I snap my head to her, lifting a brow. “Watch it.”
“Or what?” she bats her eyelashes at me, leaning over the center console.
I shake my head at her, smirking. “That mouth of yours will get you into serious trouble. The kind where I will stuff you full of my cock and wash your mouth with it.”
There’s no trace of apprehension but rather anticipation flickering in her eyes. This sunshine of a woman was custom-made to brighten the gray sky of my life.
She smiles under her breath, the vixen. “I can’t promise that.”
I am thoroughly fucked.Nothing new.
As I drive away, the car falls silent for a bit—both of us deep in thought.
“I would never put you in that position. We knew from the start what we were doing when we lied to him. To protect him,” she whispers.
I drag a hand down my face, sighing. “At what cost, though?”
Another beat of silence follows, heavy with implication.
“It’s strange,” she says, looking out the window, her features drawn in deep thoughts.
“What?” I hurry to ask, needing to know everything that goes through her mind.
“At the beginning, I thought I’d leave Reno because you’d never give in to us. Now I will because you did.”
There are two sides warring inside of me—let her go or keep her for good. One side thinks her talent needs to be shared. She deserves the chance to play on the biggest stages in the world. But that path would take her away from me. And without her, I will lose my purpose, my drive. The other doesn’t care but to have her to myself.
I am split apart, torn in two different directions between my conscience and my heart.
“Could you live without me?” I ask, trapping the breath inside.
She doodles on the window, looking faraway. “I’m used to having only bits and pieces, Mika… Living off what-ifs and scenarios I dream at night, secluded in my room.”
I know I can’t.
“If this is all the time we get together, what do you desire, malishka?”
The sadness vanishes from her face, and the pressure on my chest lessens.
She eyes me intently, as if wanting to crawl inside of me. “Are you sure?”
“Tell me.” God knows I would make the impossible possible for her.
Make her every wish come true.Except one. That inner voice can go fuck itself. I rub a hand down my face, knowing I don’t have much longer until I must pop the delusion bubble.
“Everything. A relationship. Going to bed with you, waking up next to you.”
“So, no sex?” I ask just to mess with her.
She shoves at my arm playfully, giggling. “That was implied. I don’t want to force you.”
“Oh right, the ordeal,” I say in faux horror just to keep the atmosphere light.
“And I want all of you,” she says, brooking no argument. “Not only the shiny parts but also the broken, dark, disturbed ones.”
“Dahlia…” I want to give her only the best, and she craves the parts about me I loathe.
“I want that, or you’re not getting me,” she says haughtily. The unapologetic brat.
