Chapter 24
Chapter
Twenty-Four
NATHANIEL
W alking into the bedroom, I closed and locked the door, loving how she still jumped just a little at the sound of the lock slipping home. One deviously sexy eyebrow arched at me as she crossed her arms over her chest, but not before I got a good look at her hard nipples.
Before she could start in on me, I marched across the room. Savannah dropped her arms as her eyes went wide.
“Nathan, what….” Savannah started to ask and then squealed as I grabbed her and picked her up. Her legs wrapped around my waist as I kissed her. My body shuddered, finally feeling at home now that she was in my arms. There was always so much out of my control, leaving me constantly on edge, but all of it smoothed out as the static in my mind calmed with her here. How had I gone so long without her touch?
My body blanketed Savannah as I laid her down on the bed. I’d stay like this forever if I could. I locked her arms above her head and broke the kiss, only to trace her jaw with my lips.
“I want you, my wife,” I whispered in her ear. Her body shivered beneath mine, captivating me just like the first time we touched.
“We’re supposed to be talking,” she said, moaning as I licked the spot at the base of her neck that I loved to mark.
“A week was too long to be apart. My mark is gone,” I complained.
“It was only five days. What would you do if I had to leave for a month or more?”
“It would never happen,” I state flatly.
“Is that so?”
“Never.” Rising, I admired her beauty and the wildness that burned in her eyes. With just a single look, she’d obliterated my world. The thought of losing her touch for any reason would be a devastating blow, one from which there would be no recovery. “From now on, where I go, you go. Where you go, I go. I never want to be without you.”
“How am I supposed to stay mad at you when you say things like that?”
My lip twitched as her blue eyes captured me all over again. I’d happily step into any cage with her, lock the door, and throw away the key.
“So my distraction plan is working,” I said, flexing my ass and rubbing my cock against her.
“I need you to focus for a minute,” she said, but my mind was already thinking of being inside of her and the feel of her nails gripping my shoulders.
With a deep breath and a herculean effort, I rolled off of Savannah and stared at the ceiling. “Let me have it,” I said.
I expected just about anything but Savannah cupping my cheek and forcing me to look at her. She’d pushed herself up onto her elbow, and her strawberry hair framed her face like a wavy curtain. Fuck, I wanted to wrap it up in my fist. Her eyes locked with mine as if they were searching my soul, and I suddenly felt more exposed than if I were standing naked in front of her.
“I’m not going to rail at you. Don’t get me wrong, I’m pissed, but this is why.” She rubbed her thumb over my cheek, and I grabbed her wrist and kissed her palm before she could move away.
Letting her go, she pushed herself up and crossed her legs as she sat beside me. Rolling over onto my side, I couldn’t keep my hands to myself and drew little designs on her bare leg up to the edge of her shorts.
“You’re a pile of trouble,” Savannah said and grabbed my wandering hand to hold between hers.
“I do have two hands, you know,” I teased and earned myself a glare that had my cock throbbing.
“Focus for five minutes. I swear you have a one-track mind.” Savannah pulled all of her hair over one shoulder, and it did nothing to help me concentrate.
“Nathan, I’m angry because it’s really hard for me to leave Cutter alone. Despite living in the same house with Marko, we never acted like a family. Cutter has been my sole focus and worry. I’ve devoted everything in me to him. The wrist…it could’ve happened to anyone. But you chose not to tell me, and I found out by seeing him on national television when we’re supposed to keep a low profile. Forget how my heart stopped when I saw the guards tackle him and you to the ground. I grabbed the television as if I could jump through it.” Her hand was shaking slightly, her eyes brimming with tears. I pushed myself up and leaned against the headboard to better pull Savannah into my arms.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for any of that to happen. I just wanted to connect with Cutter over something we both love and….”
“I know, but it scared the shit out of me, and you have to tell me when something happens to him. I pray nothing else ever does, but the reality is that it might. But the strip club…Nathan, what the hell were you thinking?”
“I had to go in, and there was no one to look out for him. Rita and Becky are good people. They wouldn’t hurt him, and I left guards.”
Savannah looked up at me like I’d lost my mind. “I don’t care about them or the guards. I care that you took our impressionable son into a place like that. He already picks up on way more than he should, and what would’ve happened if, god forbid, the place was raided? You’re not stupid. I don’t need to tell you that the police and FBI are always watching your family. Would they have taken Cutter away from me? From us? Would they say we were unfit for having him in a place like that? Even if you could pay off someone, which I know is what you’re thinking, how many days would he spend away from us, scared and confused? Or what if it wasn’t the police but another family with a grudge? Do you really think they wouldn’t use Cutter against you? That place is full of everything I’m trying to shield him from. I don’t care what the reason is. You never take Cutter to any of your places of work that can get him killed or paint the rest of his life with danger, at least not until he’s eighteen.”
I kissed the top of her head. “I’m sorry, I never even thought about that, but you’re right. I can destroy the world and not care, but you and Cutter…I don’t want to hurt either of you. You…us, it’s the only thing I never want to ruin.” Savannah’s lips touched my jaw, and I turned my head to kiss her. A thought occurred to me as I nipped at her sexy bottom lip. “Tell me something. Did you think I was at the club cheating on you?”
She stiffened for just a second, but I saw the answer in her eyes. “It may have crossed my mind,” she admitted.
“Why?”
“Honestly, I don’t know. Did you really think that I’d want to get back together with Shawn and fall into his arms when I saw him?”
Gripping her chin, I brushed my lips against hers. “Don’t ever say his fucking name in our bedroom again, or I will send someone to kill him.”
She licked her lips and then smiled. “That’s actually really tempting,” she said, and no other response could’ve made me smile more.
“You’re so violent, Mrs. Mikhailov.”
“Am I? It must be my husband’s influence. He’s a vicious man.”
“Is he now?”
“He is, and he’d kill you if he knew I was here in your bed,” she said, with a devilish grin tugging at her lips.
“Our bed.” I loved how she kissed me like she was as possessed as I was, even though that was humanly impossible. “Do you like that?”
“Like what?”
“The thought of being with another man, sneaking around behind my back?” I smirked at her as the ‘Are you fucking stupid’ look darkened her eyes. She was quick as she rolled away and marched for the door.
Leaping out of bed, I wrapped my arm around her waist and pulled her back into my body. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“Don’t fucking say that to me, not even as a joke. I would never do that. Hell, I was faithful to you when we weren’t even together. Can you say the same,” she snarled the question at me. Fuck me. I loved her jealous streak. Even though it was wrong, it brought me intense satisfaction that she hadn’t been with anyone else.
Spinning her around, I ate up the anger coming off of her like it was a steak dinner. Everything about her fit with me on a level that I didn’t just want or need but had to have. Savannah fueled my soul.
“I know you wouldn’t.” I tipped her chin up. “I trust you, Savannah. I just like you all fired up. But you must know that I’ll never cheat on you. I can be just as angry that you think I was fucking around on you at my club.” She flicked her eyes away, but I forced her to look at me. “Nah, Kisa, you don’t get to do that.” I slowly wrapped her hair around my fist and forced her head back until she looked at me. Savannah’s hands clenched my shirt, and her eyes were alight with defiance. My cock ached to be inside of her and to wipe that look from her eyes as she begged for more. “Say the fucking words, and you better mean them.”
Her jaw tensed as she pressed her lips together in a hard line. “Say it, Kisa. You know what you need to say.”
Savannah ground her teeth before taking a deep breath, and the anger she was hanging onto was gone a moment later. “I believe you. I trust you, and I promise not to think you’ll cheat on me again,” she said.
“Good girl, but don’t lose this jealousy because fuck, it’s hot,” I said and then sucked her lower lip into my mouth.
“Just so you know, the only way I would ever be with anyone else was if it was by force, and even then, I’d fight with all I had before that happened.”
“I know, and I vow that I’ll kill any motherfucker, including their entire family if someone ever did that.” I crushed my lips to hers, demanding she open for me. She still resisted a little before giving in and letting me taste her mouth. Savannah was trembling in my arms when I broke the kiss, her lips red from the sudden abuse.
“I do have one rule going forward. You never dress me down in front of my men like you did tonight, or I’ll bend you over and fuck you in front of them. Do you understand me?”
“Yes,” she said, her voice wavering on the simple word.
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Good.” Releasing her, I stepped back and admired my handy work. “I want to show you something.” My fingers quickly undid the buttons on my shirt, and with a shrug, it slipped off my shoulders. Tossing it aside, I turned around to show Savannah my back and smirked as she gasped.
“Oh my god,” she whispered, and I shivered as her fingers traced the new tattoo proudly displaying her name across the entire width of my shoulders. “It’s beautiful.”
“I love you, Savannah. We’re partners in every way.” I turned to my side and lifted my left arm to show her Cutter’s name across my top rib. “For every child that we have, I will line my ribs with their names as they are a part of my soul, just as you are my heart.”
Tears trickled down her cheeks, and I cupped her face, wiping them away with my thumbs.
“You’re right. I am a vicious man who has and will continue to do vile things that most couldn’t stomach because that is who I have to be. But…I give you my word that I will never become my father and desecrate what we share. I’ll rip my beating heart from my chest and hand it to you if I ever hurt you or our family.”
Taking Savannah’s hands in mine, I knelt, and her bottom lip trembled harder. “I don’t like how we got married, as hot as it was to bend you over the consulate desk,” I said, and Savannah smiled, her cheeks flaming red. “Will you honor me and marry me for real, and not because you were forced to? I know that my world is not what you pictured for your life, but I’m asking you to marry me because you choose this life with all the good and bad it comes with, because you choose our family, and because you choose me. In return…I give you all of me.”
“Yes, always yes,” she said through the tears, and my heart had never felt so full. Standing, I held her tight as I kissed her and poured everything into it.
Bringing her fingers to my mouth, I kissed her knuckles. “I’ll get you a new ring, one you want to wear.”
Savannah shook her head. “No, I want this one. I don’t care if you bought it because you knew it would annoy me or because you genuinely love it.” She held out her hand and looked at the red diamond that glittered in the dim light. “I can’t picture wearing anything else. It suits us.”
“Alright, I’ll have a wedding band made to fit with this one to give you at our wedding. My mother will be over the moon. She was really disappointed about not being part of our day. Not that she would’ve wanted to be if she knew what happened. She probably would’ve smacked me twice.”
Savannah laughed and wrapped her arms around my neck, her face growing serious. “I love you, Nathaniel Grigoriy Mikhailov. I will always choose you.”