“Whatever is going on between you and Misha has nothing to do with me, Artur. Let me go. Deal directly with my brother,” I demand.
“What? You don’t like being my guest here?” he quips.
I roll my eyes. He’s impossible to speak to.
I used to try and flirt with him when they were friends, and his response was always sarcastic or taunting.
I guess some things never change.
My eyes drift over his tall, muscled frame. He’s the tallest guy I know, by a considerable amount. The kind of tall where he has to duck slightly to walk through the doorframe. The kind of tall that I guess girls dream about when they imagine their perfect man.
I scoff, and Artur turns to glare at me.
“Something amusing you, little Maria?” he asks with a low growl in his voice that sends a tingle through my body.
“Don’t worry, I’ll keep my jokes to myself. You never did have a great sense of humor,” I say, feeling bitchy and wanting to annoy him like he’s annoying me.
He seems to skim over being annoyed and shoot straight to feverish anger.
Artur takes two long-legged strides, and in the blink of an eye, he’s standing over me again. I gasp in fright at the daunting darkness of his eyes.
“Humor?” he scoffs. “How’s this for a funny joke…you’re about to get married. Every girl’s dream, right? Their wedding day? Well, surprise. Yours is today. Right now, in fact.”
His words hover somewhere in my brain, but don’t register.
Married?
No. What?
I stammer and trip over my thoughts. “I’m not getting married,” I whisper in confusion. “Who am I supposed to be marrying? You?”
“Yes, me and—oh, I hear them now. Your other husbands have arrived,” he says, turning toward the door.
“Husbands? Plural?”What the hell is he talking about?
“Three other Pakhans,” he says without any further explanation.
“I’m not marryinganyone, Artur, so you can….” My words trail off as three men walk into the room. Suddenly, I feel small and vulnerable. They’re all clearly powerful men, bulky, tall, wearing expensive custom-made suits. I bite my lip and stare in stunned silence, trying to take everything in all at once.
“Maria, this is Benedikt Ronkov,” Artur says, gesturing to a bear-like man who is so broad and bulky he looks solid enough to stop a truck. He has bright green eyes and dark blonde hair, and a well-groomed beard over his square jaw. His gaze, despite his massive appearance, is warm and calm.
“Hello Maria, it’s a pleasure to meet you,” he says in a deep voice, holding out his hand to shake mine. I’m so stunned, I automatically shake his hand. His skin is calloused from work, but his touch is gentle.
When he smiles at me, my heart skips a beat, and I get lost in those green eyes for a moment.
The bear steps away, and Artur gestures to the next man. “This is Kazimir Petrov,” he says. Kazimir winks at me from where he’s leaning against the doorframe.
“Hi, baby bird,” he says, his voice soothing and deep.
He wanders over to me to get a closer look. From a mile away, I can read his bad-boy charm and that devilish smile that has probably tricked hundreds of girls into falling for him. He grins at me. With a carefree glance, his eyes trace over my body, and I swallow hard, wondering what he sees when he looks at my plus-sized curves.
Who gives a shit what he sees or thinks of me? I’m not marrying any of these guys!I narrow my eyes and shoot him a look that I hope conveys a clear message.In your dreams, buddy.Except he’s the kind of sexyIwould dream about. Kazimir chuckles, amused by something. His laughter sends a thrill through me, and I have to quickly remind myself that I want nothing to do with him or any of these men.
“And this is Joseph Gregori,” Artur says, cocking his head toward the final man. Joseph steps closer, his eyes trailing over me, then back up again. I self-consciously pull my long, wavyhair over my shoulder and thread my fingers through it, needing something to do with my hands. Joseph’s stare is intense. He makes me feel small, like I’m being reprimanded.
He has a classically handsome face. Clean cut, bright green eyes, blonde hair, and a no-nonsense stare that makes me stand a little straighter. He nods his head politely, speaking clearly when he says, “Good evening, Maria,” as though he were meeting me at some fancy cocktail party and not here, where I’m being held prisoner against my will.
Every single one of these men is gorgeous in a different way, but there is something obvious I can’t ignore. Every single one of them looks dangerous. The kind of dangerous that I’ve heard whispers about growing up in the mafia.
