“And you?” I ask, tears stinging my eyes. “Do you care if I’m innocent, or am I just another name you have to protect for your reputation?”
He looks like I slapped him. His jaw flexes, eyes darkening with something raw. “Don’t,” he says, voice low. “Don’t ever say that again.”
“Then tell me the truth!” I demand. “Tell me what all this really means. Why they want me. Why you won’t even let me walk outside without a shadow following me.”
He takes a step closer, grabs my wrist—not to hurt, but to make me look at him. His voice drops to a rough whisper. “Because if they take you, Sasha, I’ll burn every city from here to Athens to get you back. And I can’t afford to lose that kind of control.”
The fury in me falters, swallowed by the raw confession hanging between us.
My chest heaves. His grip softens.
“I don’t want to be your weakness, Lev,” I whisper.
His thumb brushes against my pulse, slow and possessive. “You already are.”
His jaw clenches, and for one impossible second, I think he might step away.
But then his mouth finds mine.
It’s not gentle. It’s furious, desperate—a collision of everything we can’t say. My hands push against his chest, then pull him closer instead. He groans against my lips, and the sound goes straight through me.
Lev lifts me easily, his grip sure and unrelenting. My breath catches as he carries me toward the bedroom, the world narrowing to the pounding of our hearts and the sound of his low, uneven breathing against my ear.
When he sets me down, it’s not soft. It’s reverent and reckless all at once—a man trying to make sense of the one thing he can’t control.
For a moment, neither of us moves. His forehead rests against mine, our breaths tangled, our fury blurring into something darker, heavier, impossible to name.
Then something clicks inside him, a switch I can feel in the way his body tightens against mine. His hand wraps around my throat again, pressing me gently but firmly into the bed, and he claims my mouth with his. It’s rough, demanding, and I can’t help how my body reacts—pleasure flickering through every nerve.
“Lev,” I whisper, breathless, trying to protest.
“Shh,” he murmurs against my lips, silencing me.
Before I can say another word, he discards my clothes, leaving me bare under him, and a wave of groundbreaking reliefwashes through me. I feel exposed, yes—but safe. Complete. Finally.
He takes off his own clothes just as deliberately, and my hands move over his body like he does mine—memorizing, exploring, claiming. Every curve, every muscle, every shiver of heat between us is a language we speak without words.
More kisses, desperate and consuming, trail down my neck, my chest, my stomach. I arch into him as he moves lower, and then his mouth finds my breast, capturing my nipple with a slow, reverent hunger that makes my toes curl and my body shiver.
His other hand snakes down my body, tracing every curve until it finds the heat between my thighs. His fingers slip inside me, deliberate, probing, and I gasp, arching into him instinctively.
He finds my clit with his thumb, and when I scream, he doesn’t stop—he continues, driving me higher, faster, making me tremble beneath him, a dangerous mix of possession and desire that leaves me trembling, completely undone in his hands.
“Please, Lev. I can’t wait anymore,” I whisper, desperate. My fingers reach between our bodies to wrap around his erection, feeling the heat, the hardness, the weight of him.
He growls deep in his throat, a low, dangerous sound that sends a shiver straight through me. Before I can do more than gasp, he waves my hands away and slides inside me in a single, powerful thrust.
I cry out, the sensation overwhelming, every nerve on fire as he fills me completely. His grip on my hips tightens, anchoring me to him as our bodies move together, slow at first, intentional, savoring every inch. The intensity builds, dark and consuming, and I can feel us spiraling, lost in the heat and need that’s been coiled between us for so long.
He thrusts like a man possessed, each movement wild and relentless, and I react like I’m losing my mind. My body writhes beneath him, every nerve alight, every shiver and gasp escaping in incoherent, breathless murmurs.
I clutch at him, nails digging into his back, arching into every movement, riding the storm of sensation he drags me through. Heat and need coil so tightly inside me that it feels like I might combust, my cries echoing off the walls, raw and untamed.
Then, finally, I shatter. My body convulses around him, every scream and gasp tearing from me, a release so overwhelming it leaves me trembling, spent, utterly his.
And still, he doesn’t stop. His eyes darken, jaw tight, and he drives himself through me one last time, groaning deep in his throat as he finds his own release, shuddering, lost in the connection we’ve created.
We collapse together, slicked with sweat, bodies tangled, hearts hammering in unison. Every part of me is alive, aching, and yet soothed in the aftermath of the storm we’ve made. I fall beside him, breathing in his scent.
