Chapter 15
Nikolai
Imissed the snow. I tend to complain about it after I’ve been home for a little while, but the cold suits me better than the Nevada desert. It’s great for a vacation and I honestly needed a good, solid change of pace after Helena. I didn’t want to bring Anya here. I did not need an excuse to make myself even more paranoid about her actual motivations. Seeing her in these hallways is going to be interesting, a challenge even.
The moment the plane lands, she attempts to run off and into the snow,the cold bitingher very exposed ass, making her to duckright back inside. I”m curious how long it”s been since she”s been out in the snow.
“If you don’t stop kicking at me, I’m going to throw you into the snow, and leave you here,” I say to the woman thrown over my shoulder.
Her hands are on the hem of her nightdress, holding it down over her ass. I can feel the way that she’s trembling with cold. Luckily for her, it’s only a short walk into the house now. She can’t even see the magnitude of my family home. Granted, I had no say in the architecture of it and even less say in the way that it is decorated.
Outside of the pool that I had installed over the library and the renovations that I made to my personal wing, it’s very much an old-fashioned Russian mansion. I’m sure that it was my father’s father who had the whole thing decked out in reds and golds to look as if a Tsar could walk in at any moment and mistake it for his own residence.
I did have the heating fixed, so the moment that we enter into the space, it’s warm and soothing. Anya’s body sags over my shoulder. I carry her up to my bedroom where I’ve had clothes delivered and drop her on the bed. She instantly tries to rise and move away. I point to the bed with a stern expression. “Stay.” Shockingly, she falls right back into the space where I left her, and watches me start opening bags and sifting through the contents of all of the things there. I select a pair of knitted leggings and a large cashmere sweater for her to wear around the house.
Loose enough to move out of my way if I desire but warm enough to keep her comfortable in the meantime. I have a lot of business to attend to, and while she’s here exploring, she might as well be comfortable.
I walk back to the bed and hold the garments out for her to change into. I can tell that she’s unhappy with the turn of events but I do not offer up any extra information. She hasn’t earned that. Despite how good the sex might be, she’s just my prisoner. “You will sleep here where I can keep a close eye on you for the duration of the stay.”
Indignation consumes her instantly. “What?! No!”
“You will stay in my bed, you will wear what I tell you to, and you will not leave this house without my say so. Am I understood, sweetheart?”
Her pretty eyes narrow in my direction. I can tell she’s biting her tongue to keep from saying what she really wants to. “Yes. Sir.”
She’s going to injure her jaw if she keeps talking to me like that. It’s amusing. “Good girl. You will find that you have more than enough to entertain and keep you busy here. Ivan is finishing up with some business, but he will rejoin you around dinner this evening and will take over your care at that time.”
“You’re going to leave me with the handsy brute?!” Anya protests loudly, fear pinpricking her eyes.
I shake my head and toss the clothes at her; she catches them and cradles them in her lap. Her hands brush over the soft fabrics in contemplation. “No, they have been reassigned, but there will be plenty of armed guards at every entrance and exit to the house, in case you try to do something stupid, like attempt an escape. They have all been given strict orders that they are not to touch you, unless you misbehave. If you misbehave, you will be taken to the dungeons and trussed up there until I can return home to punish you. Is that clear?”
Anya nods, and I fix her with a glare. “Yes. Sir.” she says with a tone that is only a couple of steps above defiance. It will do for now.
“Good. Get changed.”
I can tell she’s expecting me to leave the room so she’ll have some modicum of privacy, but I center my weight between both of my feet and stare. Anya rolls her eyes and drops her legs off the side of the bed heavily. She wriggles in place to pull the nightgown over her head and tosses it to the side with an angry huff of breath. I watch the way that her breasts move as she scrunches up the tights and slips her feet inside of them, pulling the fabric up her thin legs.
As she stands, she exposes her pussy to me for a moment before it’s hidden away inside of the tights. A moment is more than enough. I’m already getting hard all over again.
Anya gathers the fabric of her sweater and pulls it down over her head, and I notice the satisfied expression she tries to hide from me as the soft material comforts her. She stands, hugs her arms around her torso, and walks slowly across the room to me. It”s a far cry from what I let her wear in Vegas, but I can”t take the chance of the plane issuehappening again. The entire place is heated, and once I finish my work and have had a lengthy conversation with my men, she will revert back to the demeaning wardrobe.
I have about an hour before Ivan is supposed to check in with me.
That’s an hour that I can give myself to see her. Anya follows me silently through the bedroom door and out into the hallway. If she’s been here in Moscow before, she says nothing. There is a new tension between us. She seems hesitant, subdued in a way. Boring. I catch myself glancing at her every five steps but she’s not looked at me once. Though, as we travel away from my personal wings, she gives herself more permission to look around, to admire the artworks on the walls. She pauses sometimes, staring at the elaborately crafted sconces on the wall or the decorations embossed into the wallpaper. She glosses over the statues but looks over her shoulder back at them as if she would ask for extra time to admire them, but she isn’t certain that she is allowed to. Had the incident on the plane really shaken her that much?
I suppose the more pressing question I need the answer to would be if it was my man who frightened her, or me.
The version of her that I’ve come to expect is more… well, she’s more.
I hate that I want to ask her what is the matter. I shouldn’t care. She is my prisoner, my property, I should pin her up against the wall right here and now to prove that to her. I wanted her broken. Here she is. Subdued, submissive, compliant. Yet the only thing that I keep thinking whenever I look at her is how scared she looked back on the plane.
“The mansion hasn’t changed much for generations,” I say to break the silence. My voice seems to snap her out of her own head because she whips her attention in my direction with wide eyes. What was she thinking about? “There are a great many rooms here in the home that still contain the original antique furniture and decor. A bit gaudy for my personal tastes.”
Anya looks over to the deep crimson walls and then back at me pointedly. She scans my broad chest, down to my slightly swollen knuckles. They are always swollen, always from fighting, from training, from punching things. There is no denying that I have a temper. Physical activity is the only thing that has ever helped me deal with rage. I need an outlet, and I doubt she”ll let me fuck her as many times as I need to in a day to keep saidrage at bay. Not that I’m opposed to the prospect of having her availableto use.
That gives me a whole new world of ideas that I certainly don’t have enough time for at the moment.
“Are you certain?” Anya asks softly. “You seem to have a fondness for red—or is it only blood that you like?”
Her eyes reflect no emotion whatsoever when she looks up at me. Her arms are still folded across her chest, and it feels almost as if she’s testing me. Curious, I study her carefully neutral features. Her exotic beauty is a blank canvas, and my next words will choose the direction the artwork that is her face will turn to. I center my weight between my feet.
“Both.” The color and the blood. I will not deny it. “Perhaps we should open you up, see my favorite color painted all over your pretty skin.”
Her head tilts to the side, attempting to figure out if I’m joking. “I suppose that it’s going to be whatever you want, isn’t it?”
I nod. “That’s right.” I take a step towards her, and she slowly takes a step backward until I have her pinned to the wall. I place one palm against the wall and watch as fear slowly creeps through her. I breathe slowly and deeply—the scent of her is intoxicating.
“You afraid to have me in control, Anya? Or perhaps,” My other hand drops to her hip, sliding up the back of her sweater, pulling her hips toward me. She’s not even attempting to fight me now. “Perhaps you like seeing me in control. Hm? Does it make you wet?”
Anya tears her eyes from mine and quickly looks down the empty hallway beside us. Her breathing is coming faster now, and a light red is coloring the tops of her cheeks.
“Ah, I understand, perhaps a little bit jealous? Da?”
I lean down over her, pressing my hips into hers, my thigh parting her thighs and pressing against her center. Anya’s eyes close, and her hands ball into tight fists around the fabric of her sleeves. I press my thigh into her core, flexing the muscles there and her eyes close. I can tell she’s fighting back what she really wants to say.
“Perhaps my actions had you wanting my hands on you? Where did you want them?”
I slowly slide my hand up her back, and she arches into me at the touch. She rolls her body forward slowly into my own and the alarm on my phone goes off. The vibration was quick and punctuated, but it was enough to get her attention.
Anya shoves her hands against my chest. I remain motionless as I take my phone from my pocket and check the time. The tour has lasted much longer than I anticipated. With a knowing smirk, I return her gaze.
“Perhaps if you are a very, very good girl while I am away then I shall give you what you crave.”
Anya’s eyes open wide. “You’re leaving?”
Curious. That is not the reaction that she had yesterday when I said I was leaving her for a little while. “Da.” I answer.
“But what if...” She presses her tongue against the roof of her mouth, looking down at the floor between us. “What if he… you know?”
Does she…
Realization dawns on me all at once, my brows lift in understanding. Despite all odds she feels safer with me than without me. I lean in closer to her, and slowly she looks back at me.
“If anybody is stupid enough to touch you in my absence, they will no longer have hands.”
She kisses me.
It takes a moment for my mind to catch up to what is happening, but her lips are on mine, frozen as if she wasn’t sure she had done it herself. A moment of mutual disbelief passes between us.
My eyes close, and I pull her closer to me. Her hands softly rest on my biceps, and her lovely lips part for me, deepening the kiss. That lightning from yesterday slowly rekindles and my phone”s alarm goes off once more. “Chyort.”
It’s more difficult to pull away from her than I expected. A part of me wants to stay here to see where that would lead. She initiated things. What an unexpected turn of events.
“Come, let me show you one more thing before I must go.”
Anya nods, falling into step behind me as I take another couple of turns. In the second hallway, she unexpectedly places her arm inside mine to allow me to properly escort her. I turn around another corner, approaching two wooden double doors, and lean against them, revealing my family”s massive private library.
Rows and rows of books, every sort that one can imagine are neatly lined from floor to ceiling. A glass cube in the middle of the room is tempered and climate controlled to preserve our first editions as well as the more priceless collections. Spiral staircases are placed in all four corners of the giant room with openings to explore each of the three floors full of books. Seating areas are placed at intervals and the very top floor has a codex and cataloging system. The ceiling looks like a sunroof but is actually the bottom of my Olympic sized swimming pool. I like the way that the water refracts the light over the floors.
Anya steps around me and her jaw goes slack.
She moves further into the room and freezes, not sure where to start—stunned into silence as she scans all of the shelves.
“I figured that you could find something to do in here while I am away.”
Anya nods without even looking, as if that’s the only thing that she could manage.
“I will see you for dinner this evening.”
The mansion”s wealth was displayed to her, and this was the only part that really struck her. She”d rather be comfortable in a library than out and about, dressed up as arm candy. She”s not like the other women I”ve met. Helena would be interested in the jewels or going shopping. Anya? She’s bewitched by the simple things. It’s like she”sforgotten I exist. She nods and mumbles some incomprehensible sounds, and I leave her to it.