“So, if I’m understanding this right…You don’t want to punch me for kissing her, but you also don’t want us to be alone to kiss again?”
“I don’t know what I want,” Anton replies with a groan. “I allowed you into her life because you seemed to make her happy. You said you were going to be friends, and now I have to deal with the consequences of not realizing how fucking stupid it was to believe that the two of you could ever stay just friends. The way she looks at you, the way you look at her…this was always going to happen.”
I won’t pretend that I think he’s wrong.
Trying to discern where his head is at, I ask, “And that makes you angry?”
“It makes me something,” he grumbles. “I haven’t decided whether I’m going to demand you marry her, or demand you disappear because I can’t bear the thought of my little girl even being old enough to be married and in love.”
“You sound like my dad talking about Jade,” I muse, trying to bite back a chuckle.
Anton doesn’t share my amusement. “Believe me, Dante and I have had words. He’s far too pleased about this for my liking.”
I sober from the humor and almost freeze. “You talked to him about me and Anya?”I haven’t even done that yet.Knowing my father, he would meddle. And I wanted my time with Anya to be my own, at least for a little while.
“He says we’re even now,” Anton says with a grimace. “His daughter and my son, my daughter and his son. He has very little sympathy for me.”
“Well, he warmed up to Dmitri pretty quickly, if that helps.”
“It doesn’t.”
Sighing, I drop the bag of peas to the counter and sit up straighter. This conversation can’t be had while I’m icing my face like a wounded animal. He needs to see me for the man that I am. The man who’s going to love, honor, cherish, and protect his daughter for the rest of my life.
“I love your daughter, Sir,” I begin, switching to Russian. If he’s surprised to hear his language coming out of my mouth, he doesn’t show it. “I want to marry her, but not before she’s ready to have me as her husband.You could try to demand me to go away, but I’m afraid you may need to kill me to achieve that goal. I’m not going anywhere. Ever.”
Anton tilts his head at me.“What makes you think I won’t kill you?”
Switching back to English, I shake my head. “You wouldn’t do that to her. I know dating is a foreign concept in our world of arranged marriages and betrothal contracts, but Anya is my girlfriend. And she’ll stay my girlfriend until she indicates she wants otherwise. Whether that means dumping my ass because she’s so incredible that she could do better, or that she’s ready to take the next step and be my wife instead.”
Anton rolls his head, cracking his neck and his fingers turn white from gripping the countertop harder. “Have you touched my daughter?”
I swallow, understanding the implication of his question. “I thought you said you know everything that happens in your house.”
“The two of you haven’t always been just in my house,” he points out, voice thick with tension.
“We haven’t done more than kiss,” I say carefully. “We’ve hugged and held hands, but the kissing is new.”
He exhales but the tension in his body remains rigid. “I don’t want you in her bedroom if you’re going to be kissing, and I don’t want to see it, either.”
“Respectfully, Sir, Anya should be allowed to bring me into her room if she wants to. It’s her comfort space, and she’s almost nineteen. If you restrict her too much, she’ll only get upset.”
Anton glares, but I press on, “I don’t feel comfortable talking to you about the possibility of future intimacy when Anya and I haven’t had that conversation yet. But I’ll tell you this, if she wants to have sex, I’m not going to tell her no?—”
He cuts into my sentence with a hard scoff.
I ignore it. “Not simply because I’m a hormone-riddled man who’s deeply attracted to her. But because she deserves to have a say in what happens to her body. She deserves to know what it’s like when you want someone, and they want you in return. Anya should be able to give freely rather than be taken from. I don’t see how you could argue with that, no matter how much I’m sure it disturbs you to think of your daughter as the woman that she is now.”
His blank, narrow stare is unnerving.
“Do you want to hit me now?”
“I’m debating it.”
When he doesn’t launch himself over the counter to tackle me, I take it as a sign that I’m safe from further violence. At least for today.
“You know, this all has really thrown a bit of a wrench into my plans for the day,” I tell him with a sigh. “I can’t tell if you’re going to be more upset with me after you see the surprise I have for Anya, or if it will help my case and make you like me even more.”
“What have you don?—”
