Chapter 7
Fuck.
Shit.
I want to kiss her.
Fuckdo I want to kiss her. I want to savor the chocolate on her lips. I want to see what she tastes like. I want to repay each and every kindness that she’s shown me. This last week that she’s been coming down here has shown me that kindness still exists in this world. Selflessness that I thought only existed in books and movies. I’ve never met anybody like her.
But she’s Nikolai’s wife.
She’s Mrs. Volkovich.
I can’t do it.
Anya leans in and I lean back, turning my head just enough that her perfect, lush lips brush against my cheek instead. The fresh growth on my cheek likely scratches her sensual mouth and she freezes. I can feel the moment that her eyes open in shock as her whole body stiffens. And makes me feel like shit. She’s poised in a tense and uncomfortable position; she lingers beside me for a long minute that stretches on into forever as I fumble and scramble for something to say to make light of the situation. I want to put her at ease, but this rejection is going to make me lose her.
I don’t want her to leave me down here again. It’s more than just the loneliness in the dark. She’s the only thing keeping me tethered to sanity in here. I would have died days ago if it hadn’t been for her attending to me. Left down here like Volkovich’s refuse to rot. I can’t kiss my torturer”s wife. Maybe it would have been satisfying to me, once. But I actually respect the woman sitting beside me. I like her.
Not that she’s going to know that my rejection of her kiss is actually a good thing. How can I explain something like that to her?
There was a time that I would have hurt Nikolai, lashed out at him in any way that I could, including fucking the brains out of his wife.
But that was before I knew her as a person.
Anya jumps back and away from me as if touching me has burned her lips.
“Sorry.” I blurt lamely. I can see the deep red blush fanning from her cheeks all of the way down her slender neck. “Fuck, Anya, I’m so sorry.”
My apology lands on deaf ears as she scrambles away from me, leaving the plate behind as she starts to make a bee line for the door. She’s leaving. She’s going to leave me down here. Fuck. I’m never going to see her again. Panic builds in my chest and right as she’s about to leave and slam the door on me I speak again. I can’t let her leave like this. She needs to understand why.
“It’s not that I don’t want you!”
Not what I mean to say, but I blurted the truth anyway.
Every night I all asleep replaying every word spoken between us in my head over and over again. She’s infiltrated my dreams. I would have gone crazy down here without her keeping me grounded. I can’t let her leave thinking that not kissing her had anything to do with her.
Anya pauses. I watch her hands open and close before balling into tight fists. She answers me without turning to look me in the eye. I’ve made her doubt herself, I’ve shaken her confidence. I can see it in the way that she’s fighting her natural impulse to flee as fast as she can to get away from me. Her voice is soft, small, when she speaks again. “What is it, then?”
I sigh.
There’s no way to explain myself without sounding crazy. But we haven’t bothered sugar coating things between us yet, and I don’t plan to start doing it now.
“I can’t do that to you.”
Anya turns. She shifts her weight onto one foot and looks at me with clear accusation in her eyes. “What is that supposed to mean?”
I have to tell her or lose her. I can feel it. She’s giving me a chance here, and I need to use it as best as I can.
“I just… this is all like some sick déjà-vu, like a nightmare” I confess.
“I’m a nightmare?!?”
“No!” I answer. My shoulders slump forward in something like defeat. “Every woman that I get close to ends up dead. I can’t let that happen to you. I can’t have another woman that I care about die because she got too close to me. This game that we play, Nikolai and I, he’s always ahead of me. He’s one step forward and I have lost too much already. I won’t take you down with me.”
Anya says nothing, but I see the pity in her eyes as she looks at me.
“After what happened to Lilian…” I trail off. She’s the one thing that I haven’t allowed either of us to talk about. Even now it hurts too much.
“I am not Lilian.” Anya answers gently. “If that’s what you’re worried about.”
Anya’s voice draws closer until she’s kneeling right in front of me. The notion that there is any way in this world to compare Anya to Lilian is a joke. I laugh humorlessly. No, I’ve never met two women less like one another.
“No, that’s not it.”
“Then tell me what it is.” Anya answers softly. Her hand lifts and cups my cheek in her palm. I can’t stop the way that I flinch from the touch. I want to lean into it. I want to touch her. I want to feel close to her…I t’s been so long since I’ve allowed myself something like this. Even longer since my last physical contact from a woman.
I catch her wrist on reflex. There’s a reason that I haven’t made another move on her since my temper got the best of me a week ago. Anya moves to pull her wrist away but my hold remains. Her brown eyes lift to mine in silent question. I hold her gaze, something passing between us. I wish I could put into words what I mean… but I don’t have the vocabulary.
It would be better to let her go. I should turn her loose and let her leave. Clearly, I’m a glutton for punishment. A masochistic sadist through and through. Anya stops struggling and I reach for her other wrist. She doesn’t fight me as my hands encircle her thin wrists. I watch her carefully. I don’t miss the way her breath hitches or how her focus shifts to my mouth. I see everything. The sort of desire that blows her pupils until the black nearly equals the honey brown. The sort of thing that can’t be faked.
I lift until her arms are held over her head as I move us just enough to stand and rotate so that I can press her back up against the cool wall once more to give into all the same wicked intentions that had flooded my brain and headed straight to my dick the last time that I had her in this position.
So fucking beautiful.
Her body arches into mine for contact, silently asking for more as the pulse in her neck jumps wildly. Whatever comes of this won’t be good. This is a dangerous line for both of us to walk. It can only end in disaster. There’s absolutely no other alternative.
Kissing her would be worth dying for.
I lift her wrists higher until she has to lift onto her tiptoes or risk my cutting off circulation to her hand in silent command to move. She moves so easily, so fucking compliant to my movements. My touch softens as I smile in satisfaction that she did so well, a soft gasp from her lips like music.
I lower my lips to hers, just a feather soft brush of my sinner’s mouth against something so fucking holy.
Like a moth to flame, I’m helpless to fight it. Her chin lifts, asking for more but not taking more than I give her, and I give her exactly what she wants.
When I kiss her again, it’s consuming. It’s the sort of kiss that burns hot and bright - a star always destined to crash. That’s what we are. I won’t drag her down into hell with me… but fuck if I don’t love the small taste of heaven that she gives me.
Absolutelyworth dying for.