CHAPTER ONE
A Marriage of Convenience
IRINA
“Marry me, Ri.”
If ever there were three words that could kill an orgasm in its tracks, it was those. I groaned, staring down at Rumi between my spread legs, her mouth slick with myalmost-climax, but her eyes hard. Her thumbs were still spreading me wide.
My clit pulsed in frustration, but what was I supposed to do? Wind my fingers in her silky black hair and force her to finish me off before we had this pointless conversation for the fifty-thousandth time?
I felt like snapping my thighs shut and squeezing her skull with them instead.
She released my labia, propping herself up on her elbows. “Why are you making such a fuss about this?” Her tone made me wish I’d used the thighs-of-steel move on her. “It’s the end of all your problems!”
And the start of an even bigger one.
I slid my way up my bed and away from her growing impatience. Grabbing my sleep shirt, I shoved it over my head and tugged my thick mane of hair out the neck opening.
“I really don’t want to have this discussion again,” I muttered darkly, reaching into my bedside drawer, fingers wrapping aroundThumper—my trusty clit vibe. It could get me off in less than twenty seconds, and that was without being fluffed by Rumi.
Thwack!
Rumi smacked it out of my hand. Thumper, torn from my grip, went spinning across the room and clattered against the wall.
“What the fuck was that for?” I demanded, getting to my feet to retrieve my poor, abused vibrator. Rumi grabbed my wrist and tugged me back down. My backside hit the bed with a thud. She might be small and slight, but she was determined.
Determined to harass me into accepting her marriage proposal.
“That … thing … is not a substitute for me!” she snarled, cheeks flushed. She flicked her fringe out of her eyes. “I am offering you everything, Irina! Stability, financial security, a home … a fucking spousal visa for crying out loud—and don’t pretend that’s not more valuable to you than all the rest right now! Not to mention eating you out every fucking night, if that’s what you want!”
I swallowed. “I don’t want that,” I whispered, chest constricting at the lie. I wanted some of those things … well, one of those things … very much indeed. But not enough to let her be the one to give it to me.
Rumi huffed, eyes accusing. “You just don’t want it with me.”
I couldn’t answer. She was right. I didn’t want it with her. I didn’t want to give her another thing to hold over my head. I regretted even mentioning what awaited me back in Romania when my student visa ran out next month.
“I’m too young?—”
“Not too young to be deported as an illegal alien if they catch you,” Rumi cut in. “Not too young to be shipped home to?—”
“Fine!” I snapped before she could finish her sentence and remind me just how vulnerable I’d made myself to her. “Itisyou. Things have been fun between us, but that’s all it was ever going to be.” I launched myself off the bed, stormed across the room and scooped Thumper up. “I’m not interested in committing to you.”
Rumi’s mouth popped open as she let out an indignant gasp. “You would really harm your future here over your fear of commitment? Are you reallythatstupid?”
Of course Rumi would twist my reluctance to commit to her into afear of commitment in general. Nothing could ever possibly beherfault. I wasn’t about to let myself be manipulated out of one trap and led straight into another. Pasting a bland look on my face, I lifted my shoulders in a ‘what are ya gonna do?’ shrug.
“Maybe I’m just too young to know better.”
Rumi let out a furious growl and shoved herself off the bed. She yanked on her skirt, hunting around for that lacy top she’d worn over her black bra—the one she’d stripped off right after we got back to mine, tipsy off club cocktails and primed for some good old-fashioned fucking.
Fucking she’d just used as a weapon to try and get her way with me. To put a ring on it and keep me right where she liked me—utterly reliant on her.
I should have paid attention to the signs. Instead, I’d let myself get swept away in enjoying sex with a woman … and the lifestyle Rumi led. She was eight years older than me and from a wealthy Chinese-Australian family. Her connections, as much as her ruthlessness, had gotten her a position at a prestigious law firm. She had a penthouse in Bondi Junction, a Maserati and she ate out at chef-hatted restaurants multiple times a week.
None of it meant anything when she saw me as just another thing to show off—a foreign trinket to wear when it suited her, then box away when it didn’t. She’d done it all year, and I let her. Every time she came back with gifts, apologies and pussy eating, I forgot how it felt to be discarded.
She gathered her things from the floor, slinging her Gucci bag over her shoulder with a disdainful sniff. “You’re an immature, unappreciative little … piece of Eastern European trash! The way you tried to expose yourself for that man in the club tonight …” She let out a derisive snort. “And he wasn’t even looking at you! You’re so desperate for validation, you don’t care where you get it. You don’t even like men and you still wanted him to want you—it’s pathetic!”
