28. Maxim
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
maxim
She rubbed up against me, deliberately taunting me. My cock had already been hard when I’d come home and seen her in the mud room. Torture and death wound me up. There was an energy to it that put me on edge. Before Cora, I’d have a whore over or two if the mood was right.
“I was waiting up for you, Max,” she said.
My hand drifted to her hip. Did she mean she was up like a little cat in heat? Wanting me? I let my fingers curl beneath her panties. She was soaking — the silk fabric drenched.
“God. You’re weeping for me,” I moaned. “Get that pussy up here and those fucking panties off. I want you on my face right now.”
Her face wrinkled in confusion for a minute, and her eyes sparked with excitement. “Up there?”
“Be a good girl. Face the headboard. Hurry up. I don’t want to wait.”
She scrambled to obey, even though I could see she was shy as her slit approached my face. Growling even as she let out an adorable squeak, I grabbed her ass cheeks and yanked her firmly down against my face, fastening her to me.
Fuck.
I wanted to die like this.
Smothered.
Her hands gripped the iron rail, her nails curling around it, pumping it as if in time to her hips as she rocked — locked in her pleasure.
I was coming to know Cora. When she fucked, she did it without holding back.
I loved that.
She moaned long and low as she came, my fingers clutching her ass cheeks, spreading them as I sucked every drop from her.
“Oh God. Max.”
Her movements stopped, and she tried to move from me, but I held her to me as I continued my ministrations until I’d gotten every drop of goodness before I let her move away.
“Now on your knees, zayka. I’ve got plans for that pussy.”
I wanted to imbed myself in her. Impale her. Fuck her forever. She angled her ass up towards me with a smirk, her dripping slit swollen from my mouth. I couldn’t help but run my fingers through it before I lined up and notched my cock there. Sliding forward, I drove home, letting my balls slap hard, the wet sound echoing in the room. Each glide was so good that I wanted it to last.
“I wish you could see this view, baby. My cock going into your hole is so pretty.” She gushed in response, pushing against me. The thought turned her on.
Glide.
Stroke.
My balls tightened, and that tingle started at the small of my back, warning me that I was about to come.
“Touch your clit,” I demanded. “Give me another. Put your ass up. Head down so I can fuck you harder. I’m going to blow my load in a minute, paint that pussy of yours. Would you like that?”
“Yes.” She put her head down and ass up, her hand working between her legs furiously as I slammed into her.
“That’s it, baby. Tweak that clit so I can fill you up,” I growled.
She screamed as she came, almost losing the rhythm as she spasmed, but I was so far gone that I held tight to her as I did as I promised — filled her to the brim — coming in ropes into her channel.
Hot.
Warm.
Heaven.
Worth dying for.
Cora lay beside me afterward, and I flinched at the sight of the stitches. They still made me furious. She traced lazy patterns over my tattoos with her fingertips.
“Will you tell me about the scars on your back? How you got them?”
Her hair had fallen over her face, her dark lashes feathering around those jewel-colored eyes as they gleamed at me. I’d been wondering if she’d ask. It wasn’t a time of my life that I was proud of or liked to speak of, but she had every right to know about it.
“My father believed in very little in life. The bratva, money, power. He didn’t respect family, women, or children. Those things meant little to him unless they could be a source of income, provide for his bratva, or increase his power.” She edged closer so her nipples touched my chest, and those silken strands fell over me, and she could continue her path over my scars. “From the time when we were very young, my mother had allowed my father free rein over the two of us. She’d given birth, and that was all she’d been able to do. He beat her, raped her, and starved her when she tried to intervene. She died when I was nine.” Cora’s fingers brushed my cheekbones. She didn’t speak, and I was grateful she didn’t interrupt with empty words.
“After her death, my father didn’t have a leash anymore — not that my mother had been much of a deterrent, it had been something.”
It had meant something to me as a boy that she had tried. It had killed me that he had beaten her. I knew what happened in that room. Night after night, I had been angry with her when she defied him, knowing what it cost. I had wished that she would stop. Then, he had silenced her for good. He finally went too far and killed her. For many years, I had carried a childhood guilt that my wish had made something terrible come true.
“Dimitri was only three when she died, but I was old enough to join my father in his work, so I was taken along. Dimitri was left with the maids until I could return home to take care of him. If I didn’t obey, I was whipped or beaten by my father or his vors.”
“You killed him?” she finally asked. There was no condemnation in her gaze, no judgment.
“Not until I was nineteen. It took me a long time to gain enough men to my side to plan a takeover of the bratva. I would never have been able to leave without killing him. He would have hunted my brother and me down unless I had been able to, and even that wouldn’t have been enough. You must have the men on your side in a power struggle in a bratva, or the new pakhan will take out the remaining heirs.” Her eyes widened.
“You have a very expressive face, zayka. Did you know that?” I nudged some hair behind her ears for a better view and pulled one of her legs over my hip.
“Do I?” She kissed me softly. “So, then, were you and Dimitri safe?”
“Well, then Dimitri decided he’d rather take off. He didn’t want to be part of the bratva anymore.” I frowned, remembering that moment.
“Wasn’t he just …” I could see her doing the mental math. “Fifteen?”
“Maybe in years, but we were much older. He deserved to choose his own way if he wanted.” I didn’t begrudge him his choice, but it had stung.
“You were lonely without him.” She leaned forward again for a kiss.
“Yes, but I’m not lonely anymore. How are your stitches?”
“They’re fine.”
She rubbed against me greedily. This was what love felt like, I thought, just before I slid into her.