A dark laugh leaves him. His hand slides down to my hip and closes there, dragging me into him until my thighs brush his. His body is all heat and leather and control.
“You’re getting mouthy,” he murmurs.
“Maybe.”
His eyes drop to my lips.
For one breath, I think he’s going to kiss me right there with the club still glowing behind us and half the Bratva only a door away.
Instead, he leans in close, his mouth brushing my ear.
“Get on the bike.”
The words slide through me hot enough to make me shiver. He pulls back, his hand still locked on my hip.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
His smile turns slow and cruel.
“The woods.”
Chapter 46
Ayla
The bike’s rumble dies, and the silence crashes in like a wave.
Maksim kills the engine at the same clearing as before, ringed by pines so tall the moonlight barely reaches the ground. Cold bites the fresh tattoo under my jacket, sharp and bright, but it’s nothing compared to the heat already coiling low in my belly.
I hop off the bike. He swings his leg off. boots crunching needles and leaves. Turns. Looks at me.
His eyes are black in the dark, predatory, patient. The same eyes that hunted me the first time, when I really thought I might die out here.
Not tonight.
His hands graze under my chin as he removes my helmet, hangs it from the handle bar and cups my face. Almost gentle if it weren’t for his wild eyes.
His lips press to my forehead before he pulls back, hands dropping cold.
“Run, Beda,” he says, voice low and rough, the nickname sliding over me like a blade.
I smile—slow, deliberate. “Catch me if you can, Pakhan.”
I shrug the leather jacket off my shoulders. Let it drop. The cold hits my arms, my collarbone, the new crown still stinging under the second skin. I don’t wait for his reaction. I bolt.
Adrenaline slams through me the second my boots hit the forest floor. Leaves crunch, branches whip my bare arms, but I don’t care. I’m laughing—breathless, wild, as I tear deeper into the trees.
Behind me, his boots hit the ground. Heavy. Measured. Tracking.
My skin heats. He’s hunting me.
It’s delicious and terrifying and everything I want.
I yank the thin top over my head mid-stride, let it catch on a low branch like a flag.
A small breadcrumb for my Pakhan.
The night air licks my skin, nipples tightening against the thin fabric of my bra.
