12. Harper #3
His hand lowers, cupping my ass while I rest my hands against his face, feeling the thick stubble beneath my palms as his intoxicating scent clouds my senses and my judgement.
He’s right. This is a very bad idea, and I should walk away, but instead I kiss him harder and let one hand wander down the hard planes of his chest.
I’m lost to him, lost in this moment, lost in this kiss and the feel of his body pressed to mine, and when he tries to pull back, I let out an annoyed grunt and fist his shirt, determined to keep him close this time.
“Harper,” he tries to say, but I shake my head and press my mouth back to his, kissing him silent and willing him to stop fighting me.
He lets out a deep groan when I drag my hand lower, palming the hard length I feel straining against his jeans.
Ev’s incredibly well-endowed, and I feel downright giddy at the thought of being able to experience a cock that big.
Eager for him, I slide my hand under his shirt, dragging my fingers along his taut abs before dipping under the waistband of his jeans.
With another pained groan, he pulls back, this time with enough force to put space between us, and it’s like a slap to the face. Anger and humiliation war with each other in my head while my heart beats a fast rhythm fueled by adrenaline and hormones.
“Why do you keep doing that?” I yell at him. “Is the idea of fucking me that repulsive to you?”
“That’s not what this is, and you know it,” he says, dragging a hand through his unkempt hair while he tries to get his breathing under control.
“I want you, Harper.” He lets out a heavy breath while his eyes rake over me.
“I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anything, but that doesn’t mean I can have you. ”
“Why not?” I ask, exasperated and hurt and so aroused it’s like a physical ache between my legs.
He scrubs a hand over his face and shakes his head. “I just can’t. We can’t. I’m sorry, but you need to leave.”
When he starts to turn away, I lose it. I’m not about to have him turn his back on me.
We’re not leaving things like this again, so I lunge for him.
When he sees me coming and tries to move away, I grab onto his shirt.
Everything happens so fast. One minute I’m grabbing onto him and trying to pull him back to me, and the next minute, his shirt slides up his arm, revealing a tattoo that I immediately recognize.
“What the?” I start to say, so stunned I freeze in place while my eyes run over the Grim Reaper, my brain refusing to accept what I’m seeing. “Ev?”
“Goddammit, Harper,” he growls at me, yanking back his arm and looking at me like he can’t believe I’ve just seen what I’ve seen.
But there’s no hiding it. We both know there’s no turning back.
There’s no unseeing it, and everything clicks into place, the reason why he knew Sasha had been arrested minutes after it happened, his determination to free him, the long hours he spent with the Melnikov family at their apartment, and his refusal to let me get close to him.
Terror suddenly hits me hard. This is not a secret you get to know and walk around with.
This is the kind of shit you find out about that gets a person killed.
My first instinct is to run, so that’s what I do.
I turn and bolt towards the door we’d just used, but I don’t even make it three feet before Ev is grabbing me from behind and pinning me against him.
This time is different, though. Instead of nuzzling my neck and dragging his lips along my skin, he keeps himself at his full height and drags me further into his home.
“Ev, you have to let me go,” I say, because the alternative is too insane to voice.
“I have a job. People are going to notice I’m missing.
” I try to reason with him, but he ignores me and when we get to the stairs, instead of trying to pull me up them, he scoops me up and starts to carry me.
I don’t fight him too hard since the last thing I want is to have an accident where I fall down his stairs and break my neck.
I don’t want to make it too convenient for him, so I wait until we’re on the second floor and he sets me down.
The first thing I do is run. He doesn’t chase, and I don’t waste time trying to figure out why.
He stays where he’s at, blocking the stairs, silently watching me make an ass of myself.
The first thing I do is dart to the French doors, even if the back is surrounded by a giant wall, I’m pretty sure I’m ready to try to shimmy my ass up and over it.
When I try the handle, the doors don’t budge.
Trying to find a way to unlock it, I notice a fingerprint sensor where a lock should be.
Glancing over my shoulder at him, I ask, “Seriously? Who the fuck does that?”
He doesn’t say anything, and I don’t waste time asking more questions.
I run to the first window, not at all surprised to see that there’s no way to open it.
Looking back to give him a defiant look with a hint of you’re the one who made me do this added in, I grab a stool, the same one I’d been sitting on under very different circumstances, and hurl it at the window.
I’m expecting a loud, satisfying shattering of glass, but instead it bounces off and comes right back at me.
It happens too fast for me to react, nearly smacking me right in the head before Ev grabs me and pulls me out of the way.
“Why the hell didn’t that break?” I ask, hearing the tremor in my voice but unable to stop it as the reality of my situation starts to sink in a little deeper. “You’re not going to just let me leave, are you?”
“It’s shatterproof,” he says, letting me go and taking a step back. “And bulletproof.” He grabs the stool, righting it and putting it back where it belongs. “So please try not to throw anything else. You’ll only end up hurting yourself.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Turning his back to me, he walks to the fridge and takes out a bottle of water before walking over and handing it to me.
“You should’ve just left, Harper. Why the fuck couldn’t you just let this go?”
“Don’t you dare pin this on me. I’m not the only one who was taking part in what happened downstairs.
It sure as hell wasn’t my own hand molded to my ass, and there’s no way in hell I imagined that big dick of yours straining to get out of your jeans.
So, yeah, I didn’t leave the second you asked me to after all that, but I sure as hell never thought you were trying to get me to go because you’re a member of a goddamn Bratva! ”
I let out a harsh, deranged-sounding laugh. “Holy fuck, Ev! You’re a member of the Bratva!”
He sighs and tugs at the sleeve of his shirt, but it feels more like habit than anything else. The damage has been done. I’ve already seen it, and there’s no going back.
“I’m sorry,” he says, lifting his eyes to meet mine. “You were never supposed to know about this.”
“And now that I do?” I can’t help but ask.
He sighs and looks around the large, open floor plan we’re currently standing in. “I’m glad you said you liked my home because you’re not leaving it.”
I force a laugh, because he’s got to be joking. When he doesn’t laugh or smirk or crack even the slightest of smiles, I say, “You’re not serious. You can’t be serious, Ev. You can’t just keep me here.”
“I also can’t let you just walk out of here knowing what you know. You’ll ruin everything. It will destroy my career and reputation and it’ll leave my cousin rotting in jail, and I can’t fucking allow that to happen.”
“Your cousin?” I ask.
“Sasha’s my cousin, yeah.”
“So I’m being held against my will so you can let your murdering cousin go free? Is that what’s happening here?”
I see a flash of anger before he says, “Sasha didn’t commit that murder.”
“Not that one?” Nice distinction. “What if I promise not to say anything? Will you let me go then?”
This time it’s his turn to laugh. “I don’t believe you.”
“What about my job? What about the people who will be looking for me?” My eyes go wide when I think about Watson alone in the apartment. “My dog, Ev. What about Watson?”
“You left your sidekick at home this time?” he asks.
I take a desperate step towards him, reaching for his arm.
“Ev, please, you have to let me get my dog.” The thought of Watson being scared or hungry or needing to go to the bathroom with no one to let him out has true panic flooding my veins.
I clutch his arm, willing to agree to anything if it keeps my greyhound safe.
“Harper,” he says, cutting through my fear. “Look at me.”
His tone is calm but demanding, and I obey him without thinking.
The blue-green of his eyes is just as vibrant as ever, and even though I’ve just found out he’s a very dangerous man and I can’t leave, there’s no anger in the stare he’s giving me, no cruelty or any indication that he’s happy about the current predicament we’re in.
When he tries to reach up and cup my face, I jerk my head back, and I swear I see a look of hurt cross his face before he schools his features into the unreadable mask I’m used to. Dropping his hand, he says, “I’m not going to let anything happen to Watson, okay? You need to calm down.”
I’m still tightly gripping his arm when I give him an incredulous look. “Calm down? You want me to calm down, Ev?”
“I do, yeah,” he says, like my freaking out right now is an absurd reaction to what’s going on.
“How about I leave and calm down in my apartment? I bet my blood pressure drops quite a bit as soon as I leave this place. Wanna see if I’m right?”
He actually has the nerve to look concerned when he asks, “Do you have high blood pressure?”
I sigh and let his arm go. When he doesn’t stop me from taking a step back, I decide I must still have walking privileges, so I take advantage of it by going to his couch and sitting down.