Two days since the gala. Two days since I dragged her into that study, shoved my hand between her thighs, and made her come on my fingers while a hundred people danced in the next room. Two days of her avoiding my gaze in the hallways, of meals sent to her room because she refuses to come down. Two days of replaying it on loop like a broken record I can't turn off.
The slick heat of her. The way she clenched around my fingers when I curled them just right. That gasp she tried to swallow but couldn't quite manage. And after, when I pulled my hand free and licked my fingers clean while she watched, wrecked and furious and still trembling.
She tasted like honey and vengeance and something uniquely Sofia that I can't get out of my head.
I haven't touched her since. Haven't trusted myself to get within arm's reach without doing something stupid. Something that would compromise everything I've worked eleven years to build.
I stand at my study window, watching the morning light creep across Chicago. The city doesn't care about my obsession. Doesn't care that every time I close my eyes, I see her face when she came, that perfect crack in her armor, the way she bit her lip bloody trying not to scream my name.
Two objectives today. First, find out what she really is. That joint lock at the gala wasn't amateur hour. The way she moves,the way she holds herself, she's trained. Properly trained. I need to know how much.
Second, set a trap. Plant information. See if it gets back to the Rosettis. If she's communicating with her family somehow, I'll know. And then…
Then I'll deal with it.
I down the rest of my coffee, the bitterness doing nothing to wash away the phantom taste of her.
Time to see what you're hiding, kotyonok.
My private training room sits at the back of the compound, separate from where my men work out. This is my space. Mats on the floor, weapons displayed on the walls, mirrors that show every angle. The place where I work through problems with my fists when thinking fails.
I have her brought here without explanation. She enters in another shapeless cotton dress, barefoot, hair pulled back in a simple ponytail. Her eyes scan the room immediately, noting everything about the place. Soldier reflexes, not princess ones.
The rough cotton shifts as she moves, and I force myself not to think about what's underneath. Or what isn't. The memory of searching her, finding nothing beneath that destroyed dress, burns through my mind before I can stop it.
"What is this?" she asks, voice perfectly neutral.
"Training room."
"I can see that. Why am I here?"
"You're going to show me what you can do."
She tilts her head, all wide-eyed innocent confusion. The performance would be convincing if I hadn't seen her almost snap a man's wrist with perfect form. "I don't know what you mean."
"At the gala." I circle her slowly, watching how she tracks my movement without turning her head. The faint scent of her, floral mixed with something darker, drifts to me. "The way youmoved when Tork grabbed you. My lieutenant. The joint lock you almost put him in before you caught yourself."
Her face stays perfectly innocent, that denial she's so good at. "Self-defense classes. My brothers thought…"
"Stop." I'm in front of her now, close enough to smell that faint floral scent that clings to her skin despite the rough cotton. "I'm tired of that lie. Show me, or I'll make you show me."
"Is that a threat?"
"It's a promise."
I attack without warning. Not full speed, not trying to hurt, just a grab for her wrist to test her reflexes.
She blocks. Pure instinct. The movement is clean, efficient, trained. Her arm deflects mine with an economy of motion that takes years to develop.
Our eyes meet. I see the moment she realizes what she's revealed.
"Again," I say.
This time I come at her harder. A feint left, then a real grab from the right. She evades, redirects my momentum, creates distance. No wasted movement. No panic. Just fluid grace that speaks of muscle memory drilled in until it's automatic. Our breathing fills the room, hers controlled, mine getting rougher.
Who the fuck trained you?
I increase the pressure. Testing her limits, finding the edges of her skill. She defends, never attacks, but her defense is flawless. She knows exactly where to be to make my strikes miss by inches. She reads my body language like a picture book.
