Chapter 1 #2
"What have I told you about reading and walking, Moya?" comes the deep, unmistakably amused voice, thick with the rasp of his voice as if he just woke up this morning with the exact formula of how to get my heart racing in my chest.
I don't even have to look up. My spine already knows. My skin already knows.
But of course I do look up, because I'm weak and nosy and human, and there he is—leaning down slightly to meet my eyes, his mouth curved in that lazy, smug smile that says he enjoyed this far too much.
His dark hair is still damp from snow or sweat or sin and clinging seductively to his forehead, and his black cashmere coat looks like it costs more than my rent, is open revealing a black hoodie and a gray scarf hanging around his neck.
I inhale—pure instinct—and his scent hits me like it always does: all warm spice, clean linen, and smoke. It invades my senses and coils low in my stomach, flipping it in that wild, chaotic way it always has around him.
My body, as usual, completely short-circuits.
I mean, I've read enough books. I know the knee-buckle guys, the slow-burn heartbreakers who make any girl swoon with a smile, the sharp-jawed villains who says and does all the right things—but none of them, not a single fictional man, makes me feel as pathetically unhinged and discombobulated as Aleksandr Petrov.
"Aleksandr," I say, breathless—too breathless, like I'm Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday, Mr. President. I want to smack myself.
There is zero reason to be using a breathy voice unless you're mid-affair with the recipient, and I am so far from being in an affair with Aleksandr it is laughable. I have a better shot of joining a demon cult in Queens than having an affair with Aleksandr.
He sees me as his younger sister's annoying bestie, or worse but way more probable—a little sister—since I am a year younger than him and two years younger than Nadia, but I was smart enough to skip two grades in middle school.
"Moya Lily," he murmurs, unreadable as always, voice low and smooth as he gently places me back on my own two feet. "Why were you walking and reading?"
"Why were you walking into people who clearly couldn't see you?" I shoot back, rubbing the tip of my nose. "I could have a broken nose right now because of you," I add, doing my best to sound annoyed instead of slightly delirious.
I take a step back—but not too far. He's still standing between me and the elevator, and I need both space and air that hasn't been through him first.
He just smirks.
Then he reaches for my wrist—lightly, but firmly. His fingers wrap around mine and heat blooms up my arm. Was he always this warm? Or am I just always this stupid around him?
He pokes the tip of my nose, his smirk deepening as he gently pushes my glasses back up the bridge. "Doesn't seem broken to me."
Before I can come up with a response that isn't just a string of vowels, he crouches to pick up my book from the elevator floor. His fingers brush mine as he hands it back—barely a second, barely a touch—but it crackles under my skin like a lit match.
It's always like that with Aleksandr. Brief. Electric. Dangerous.
And I hate—hate—how easily he can still do that to me. You would think that my body. My mind. My freaking soul! Would get a hint, but it can't. It won't because it's him, and despite him telling me there is nothing more, or that there can't be, something in me won't let him go.
"Still reading that one?" he asks, glancing at the cover before tucking a stray curl behind my ear like he has every right to touch me. "I thought by the time I got back you'd have finished it by now."
"Your sister interrupted me during the last book, so it's taking me an extra hour," I say, stuffing the book into my jacket pocket. "And now I am supposed to take my time getting Chinese food."
The elevator beeps impatiently, and he grips my shoulders and takes a step into my space, pushing me back into the hallway with him. I try to ignore the electricity flying across my skin despite my puffer jacket blocking his hands from touching my skin.
His gaze is on the conference room behind me as he looks over the scene taking place in there.
I follow his gaze. Everything looks tense in there from the two men still shouting to Nadia standing in the middle with a newly exposed gun on her waist, something I am used to her having, and am totally used to her showing some of the patrons.
"I should get out of here sooner rather than later," I mumble, more to myself than to him, as I tear my eyes away from the conference room and look up at Aleksandr with my eyes rolling over his gorgeous face.
It's just as unfairly perfect as it always is. Sharp cheekbones, clean jawline with a five o'clock shadow, full lips that normally quirk up into a smirk that shows all the emotion he tries to hide.
His eyes and hair are different from his siblings. He has black hair that is normally very neat, and knowing him every strand will be back in place by the time I get back.
He has deep stormy gray eyes, rimmed in the thick lashes no man should have unless he plans to ruin lives with them. There is also a faded scar over his left brow from when we were children, that only adds to his stoic expression.
I look away before I lose myself in him, as I have done countless times before, and clear my throat.
"I am assuming you want steamed pork dumplings?" I whisper, looking down at the chalky marks on my yellow boots.
"You're going outside like that?" His voice cuts clean through the fog of my thoughts—low, steady, laced with that no-nonsense tone he reserves for everyone but sharpens slightly when it's directed at me.
I glance up, confused.
He's already pulling a soft gray hat from out of his pocket, the fabric damp from melted snow. He shakes it once, then hands it to me without another word.
"Aleksandr, don't. I can use my book as a cover, see?" I hold the book over my head, and as much as it would pain me to do so it would work in a pinch. The Chinese restaurant is literally a block and a half away.
"You're going to catch a cold." His tone is sharp, and no nonsense in that way that makes your spine straighten and the urge to avoid eye contact as you say yes sir.
"Take the hat, Lily."
I take the hat out of his hand and slide it on my head. It's slightly damp, but it has an inner lining that keeps my head warm and shielded from the cold.
I look up at him, sticking my tongue out. "Happy?"
His eyes scan over my body, and when his eyes lock on my exposed neck he unwinds the charcoal scarf from around his neck, and drapes the scarf over my shoulders.
"Aleksandr," I huff, as his fingers work to wrap the huge scarf around my throat. "This is too much."
"You have a lot to say other than thank you," he sighs, adjusting the scarf until it's neatly knotted around my neck and tucked into my jacket.
I roll my eyes and he tugs the scarf tighter—just a little too tight. Not enough to hurt, not really, but enough to make me suck in a sharp breath and stare at him like he's lost his mind… or like he suddenly found the part of mine I've tried very hard to bury.
My stomach somersaults so hard I feel the floor sway under me, and the way my clit jumps makes me want to cross my thighs and wish for Joe the vibrator.
His eyes are steady, unreadable. Except for the corner of his mouth—that smirks.
He leans in the tiniest bit, his voice reduced to a low rasp with just a dash of teasing. "Now… thank me."
I blink, lips parting—honestly, he might as well have asked me to recite the Constitution. My brain is mush, and my heart is sprinting like it just heard gunfire.
"Th—thank you," I manage, voice softer than it should be, like the words don't quite belong to me.
I swallow hard and sway slightly on my feet, because this isn't the first time Aleksandr has teased me like this.
It's not the first time he's taken some quiet, almost smug satisfaction in watching me flustered and thrown off balance—submissive in a way I don't even fully understand, except that it only ever happens with him.
Sometimes I think I'm a game to Aleksandr. A cheeky little mouse he can toy with whenever he's bored or in the mood to watch me squirm. And I hate that—God, I hate that about our dynamic. The way he can pull me in and keep me at arm's length all at once.
But the truth is… I also crave it.
These little teases, these rare, electric moments—because this is probably the closest I'll ever get to him. The closest I'll ever be allowed. And no matter how much I want more, this—this tension, this almost—is all I'm going to get.
His smirk deepens, as if he's pocketing the moment for later. "Was that so hard?"
I scoff under my breath, fingers flying to the knot at my throat as I loosen it just enough to breathe without confessing my sins.
Aleksandr glances casually toward the glass conference room, where yelling has resumed in two different languages and one slammed espresso cup.
"I'll take the dumplings. And get the beef chow fun too," he says, like none of that just happened, like I'm not standing here warm and flustered and unraveling like a badly wrapped Christmas gift. "You can steal some. If you ask."
The corner of my mouth lifts before I can stop it, and he presses the button for the elevator to open again. He steps aside, hand brushing lightly against mine as I pass into the elevator just as it dings open.
"Be careful," he says, not looking at me now. "And don't be too long, there is a blizzard warning."
I turn, scarf tucked tight, hat pulled low, and step into the elevator with my pussy fluttering in a way it absolutely should not be in public.