I set down my book carefully, my pulse thrumming. “Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Should I ask?”
“No.”
The silence between us was heavy, tactile, charged with everything we weren’t saying. I should have been horrified. Should have recoiled from the evidence of violence painted across him like war paint. Instead, I stood and crossed to him, my bare feet silent on the Persian rug.
He watched me come, utterly still, like he was afraid I might disappear.
“You should shower,” I whispered.
“I should.”
He reached out and pulled me into his arms. His hand cupped the back of my head, fingers tangling in my hair. “Are you all right?”
The question nearly broke me.
Because no, I wasn’t all right. I was terrified, confused, and hiding letters from my supposedly dead father. I was fallingfor a man who killed people before dinner and made love to me like he was trying to crawl inside my soul.
But in his arms, I didn’t feel like prey. I felt untouchable.
“Yes,” I lied.
He pulled back just enough to study my face, those pale eyes seeing too much. Then he kissed me—slow and deep and possessive, tasting like whiskey and danger. When he finally released me, we were both breathing hard.
“Shower with me,” he said.
**********
The bathroom was all marble and steam, large enough to house a small family. Alexei stripped off his ruined shirt and pants, revealing the lean muscle and scars beneath. I’d traced those scars with my fingers and tongue, learning the geography of violence written on his skin.
Now I watched him step under the spray, watched the blood and dirt swirl down the drain, and felt something twist in my chest.
He was beautiful. Terrible. Mine.
I undressed slowly, aware of his eyes on me through the steam. When I joined him under the water, he pulled me flush against him with a sound that was almost a growl.
“I thought about you all day,” he murmured against my temple, his hands roaming my wet skin. “Every meeting, every decision. You were there.”
“Alexei—”
“I can’t concentrate when you’re not near me.” His voice dropped to Russian, words I was beginning to understand through context and repetition. “Moya krasivaya zhena,eto svodit menya s uma.” My beautiful wife, it’s driving me insane
He kissed down my neck, teeth grazing my pulse point, and I gasped. Water cascaded over us both as his hands grippedmy hips, lifting me easily. I wrapped my legs around his waist on instinct, feeling him hard and ready against me.
“I need you,” he breathed. “Tell me you need me too.”
I should have said no. But his fingers were between my legs now, skilled and relentless, and I was already trembling.
“Yes,” I gasped. “God, yes.”
He carried me out of the shower, both of us dripping wet, and laid me on the bed with surprising gentleness. The sheets would be ruined, but neither of us cared. He knelt between my thighs, water droplets sliding down his chest, and looked at me like I was something precious.
“So beautiful,” he murmured. “And all mine.”
Then his mouth was on me, and my brain went off.
