By the time I lower the glass, my feet are already screaming again. These shoes are beautiful, but they feel like medieval torture devices. I set the glass on the table beside me and bend forward to unstrap one, fingers fumbling with the tiny buckle. I but I can’t unlock it with my nails and give up, reaching for the second, but the heel snags in the hem of my skirt.
“Seriously?” I mutter under my breath, twisting awkwardly to try and free it without ripping the dress. I can hear Aleksander finishing the last of his drink behind me, slow and unbothered. By the time I glance up, he’s already set his glass aside.
“Did the shoes hurt even with the insoles?” Aleksandr says, stepping closer, crowding into my space, and then he’s kneeling down—right there, between my knees—like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
“Y-yeah, but they’re gorgeous and I love—” My breath catches, the rest of the sentence scattering when his big hands gently move mine out of the way.
“I’ve got it,” he says quietly, his voice so low it slides over my skin like a whisper meant only for me.
His head dips down, and all I can see is the dark sweep of his hair and the expanse of his shoulders filling the space between my thighs. My heart stops. The air feels thick, charged, as his fingertips trace over the arch of my foot, following the delicate line of my ankle before carefully freeing the trapped heel from the folds of my dress. His hands are large, warm, steady, and the simple act makes me want to melt into the table behind me.
And all I can think is that I’m never going to survive being married to him.
“Oh, Alek you don’t have to-” I stammer, trying to pull my foot back, but he holds my ankle firmly, not hard enough, but to keep me from moving away.
“I will do what I want,” he says, leveling me with a glare that makes my mouth snap shut. “And I want to take care of my wife.”
Holy shit.I don’t think there is anything hotter than hearing him saysmy wife,and then he eases the shoe off entirely, cradling my foot in his hand. I practically shiver with the way my clit throbs.
I barely have time to exhale before he does something that sends my pulse into chaos. He lifts my bare foot to his mouth and presses a slow, firm kiss to the sole, lips lingering just long enough for the heat of it to sink in. My breath hitches—loud, sharp—and I grip the table behind me so hard my knuckles ache.
Without a word, he reaches for my other foot. His fingers slide beneath the strap, unbuckling it with an easy precision that makes me shiver. He works the second heel off, discarding it quietly on the floor, and then his mouth is there again, pressing a slow kiss to the tender arch, warm and deliberate, his lips dragging slightly over skin that has never been touched like this.
The sensation is too much, overwhelming in a way that shouldn’t be intimate but is, achingly so. My whole body hums, nerves pulled so tight that I feel like a wire about to snap as I stare down at the man on his knees in front of me, his mouth against my skin as though this moment belongs to no one else but us.
“Seriously, I had them on for like thirty minutes, it’s not that?—”
The words die on my lips the moment his hand moves.
I don’t even realize I’ve gone silent until the air around us thickens. Aleksandr’s hand—large, warm, and unyielding—slides from my ankle in one unbroken path, his forearm bracing closer as he wraps his palm around my calf. The strength in that touch is startling and tender at once, fingers curling lightly, as though he’s mapping every inch of me.
“You know,” he says, his voice low and steady, “years of being around you… knowing you… and I still haven’t figured out one thing.”
His breath ghosts over my skin as he speaks, lips so close I feel the heat of every word.
My chest is too tight, too small to hold the frantic pace of my heart. “W-what?” I whisper.
“How to get you to stop trying to please everyone around you, hmm?”
His hand keeps moving, gliding up the curve of my calf, leaving every inch of skin tingling in its wake. When he reaches the back of my knee, he doesn’t stop. His thumb presses into that sensitive hollow, and then his mouth follows.
The heat of his lips is shocking, a soft, lingering kiss to a place I didn’t even know could make me feel like this. My entire body jerks, a shiver running straight up my spine. Sparks exploding beneath my skin.
And then he does it again.
Another kiss, higher this time, just above my knee. His other hand settles on my opposite thigh, fingers splayed wide, steadying me, while his gaze lifts and pins me in place from beneath his lashes. That look is fire and gravity at once, and I feel my stomach flip over at how dangerous it is.
“You never answered me, Moya,” he murmurs against my skin. His lips brush as he speaks, warm, relentless.
“I-I can’t think,” I manage, breath shaking. My grip on the table edge is white-knuckled, because my legs can’t hold me steady,not with his mouth this close, not with his voice sounding like that.
Aleksandr smiles against my skin—a soft, devastating curve of lips that burns against the tender flesh of my thigh. “You think too much,” he says quietly. “Always letting your mind run wild. Beautiful. Frustrating. Let me show you something else.”
His mouth trails another kiss, higher this time, so close to the slit in my dress that the fabric brushes against his cheek. The room tilts; my world narrows to nothing but his mouth.
“W-what do you want to s-show me?” I stammer, my voice breaking.
“How to clear your head,” he says, the words vibrating against my skin. “And I think I know how.”
