“You’re too close,” she says.
“Yes.”
“You should move.”
“I should.”
I don’t. Neither does she.
She could push me away. She doesn’t.
My restraint cracks when her fingers touch my shirt. Not a shove. Not even close. Just the lightest contact against my chest, like she means to stop me and forgets halfway through.
I catch her wrist, and her breath catches.
“Say no,” I tell her.
Her eyes flash. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? To feel noble for stopping?”
“No.” My grip tightens just enough for her to feel it. “I would hate it.”
That does something to her. I see it in the way her pupils widen, the way her mouth opens around a breath she doesn’t release.
She should say no. Instead, she whispers, “I hate you.”
I bend closer. “Not enough.”
Then I kiss her.
There’s nothing soft about it.
The first touch of her mouth is enough to make my control slip. She makes a small sound against me, shocked and soft, and I take it deeper before she can pull it back. My hand goes to the back of her neck, fingers sliding into her hair, holding her exactly where I want her. She tastes warm, nervous, sweet from the fear she’s trying to bury under anger.
For half a second, she freezes.
Then her hands grab my shirt. Not gently. She fists the fabric like she needs something to hold on to, and the moment she kisses me back, everything in the room changes. She doesn’t know what she’s doing. That much is obvious. Her mouth is clumsy, hungry, overwhelmed.
It makes me want her worse.
I push her back against the desk. Papers scatter. Something hits the floor. She gasps into my mouth, and I use that sound, take it, swallow it. My hand drops to her waist, then lower, gripping her hip hard enough to keep her from sliding away.
She doesn’t try.
Her knees part when I step between them. I lift her onto the desk in one motion.
Her breath breaks. “Yaromir,” she says, and my name out of her mouth like that almost ruins me.
I drag my mouth from hers and kiss down the side of her neck. Her pulse is frantic beneath my lips. She tilts her head back before she can stop herself, giving me more access, and I feel the moment she realizes she has done it.
She stiffens.
I bite her lightly, just enough to make her gasp, and her fingers dig into my shoulders. She’s panting now, short uneven breaths that make her chest rise against me. I slide my hand up her side and cup her breast through the fabric of her sweater.
She goes still.
Then she melts. It’s small, but I feel it. The way her body softens into my palm. The way her thighs tighten around me. The way her lips part around a sound she’s too proud to let out fully.
I squeeze once, slow and firm, and her head falls back. Not the polished girl from the pier. Not Dmitri’s abandoned bride. Not Sergei’s frightened daughter. This woman is flushed, furious, aching, and unable to pretend her body is not answering mine.
