29. Nikolai
29
NIKOLAI
“ A new dawn, a new day,” Justine murmurs.
With her eyes glued to the sun rising on the horizon, she nuzzles into my chest. Since I don’t have any patio furniture, we’re sitting on the concrete floor of my balcony, taking in the sunrise as I have nearly every day for the past thirteen years.
It is barely 5 a.m., and the heat is disgusting, but nothing will stop me from watching the sunrise this morning. The only time I missed seeing the birth of a new day were the days I spent with Justine last week. I didn’t need to appreciate another day amongst the living when the very definition of life was directly in front of me.
Curling her arm around my waist, Justine draws herself closer to me. She burrows her head into the groove in the middle of my chest, the hunger for friction on her skin unmissable in her fire-sparked eyes. I run the back of my fingers down her arm, relishing the goosebumps that follow in my wake.
I kept my word of feeding her, showering her, and putting her to bed without fucking her. Let me tell you, it was a fucking hard feat. Justine is my drug of choice. The more I denied myself, the greater my cravings became. But I did it. I kept my word— barely!
Although we didn’t sleep, the past five hours were as beneficial to Justine as rest. The shakes hampering her tiny frame have eased dramatically, and the adrenaline in her blood began tapering off nearly an hour ago. We haven’t directly discussed the outcome of tonight’s event, but we worked through Justine’s concerns in a remarkably mature way.
I’m not a fan of Q&A. I generally avoid interrogations like they’re the plague, but my stomach became less knotted for every question I answered. The shake in my hands remains, but that could be due to keeping them away from Justine. I crave her more than my lungs wish to breathe. One taste will never suffice.
“Nikolai?” Justine croons, her voice as sweet as the treats she devoured earlier tonight.
I hated my name growing up, but I love how it rolls off Justine’s tongue. Her voice is sweet and sexy, and it sends a pleasing zap straight to my balls.
“Yes, Ангел ,” I answer, my restraint pulsating in my tone.
She peers into my eyes, the lusty gleam in them as pleading as ever. There’s a slight variation to the look they’ve held all night. They don’t solely have the glimmer of a lady being led by her desires. They’re pleading on behalf of her heart as well.
Fuck—she is beautiful.
Innocent, yet tempting.
Dangerous, yet safe.
Mine, and only mine.
When she feels the effect she has on my body digging into her curvy ass, her cheeks inflame with heat. She runs her teeth over her bottom lip, acting innocent.
She can’t act coy. She knows the power she has over me, as she has relished every shameful squirm I’ve done while fighting the urge to touch her.
That’s why she doesn’t need to utter a syllable for me to hear her thoughts. I can see them in her eyes and smell them on her skin. She craves me as addictively as I need her.
“I always knew there were devilish thoughts in your mind, Ангел ,” I mutter, my tone half wrathful, half playful.
I’m not angry at her. I’m just annoyed by how weak she makes me.
For the first time in my life, I’m trying to treat her with the respect I’ve never shown women, but instead of encouraging my honorable intentions, she is rebelling against them.
I understand her motives. I know better than anyone the struggle of denying yourself your greatest wish—I did it numerous times the first night I stayed at Justine’s apartment—but I also know if I make one wrong move, I could fuck everything up. I don’t want to do that, so I will keep my word no matter how often she begs.
“Please, Nikolai. I need you,” Justine murmurs, issuing the same heart-stabbing plea she’s given many times tonight.
“No, Ангел . Not yet,” I grind out, my short reply incapable of hiding the volatility in my voice. “I will take you when I am good and ready, not when I’m forced to.”
My back molars smash together. I didn’t mean for my words to come out as they did. They were rough and full of command, not a tone I should be using on a woman I’m trying to keep away from the edge of insanity.
“Justine,” I mutter when she pulls away, the look on her face anything but pleasant. “I’m tired and lashing out.”
“Tired?” Justine replies, the anger in her voice shocking me. “Or are you just not liking what you see anymore?”
When I remain quiet, unsure of what she means, she unknots the satin belt cinched around her waist. Her kimono slips off her body with a soundless whoosh, amplifying the pin-drop silence surrounding us.
I fist my hands at my side, my fight not to touch her ramping up to a level I’ve never experienced. Her lush tits fall heavily to her chest, and her wet slit is displayed in ball-clenching detail directly in front of me.
I want to eat her until she is screaming my name. I want to fuck her until her nails make my back bleed, but I also want to protect her from the torment I experienced thirteen years ago.
So instead of crossing the first two items off my wish list, I stand from the ground and then say, “No, Ангел .”
Grief crosses her features as her lips quiver. “I knew it. You’re embarrassed that everyone knows you sacrificed everything for me, a marked-up half a woman.”
“What the fuck?” I reply, my voice so loud I’m confident the entire compound heard it. “Nothing about you embarrasses me.”
“Then why won’t you touch me?” she sobs, her voice as loud as mine.
“Because I am doing everything in my power to keep you sane! That’s why I won’t touch you! It has nothing to do with the way you look and everything to do with keeping you out of the hell I’ve been living the past thirteen years!”
A tear rolls down her cheek when she shakes her head, denying my defense with stubborn determination. “If you don’t like what you see, Nikolai, we may as well end things now…”
Her words trail off when I yank at the waistband of my boxer shorts, dropping them to my knees. When my cock springs free, it slaps my stomach, its firmness so uncontained that the veins feeding it are as furious as my heart rate.
“Does this look like the reaction of a man who doesn’t like what he sees?” I ask, my words as hot-tempered as my face. “I’m not torturing myself because I don’t want you . It is because your well-being is the only thing stopping me from hunting down the men who bid on you and slitting their fucking throats.”
Justine doesn’t balk at my confession. She doesn’t even glower at me. She keeps her eyes locked on me, the lust in them deepening with every syllable I speak.
“And believe me, I won’t kill them because I’m embarrassed they saw your scars, you are way beyond fucking perfect. I’m going to slit their throats because they saw in you what I see. They saw what is only mine to see. They saw you—my Ангел !” I bang my chest with my fist, its hollowness unknown from the rapid beat of my heart. “Mine . ”
She stills as the tension in the air turns roasting. I don’t need to say any more than I have.She knows I’m telling the truth. That’s why my hands won’t stop shaking. My desire to kill is at its greatest. I’m not embarrassed my competitors have seen her scars. I’m mad as hell she was in that predicament to begin with.
But since my desire to protect her is more intense than my wish to kill, I can’t react to their insolence.
Not yet.
Not until I’m assured she is safe.
Then they will regret the day they ever placed a bid on her.
I will hunt down every one of them, and I will kill them. It isn’t a probability. It’s a fact. Protecting Justine doesn’t just extend to those who physically harm her. It is also for the men and women responsible for keeping her guarded. I want her free, and no amount of bloodshed will stop me from achieving that.
“The men who bid on you will pay for their error, but not until I am assured you are okay first. You are my number one priority . Nothing will ever change that. Not revenge. Not power. Nothing .”
Justine connects her eyes with mine, the adoration in them thickening my cock to the point it is painful. “Just like nothing can lessen my desire for you, Nikolai. Not insanity. Not a man with the heart of Satan. Nothing . I am not me unless I am with you, so not touching me in the hope of keeping me sane is pointless because not having your hands on me is enough to drive me mental.”
As quickly as our disagreement began, it ends. Our bodies collide with brutality, our hunger for one another no longer capable of being restrained.
I growl into Justine’s mouth, equally annoyed and relieved she broke my restraint. I’m dying to touch her, but I must tread carefully. At the first sign of distress, I’m out. I can’t hurt her any more than I already have.
When we fall to the floor, I stretch out my arm, catching our bodies as we tumble. Justine’s giggles tickle my mouth before her tongue adds to the tingling sensation dancing across my face. She darts her tongue between my lips before dragging it along the roof of my mouth, tasting the cinnamon roll we shared while watching the sunrise.
After I finish yanking my boxers down my legs, I assault her mouth with the same eagerness she is bestowing on me. Our kiss is as frantic as my need to drive her to the brink of ecstasy. One hit is never enough.
My toes flex on the polished wooden floor as I jerk my hips forward, ramming my cock inside her. Her breaths fan heavily on my neck when she moans through the sensation stealing the air from her lungs. Even with my desire to have her screaming my name at fever pitch, I watch her intently, evaluating every look crossing her face.
Assured I see nothing but pleasure beaming from her gorgeous features, I draw my cock back out of her tight pussy. Her insatiable cunt sucks at me, begging me to stay immersed in the warmth more capable of crippling me than my greatest enemy.
After adjusting the tilt of her hips, giving me unrestricted access to her lavish slit, I ram back inside her. Her nails claw at my back when I take her to the root of my cock. I slam into her harder, wanting her to mark my skin as deeply as she has scoured my heart.
To replace his scars with ones less painful.
“Your body was built for me. To be fucked by me. That’s why we fit together so well. Your cunt was crafted by God for me, Justine.”
The urge to drive her to climax triples when she huskily moans at the mention of her name. She loves it when I use her real name, but I prefer calling her Ангел , as she truly is my gift from heaven.
My Ангел —the only person capable of keeping me sane.
Cupping Justine’s ass, I lift it off the ground, the inane need to fuck spurring me to take her harder and faster. I grind into her on repeat, loving the throaty moans rolling up her chest. The more I urge her to climax, the less knotted my stomach becomes. Only Justine can make me forget. Only she can strip revenge from my mind as quickly as she clears me of thoughts. When I am inside her, nothing but having her scream my name is on my mind.
Not. A. Single. Fucking. Thing.
“That’s it . Nice and loud.”
As Justine’s clutch tightens on my back, her screams grow louder. I plunge into her faster, ensuring I roll my hips at the exact spot that drives her wild.
“Oh god, Nikolai. Oh…”
Her moans are muffled by my neck when she burrows her head under my chin to gnaw on my shoulder blade. I love fucking her so wildly she becomes senseless with lust, but I need to see her eyes to ensure I’m not hurting her. One wrong glimmer and our exchange will be over, no matter how much my cock objects.
Careful not to irritate the nasty bump on the back of her head I assessed in the shower earlier, I coerce Justine’s eyes back to mine. She complies with my request without too much protest.
Cupping my sweaty jaw, she draws my head down to rest on hers, giving me unlimited access to her beautiful eyes. The love projecting from them doesn’t match our exchange.
The speed of my pumps and the sting of her nails in my back leave no doubt I am fucking her, but she is staring at me like I’m making love to her—like every pound of my cock is freeing her from insanity.
Perhaps what she said is true? Maybe my touch is the only thing needed to ensure she doesn’t break as I did thirteen years ago.
Ignoring the urge to bang my chest like a caveman, I grip her slender thighs in my hands and guide them around my sweat-slicked waist.
The change in position allows me to drive into her deeper, ensuring every inch of my cock is caressed by her greedy cunt. Although we are fucking on the floor like wild animals, there’s no hesitation in Justine’s eyes. They are too filled with lust to let something as weak as worry enter the equation.
When her cunt ripples around me, squeezing the last of my constraint, I demand, “Give it to me. Come for me. I need to feel you quivering beneath me while screaming my name. I want your cunt milking my cock for its release as I pound into you.”
Justine arches her back with a moan, her heels digging into my ass as she matches my thrusts grind for grind. A rough groan leaves my mouth when she cries my name on repeat, her wish to come resonating in her breathless moans.
“ Nikolai… ”
Pinning the top half of her body to the ground by her shoulder, I drive into her harder. I fuck her with violence, my hips like a piston, lethal and without constraint.
She grows slicker, hotter. As her cunt tightens around me, the lust in her heavy-lidded gaze grows and grows and grows until it reaches the point of detonation.
She orgasms with a hoarse moan, growling my name in a way that feels like hot lava is rolling through me. As an orgasm steamrolls her into a hot, sticky mess, the heaviness of her eyelids becomes undeniable, but she keeps them open, electrifying the air with palpable energy.
“Fuck,” I groan, fighting against her cunt tightening around me and wordlessly begging for my cum.
Incapable of denying her every wish, I grind into her another four times before the tingles gripping my sack eject into her in raring spurts.
“Nikolai…” Justine whispers in a soft cry as my climax stretches hers from one to two.
She stares up at me as her body works through the shudders enveloping every inch of her, the utter bliss on her face unmissable.
Fuck—why didn’t I see this sooner?
Vladimir didn’t make Justine crazy. I did.