Page 101 of Bought By Sin

He didn’t only care about me.

He didn’t simply want me to live for the sake of working for his family.

Lev Volkov, the fearsome enforcer, loved me.

As I rolled on my side to face him better—a task made infinitely easier with the bounty of pillows that I’d been propped up on as I rested—I sighed. It was a sound of pure happiness as I watched him sleep. He lay next to me, his head slumping to one shoulder. Sitting up but reclined, he looked like he’d only dropped off to sleep in that position because he’d been staying with me nonstop, ready to jump into action and help me, prepared to be on call and deliver on anything I desired.

If this was what being pampered felt like, I supposed a girl could get used to it.

Not me, though.

I didn’t want to be coddled or treated as a delicate, broken thing.

I wasn’t either of those.

I couldn’t call myself delicate when I’d be tested and hardened by the atrocities of my past.

I had been broken before, but all the pieces that made me up were glued together again—because of him.

Lev had been the founding source of happiness and security, and I would never lose sight of all that I owed him.

He stirred, almost as if feeling the brunt of my attention on him spurned him into waking up. Blinking his warm, dark eyes open slowly, he stirred and turned to face me. Like his first thought when he woke would be of me, to seek me out.

A tender smile lifted his lips as he made eye contact with me. In this quiet, comfortable moment of merely watching each other, we connected on a level that surpassed time and touch.

Our souls meshed.

Our hearts united.

“I—”

He pressed his fingers to my lips. “I have something to say first.”

I nodded, fighting a smile at his impatience.

When he took his fingers away, I licked my lips. “But what I want to tell you is important.”

He furrowed his brow, looking torn between insisting that he have his way or to let me have mine.

Since I’d already overheard snippets of what he’d told Adrik about me, I had a hunch that I knew what he was going to greet me with now. And I looked forward to hearing him confess those same things all over again. To me.

“Okay.” He frowned, implying that he didn’t think it was okay. “You can go first.”

Damn. Now I was tempted to hear him out instead. “Um. You can.”

He grinned slowly, a wicked and slow change of his usually stern face.

“I want you to marry me.”

I huffed, amused at his highhanded approach. “Are you asking me?”

“Do you want me to ask you?” he challenged.

“I do.”

“Now you’re just jumping ahead.”

I laughed lightly, feeling so damn happy and free to embrace this bliss that my heart was about to overflow.