed, I help her into bed and pull the blanket up around her shoulders.
“Good night,dusha moya.”
“Good night, Kill.”
And with that, I leave the room, only to slump back down onto the floor outside the door, unwilling to ever truly part from her again. Even if it ends up killing me.
Chapter 15
Stella
It’s been four days since I woke up stranded in Russia. Four days since I’ve been on bedrest, too. And I’m starting to get restless.
Every day, I’m visited by Dr. Sokolov in the morning for a check-up, and every day I ask him if I can leave this godforsaken bed already.
‘Soon,’ he says in garbled English. Soon is not soon enough.
The rest of my days are filled with visits from my brother and Frankie, and phone calls from my parents and siblings. They are all up in arms about Lucky and me being here. But I have to say, if it wasn’t for the fact that I can’t get out of bed, I don’t mind it too much. Partly because Kirill comes to me every night and helps me take a bath, his eyes always wandering all over my body, pretending it doesn’t hurt him not to touch me. However, I see in his eyes that it does. Mainly because it’s been hell not to touch him back.
I hate to admit it, but I’m living for every stolen moment with Kirill. Every lingering look. Every dark promise in his eyes. Every slide of hand and tender caress.
Still, the moment he leaves the room and bids me goodnight, I lie awake, restless and aching, thinking about the gentleness in his touch, the careful way he gathers me into his arms.
I’ve never let anyone care for me this way, but with Kirill, all my resistance slips away. I cherish those moments. I crave them. And even though I can see in his eyes that it kills him to leave me at the end of the night, he still does, refusing to give in to this magnetic pull between us.
The man is confusing me. Confusing me in ways he shouldn’t. He’s the one in the wrong here, not me. And yet he’s acting as if I were the one responsible for all his woes and misery.
Leave it to a man to blame a woman for shithedid and punish her for it. Asshole. Ugh.
“Enough!” I grumble, yanking the blankets off me in frustration and scooting to the edge of the bed. Since sleep isn’t happening with Kirill occupying my every thought, I might as well spend this restless energy scouting the Petrov mansion instead.
With everyone asleep, who’s going to stop me?
“You can do this, Stella. Let’s go see what all the fuss is about,” I whisper, trying to hype myself up. I try to lift off the bed, but without the sling to steady my arm, the pull on my shoulder makes me gasp and grimace. “Damn it,” I grit out, trying to push the pain away.
I wait for the ache to settle into something I can tolerate before trying again. On the second attempt, I’m ecstatic to actually manage to get to my feet on my own. With one hand instinctively bracing my shoulder to keep it from jarring in the dark, I make my way to the door, cracking it open just enough to see what’s outside. My brows knit together when I spot Kirill lying on the floor, tucked under a blanket with a pillow beneath his head.
I should be pissed that he’s guarding me like a prisoner. But I can’t muster the rage when he’s curled up at my feet like that.
Kirill refuses to sleep in the same room as me—much less the same bed—yet he has no problem sleeping on the floor in the hallway right outside my door.
I swear, this man is going to be the death of me.
I nudge Kirill lightly with my bare foot, his eyes opening in an instant, and his body jerking upright a moment later.
“What’s wrong? What do you need? Are you okay?” he asks, panic flickering in his voice as his hands settle softly on my waist, his eyes darting over me to make sure I’m not hurt.
Instead of answering, my gaze drops to his makeshift bed. “Don’t you have a room somewhere in this place? A bed, at least?”
Kirill pulls his hands off me and rushes to pack his things. “Here is as good a place to sleep as any.”
“Liar.”
His lips curl into a little smile, but it fades almost immediately. “Do you want me to go?”
Do I? No. I don’t.
