The words land between us like a lit fuse.
I take a step closer. Then another. Until I’m nearly chest-to-chest with him, the heat of his body bleeds into mine.
“How am I supposed to do my job,” I whisper, “if you keep me blind? How am I supposed to help you, or myself, or our daughter, when I don’t know what’s happening? If someone is out there, if someone is hunting you, hunting us?—”
His hand snaps to my waist, pulling me closer in a single decisive movement.
I gasp, palms bracing against his chest.
“No one is hunting you,” he growls. “They’re hunting me.”
“That’s not comforting either!”
Another step forward and we collide—the argument collapsing into the charged, impossible gravity that has been growing between us for weeks. His grip tightens. Mine does too.
“You don’t get to decide what I know,” I whisper against his throat. “Not anymore.”
“I decide everything,” he murmurs, voice low and dangerous. “Especially when it concerns your safety.”
“I’ve handled my life fine for the past six years without you.”
His eyes darken. “And look where that’s gotten you. Right in my grip.”
The insult is a spark, as is his smirk. I shove his chest. He catches my wrists. Our breathing tangles in the small space between us.
“You are infuriating,” I hiss.
He leans in, so close his nose brushes mine. “Good.”
Something breaks. Or maybe it fuses.
The next second we’re kissing—no, consuming each other—restraint tearing loose with a force that leaves me dizzy. He lifts me onto the kitchen counter without breaking the kiss, hands gripping my hips like he’s been starved for this. The sudden rain outside seems to beat harder against the windows, like the world is urging us on.
I hear a voice outside—one of his men, maybe two. Footsteps near the porch.
Mak doesn’t stop.
If anything, the danger sharpens the desire, turning it molten.
His mouth moves to my neck. I arch into him, unable to stop myself. The counter is cold. His body is hot. And the contrast snaps something inside me wide open.
“Mak—your men—” I choke out.
“They know to stay away,” he growls, pulling my robe open with one rough tug. “Let them hear.”
The heat that floods my body at that is blinding. I widen my legs, ready for him, but he surprises me by kneeling.
“What—”
A memory flashes through my mind; all those years ago, Makari Medvedev, the man in the mask, on his knees in the bank vault. Eating me like his last meal. Savoring me like no man ever has.
My knees are trembling when he looks up at me with those eyes. Another murmured conversation outside; Mak hears it too,and murmurs, “You better be quiet, Roxanne. Unless you want my men to hear how hard I make you come.”
Just those words make my pussy throb. His hands are hot as they push up my thighs, his stubble-covered jawline grazing my skin. I inhale sharply, pursing my lips against the feel of his tongue licking a long, wet trail up my center. My lower back arches.
Fuck.It isn’t going to take much; working with him every day, so close, feeling his heat…
A strangled cry comes out, and Mak chuckles darkly, his tongue lapping quickly and hard on my clit.
