Page 31 of His Contract Queen

My body registers it before my mind does, pulse jumping as every nerve inside me suddenly flares awake screamingpredator. I keep my breathing even the way I’ve trained myself to do when cornered and slowly open my eyes.

Aleksandr Volkov stands motionless at the foot of my bed, half-swallowed by the fading shadow still clinging to the corners of my room. The dim gray dawn slicing through the narrow gap in the curtains drags a pale line of light across one side of his face—sharp cheekbone, the edge of his jaw, the faint glint in an eye that should not look as calm as it does.

Even in near-darkness, he radiates power.

My fingers curl into the sheets as I slowly push myself upright, the silk strap of the nightgown I slipped into last night falls down my shoulder. I don’t bother fixing it. My throat is too tight to speak, though even if I managed to find any words, I know my voice would embarrass me by shaking.

For one long, suspended heartbeat, we simply stare at each other. Him silent and unreadable, me with my pulse hammering hard enough in my chest that it makes it hard to breathe. In that terrifying quiet, something unexpected flickers through my mind.

A memory of that amused smirk he so often wears. That small, mocking curve of his mouth when he enjoys cornering me with words instead of violence. The dangerous glint in his eye when he’s in the mood to provoke rather than punish me for my defiance.

I find myself missing it.

His arrogance and wicked hint of playfulness, as twisted as it is, has always felthuman. Predictable in its own darkly-edged way.

But this? This is something else entirely.

Aleksandr stripped of theatrics, without the veneer of amusement to soften the monster I know him capable of underneath scares me. Aleksandr in his raw, unforgiving state he hides from everyone but the people he intends to break is the part of him I’d never hoped to cross paths with.

I feel a slight tremor roll through me. Not from fear, though it’s absolutely there, but from the crushing awareness that whatever Aleksandr came here to do, whatever decision solidified in his mind during the hours he disappeared into the night had made him come here resolved in his choice.

There is no changing his mind at this point. The window for bargaining closed long before he stepped into this room.

I swallow, my throat tight. Somehow the only thing that manages to escape me is a whisper-soft, stupidly small question, “Are you still angry?”

The moment the words leave my mouth, regret punches through me. Of all the things to ask… why that? Why poke the wolf with bare hands when he’s already staring at you like he’s deciding where to sink his teeth first?

I brace myself for the cold, clipped reprimand. For the hand around my throat, clenched hard enough to bruise and remind me just exactly who owns the air in my lungs and allows me the privilege of breathing it purely because he hasn’t decided to take it away yet.

What I get instead confuses me immediately. A flicker of surprise flashes across his face.

It’s the only thing in the world that could have disarmed me more than rage.

He steps closer, one measured stride at a time. When he reaches the side of the bed he stops again, close enough that I can see him better now. His eyes are practically black in this lighting, bottomless in their depths and devouring whatever light manages to touch them.

I miss the blue. The blue meant he was still human, this darkness reminds me he is not.

My heart kicks hard against my ribs with one jarring thud that makes the rest of my body feel weightless.

The quiet is worse than shouting. It forces me to hear the tremor in my own breath and feel the bare edge of panic creeping up my throat. To confront the possibility—no, thecertainty—thathe will inevitably kill me by the time the sun rises beyond my windows.

His gaze suddenly moves to follow the path of the thin strap of my nightgown that’s slipped down my shoulder, lingering long enough for my skin to prickle with awareness. It drifts lower down across my chest to my stomach. Every inch he traces feels like a brand, my body being marked by a touch that doesn’t even have to be corporeal.

My hands tighten around the sheets pooled in my lap.

I hate that he can do this to me without even touching me. That my body responds despite the threat looming overhead. Heat pools low in my belly, forcing me to press my thighs together beneath the sheet like that could hide the way he’s already unraveling me.

When his eyes finally return to my face, something in them shifts. His lips parting slightly with a soft inhalation as if he’s steadying himself or savoring something he hasn’t yet claimed. A traitorous flutter I can’t smother no matter how hard I try tightens my gut.

“Is that what you thought,” he murmurs, lashes lowering just enough to magnify the darkness of his gaze. “That I was angry with you?”

I shift unconsciously. “Yes.”

A low rumble leaves him, a sound of disapproval.

He leans down, folding into my space with predatory grace. One hand braces on the mattress beside my hip, sinking the bed slightly beneath his weight. The other lifts, catching my chin between his thumb and forefinger. The hold is not gentle, firmenough to tell me he wants me still, looking at him and nowhere else.

His thumb strokes once along the line of my jaw, deceptively soft. “Do you need my approval that badly?”