“He provides for all of us in the family,” she stated.
I was grateful for that. But in a darkness in my mind, I couldn’t deny that I was also secretly grateful for what he had done to me. It was rougher than I had imagined it might be, but he'd made me feel so good, too. He made me come in such a glorious way that I hoped I could experience it again.
“Eat, Miss Elena, and know that he will be glad that you are doing as he asked. That you are taking care of yourself so you cancontinue to contribute to doing your part for the success of the family.”
She nodded once, as if that finalized her statement. Then she turned away, leaving me with the delicious-smelling food.
The success of the family?
I didn’t want to claim success over crimes being done.
And I wasn’t part of their family at all.
I was just Elena.
And I tried not to feel like I was the discardedthingthat he’d helped himself to when I had no other way out of whatever this life was supposed to be.
I shut the door and took the food into the kitchen, unsure when I’d have the appetite for it with all the questions swirling in my mind and the conflicted pangs of hurt in my heart.
19
ADRIK
My solution to wanting Elena was more distance. Tangible separation.
I warred with going to the guest house all that night after I’d fucked her.
But I held back.
The morning after, I left with Maksim and Alexei to look into the matter of my uncle still being alive.
I’d texted Elena before I went, and that was the only communication that I wanted to have with her until I could think straight and not obsess over the memories of how damn good it had felt to take her so hard. How absolutely gorgeous she’d looked sprawled out on that desk, taking my dick so tightly.
Some kind of purge was necessary.
She couldn’t have this power over me when it was so crucial for me to be obtaining and maintaining the power of the Volkov throne.Especiallywith the threat of my uncle out there.
While I waited for my brother and cousin to join me in the car after one of the meetings in New York, where we’d flown to speak with some people who might have intel about the chances of my uncle being alive, I reread the texts I’d sent her.
Adrik:Investigate as far as you can about what you presented to me in the office.
My office.
It was harder to think about that room as just being any old place. I felt like fucking her in there had somehow made itmyspace.
Elena:Yes, sir.
I gritted my teeth at her reply. I wanted to hear her say my name again, dammit.Sircould apply to too many others. Any man in the world could be calledsir.
Elena:Just to confirm, you are referring to the name of the individual who is likely behind the network I uncovered through the shell companies?
Adrik:Correct.
I couldn’t be referring to what else she’d presented to me. As in her sweet pussy or the sight of her pink nipples so hard from my touch?—
“Fuck.”
I shook my head at how easily I could fall right back down to thinking of her and how spectacular she looked on that desk.
