Page 46 of The Russian's Bought Bride

She makes the softest sound against my mouth, caught between surprised and breathless, and for one terrible half-second, I think I read it all wrong.

Then she kisses me back, and that’s it. Any remaining control I have evaporates completely.

Not even trying to pretend I’m composed in this, I pull her closer automatically, and my other hand tightens at her waist as her fingers clutch harder at my shirt. The kiss deepens fast, letting go of all the tension that’s been building between us.

She tastes like sugar and chocolate, and it’s so addictive that I can’t bear to stop. The kiss is half-starved from the start, like both of us have been fighting this harder than we realized.

I angle my head, kissing her deeper and slower this time, and she melts into me enough that a rough sound nearly leaves my throat, but I barely keep it in.

Fuck.

This is bad, but I can’t make myself care when she’s kissing me like this, and when her body fits against mine so perfectly it feels intentional.

Her hand slides upward slightly, fingertips brushing the side of my neck, and the contact sends heat straight down myspine. I kiss her harder before I can stop myself, and need sinks into the moment too quickly.

My grip tightens instinctively at her waist, and she gasps softly against my mouth.

That sound nearly ruins me, and I break the kiss just enough to catch my breath and to force myself to think for one damn minute.

Her lips are still parted, breathing unevenly as it mingles with mine, and her eyes widen in a way that hits me harder than I can recover from. She looks as affected as I feel.

“Nikolai,” she whispers again.

God.

My thumb brushes lightly across her hip, grounding myself as much as I can.

I crossed a line, and I can’t bring myself to regret it. Not even a little. But reality starts creeping back in anyway, ugly and unavoidable.

She’s vulnerable, grieving, and trapped in my house. I don’t want Dani to assume I’d take advantage of her in any way.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” I say roughly, so close still that we might as well be kissing again.

The words feel wrong the second they leave my mouth since they’re not true. I absolutely should not have done that, but I wanted to, and I did.

“That’s not what I meant,” I say immediately before she can misconstrue it.

“Then what did you mean?”

I look at her for a long moment as too many answers rise at once.

I can’t think clearly around her anymore; touching her felt better than it should have, and I’m already too attached to someone I was supposed to protect from a distance. All of them are true, but none of them feels right to say in this moment.

“You make things complicated.”

A soft exhale leaves her, but she still doesn’t pull away. “Funny. I was thinking the same thing.”

Somehow, despite the chaos waiting outside this kitchen and the disaster we’re probably walking straight into, none of it seems like enough to pull me away from her.

So I lean in and capture her lips again, far too weak to resist her.

Chapter 14 - Dani

This is a terrible, horrible idea.

The same thoughts linger in my head, repeating again and again, but the heat of him pressed against me, gripping and kissing me like he’s afraid I’ll vanish, along with the way his hips tilt towards mine…it dulls that voice.

It gets snuffed out the moment Nikolai places me on the counter and slots himself between my legs while he devours my mouth, kissing me with the kind of pent-up intensity that can only come from being stuck with someone for too long without doing anything about it.