Chapter 32 – Vivian
G asping for breath, my body sagged against the vehicle. “I’ve never come so hard.”
“I know,” Luka chuckled.
Overly confident bastard. I wanted to smack him. But he would probably consider that foreplay. Not to mention my hands were bound. Bound! Part of my mind couldn’t wrap around the purely animalistic way we’d just fucked. And yet, I couldn’t wait to do it again. The sad thing was, I knew what had brought it out of him. Luka had been jealous—possessive, even!
Over me.
Why did that make me smile so hard? He didn’t like me. He couldn’t. That just wasn’t possible.
The roar of another vehicle approached.
Luka cursed violently in Russian. He pulled away. A sob bubbled in my throat at the loss of him.
“What the hell are you doing?” a familiar voice shouted.
“Take a step forward, and I’ll decorate your forehead with a pretty red hole.” Luka’s voice was light and teasing as always.
But as I squatted and awkwardly—oh so awkwardly!—pulled my jeans back over my hips, I risked a peep around the Jeep’s back door that I didn’t remember being open. I gaped. He had a gun drawn on his brother.
“You’re such a little shit.” Kolya’s dark gaze remained pinned on his brother.
“How did you know where we were?” Luka cocked his head.
“Luka!” I hissed. “Put that down. He’s your brother.”
A long sigh escaped his chest. “He’s a pain in my ass.”
Kolya harumphed. “I saw that you went off-road into a field. Forgive me for worrying.”
He turned his bike around, spraying dirt and crops into the air.
“Oh, and brother?”
“What?” Luka snapped.
“You’re holding up dinner.” With that, Kolya tore off.
Luka snorted. “The fucker has GPS on my Wrangler. I’m going to kill him.”
“Now that I’ve got the big family I always wanted, I’d rather not have a blood feud,” I said without thinking. “Uncuff me. Now.”
“You wanted a big family?” Luka asked, voice like silk. It slid against my skin with a feather light brush.
That was not a conversation we were having right now. I avoided that penetrating gaze as he fished a key from the glovebox.
“Say please, darlin,” he purred.
I narrowed my gaze. “Please uncuff me so your step-mom doesn’t see the kinky shit her pride and joy is into.”
“Oh, darlin, if you think they don’t know I’m nuts—”
“Well, I don’t need them to know I am too!” It was true. I had to be a little crazy to have feelings for this man.
Stepping into me, Luka undid the restraints. “There.” His lips pressed against my wrists. “That wasn’t too rough on you, was it?”
The gentleness in his tone, the real concern, it twisted the place in my chest where feelings for him flourished. “I’m good.”
Putting some distance between us, before I proved just how nuts I was, I returned to the passenger seat. There was a mess, and I looked around for anything to clean myself up with. Shorts and going in bare weren’t a great combination. The crotch seam was soaked with a mixture of us.
Luka opened and closed the trunk before climbing into the driver’s seat. “Here.”
He tossed me a duffle bag.
Upon opening it, supplies stared back at me. There was also a dark cotton shirt, new with tags, and a linen dress shirt with a dark undershirt.
“You brought extra clothes?” I held the garments up.
Luka flicked a glance. “As you can see, I have a habit of getting messy .” He pointed to the still bleeding cuts on his body. “And Chiara likes us dressed for dinner. Even if it is outside, family-style on a wooden table.”
“Then you should have brought a dress for me,” I muttered, buckling and setting about cleaning myself up. There were unscented wipes. And once the mess we’d made was manageable, I held out a fresh one for him.
He reached out, but I noted the cuts on his fingers.
“Those are deep.” I winced.
He lifted a careless shoulder. “I’ve had worse.”
Scoffing, I took his hand and proceeded to bandage the fingers while he held the wheel with the other.
He took mine and placed a kiss on them. “Thank you, darlin. They feel much better.”
Warm wings beat inside my chest to a thunderous rhythm. Oh, shit. I opened a floodgate with this one. I’d crossed the distance, and now I was falling.
I was falling days ago. I was just too scared to open my eyes and enjoy the plummeting drop.
***
“You’ve got that down to an art form,” I observed.
Laurel, squatting before the raised fire ring, chuckled. “You’re too impatient.”
It was true. My marshmallows were black and charred on the exterior while the insides were hard. Laurel, on the other hand, slowly toasted hers over the coals. She twisted the stick back and forth, making hers a golden brown that was melted through.
“I am,” I agreed, rubbing my third lite beer between my fingers.
The strangest revelation of the evening was that Luka didn’t drink. I remembered he’d declined the gin on the beach, but that could have been because he was kidnapping me later. It wasn’t. He said he wasn’t opposed to throwing back a toast for celebrations, but when I offered him a beer, he declined. I lifted mine, staring through the pale liquid at the fire dancing behind.
I don’t know him at all.
Does it matter? On some level, I already knew him, or I wouldn’t have let him jump with me. Minor details didn’t change the fundamental things.
“Maybe that’s the point,” I muttered.
“What’s that?” Laurel piped up.
How she’d heard me…. The rest of the family chatted in the camping chairs around the fire. Their speech was a droning buzz.
“How well do you know Dimitri?” The words came out before I could think better. Maybe the lite beer was stronger than I realized.
Laurel laughed. She rose, nudging her chin toward the kitchen setup. I followed her to the granite counter set on pillars made from stone and mortar.
“We’d only officially met a handful of times when I agreed to marry him. But I knew what was important,” she started.
“That he was a good man,” I finished before tipping my beer back. Heaven help me, but Luka was a ggooooddd man.
“Exactly.” Laurel smooshed a piece of semi-melted chocolate on her graham cracker before placing the perfectly golden mallow on the top. “If we’d dated for months, hell, even years, I would have discovered the minor things eventually. It wouldn’t have changed how I felt about him. So why not make the discovery now? As a married couple?”
That made too much sense.
“Thanks.” I gave her shoulder a squeeze.
“You okay?” She tipped her head to the side, s'more hovering partway to her mouth.
I smirked. “I will be if you make me one of those when I come back.”
She grinned conspiratorially. I tipped my beer back, chugged the last of it, and then set off to find Luka. There was something I had to tell him. But as I snatched another beer from the box, I realized I didn’t have the words. It didn’t stop me from sauntering off to find him. The words would come when I saw him, of that, I was sure.
Luka wasn’t with the others around the fire ring. Earlier, he’d played a game of soccer with his distant cousin Stepan. That was immediately after dinner. Now Stepan lounged by Dani and her cousins.
Kolya is missing too .
The moment I realized it, I began to jog to the water. He’d gone to swim.
Twilight twisted the world. Shapes distorted, and depth perception warped. I stumbled through the cleared trees, feet sinking into the sand. My heart skittered as two figures came into focus at the end of the dock. The bulky one bobbed in the water, while the one with a slighter build lounged on the end.
Relief and apprehension mixed in my chest. There were no guns this time. Their body language seemed relaxed. But the extinguishing shades of daylight made it hard to tell.
I squinted.
“I prayed you’d find someone,” Kolya suddenly said.
His voice carried well. I stopped inching forward.
Luka grunted in response.
“You’ve been lonely too long,” Kolya added. “But Luka, I can’t clean you off the floor. Not again.”
“It won’t happen,” Luka snapped. That familiar thread of annoyance flittered through his voice. I checked again for a weapon. Not that he needed one.
He was one.
“You don’t know that! If you like her, that means something. And in our world, shit’s unpredictable. I can’t find you—”
“You won’t.” Luka threw his arm wide. “I’m better.”
“I believe that…now. For years, you were coping.”
Luka didn’t respond. His leg swirled in the water.
“It nearly killed me, brother.” Kolya gripped the edge of the dock, pulled himself up and out of the water in a show of impressive upper body strength. He stood there dripping and towering over his brother.
Luka cursed and moved out of the way.
Kolya stuck out his hand. After a beat of hesitation, Luka took it. The older brother pulled the younger up with unnecessary force. Luka was shot forward with the force of that gesture—
Launching right into the lake.
Without so much as a backward look, the older brother strode away.
Luka leapt out of the water like a fiend possessed. His feet slapped against the dock as he charged after his brother.
Too busy watching Luka, I didn’t realize Kolya was so close. He appeared in front of me, towering and imposing.
His voice hardened. “It was nice to meet you, Vivian. Perhaps when I’m back in town, we can become properly acquainted.”
I gaped at my brother-in-law walking past me. A war yell called from across the sandy beach, but Kolya never stopped moving, clearly not expecting a response from me. Since I didn’t have one, I let him go. He wasn’t the one I was here to talk to.
I stepped out of the shadows. “Luka.”
He stopped. His chest rose and fell. Even in the dim light, I could see the wild look in his eyes.
Closing the distance, I lifted the wet hem of his shirt. My fingers skimmed along the smooth planes of his stomach. His sharp gasp sent a bolt of warmth through me.
I opened my mouth.
Words failed me.
I brushed my fingertips across the lines of defined muscle. Letting them drift lower, I met his gaze. Heat blazed in his eyes. My stomach did a little flip, knowing exactly what I’d gotten myself into. One touch, and this beast was mine. This power was intoxicating.
“But not in the sand,” I rushed to clarify. “It’s scratchy and gets everywhere.”
Luka’s dark chuckle sent a delicious shiver down my spine. “Says the Florida girl?”
“I said what I said.”
“Very well.” He bent and scooped me over his shoulder.
Upside down, the world morphed and contorted to the silvery ringmaster’s bidding. The magic carpet of tall grass swayed to a nocturnal breeze. The thick ground cover shimmered under the moon’s caress, each leaf appearing as though it was dusted with glittering frost. The inverted scene was a sea of shadows and light. When Luka flipped me over, making the world once again twist and distort, the dreamlike landscape remained as ethereal, the edges of reality blurring into the fantastical.
I braced my palms on the enormous stone my ass was perched on. Luka stood over me. His left hand rubbed his mouth and chin as his eyes considered me. My heart leapt, and my core clenched tight.
Slowly, so there could be no doubt, I unbuttoned my shorts. The beer bottle was still in my hand, and somehow the liquid hadn’t spilled. A soft chuckle tickled my throat.
Luka plucked the bottle. As I shimmied out of my jeans, I watched his throat flex and pulled the liquid from the small opening. Those lips wrapped tightly around the glass as the light alcohol worked its way down his throat.
Wow…. What a freaking turn-on.
When he lowered it, pinning me with another look, I knew what I wanted.
The command came out a touch breathless. “On your knees.”
Luka tipped his head to the side as he considered me.
With my finger, I drew a line through the air, gesturing for him to kneel.
His dark chuckle brushed down my spine, a tangible caress. “As you wish.”
He pulled his wet linen dress shirt over his head and set that with the bottle on the ground beside us. The moonlight fell over his sculpted shoulders and the body-hugging shirt that molded to him like a second skin.
That wicked mouth pressed against my knee as his fingers slid the Converse from my feet.
The contact was electric. I let my head fall back with a moan.
The scent of rich earth and fresh plants filled the air, mingling with the faint, sweet fragrance of wildflowers. They were the last salute of summer. There was a whisper slithering through the night wind that promised cooler temperatures, a frozen slumber, and perpetual darkness that would swallow the daylight. The heat that scorched my skin was a promise that the winter wind could howl, but I would never be cold again. It was right there, ready for me to take. I wanted nothing more than to fall back and let a primal connection forge with this man.
His tongue paused to flick against the curve of my knee. I wanted to scream. When I told him to kneel, I meant front and center—now! This slow, teasing journey just wasn’t going to cut it.
I moved, ready to hop off the stone and march back to the bonfire. There was a s'more with my name on it that I could drown my sorrows in.
With a growl, Luka planted a hand on my ribs. “Run. I dare you.”
It was tempting. I licked my lips and considered just what would happen.
“Don’t,” Luka warned before pushing my thighs apart and lowering his mouth over my core. “If I have to catch you after you offered yourself to me, you won’t like the consequences.”
“Oh, what would you do?” I taunted, because my mouth just wasn’t as smart as my brain right now.
His smile brushed across the sensitive skin of my inner thigh. “Nope, that’s not how it works.”
The idea of challenging him rose bright in my chest. I wanted to push him, see how far he would take us. But while I hung poised in indecision, his hot breath blew over my pussy. A sharp inhale filled my lungs. Heat zinged through my core, and my pussy wept with anticipation. Just a little farther—
Nothing else matters.
Well, that was almost true. And it wasn’t the past that haunted the present. His late wife wasn’t here, and her memory wasn’t preventing him from being mine. But…I needed to know that he was mine. All mine. He wasn’t the only irrationally jealous one in this relationship. His body said it with every caress of his lips, each swipe of his tongue. But until I heard the words from his mouth, there was a seed of doubt in the back of my mind.
As if sensing the rolling thoughts, Luka’s mouth hovered over me, but his eyes flicked up. “I’m going to fucking devour you, little one.”
“Is that a promise?” I panted. My nipples, hard and painful, strained against my shirt. Luka’s hand on my ribs between them offered no relief.
“Promise.” And then he licked the entire length of my sex.
I moaned, dropping back against the stone. His hand settled on my belly, a solid presence, as his mouth began its initial assault. His kisses felt wicked and sinful.
I craved the destruction.
When his teeth nipped against my clit, my back bowed off the rock. My heart pounded against my ribs. I ached for this man’s touch, both the pleasure and pain. I wasn’t the girl who fell into a twisted cat-and-mouse game. And yet here I was, ready to do anything if he would just give me the sweet relief I needed. Logic had no place here. Reason lost its voice. I was reduced to feeling.
The fire inside burned for this man.
And if I read him right, he was in the same inferno. The kisses he gave me there were greedy, taking everything I gave him, stealing it even though I’d offered.
“More,” I gasped, lifting my hips to give him better access.
There was a pressure at my entrance, and then his touch slid deep inside. Luka groaned as my muscles clenched his fingers. “That’s it, baby, you’re doing so well.”
I whimpered.
Alternating between curling and thrusting, he fucked me with his fingers while his mouth worshiped me. He flicked against my clit and slowly rolled it with his tongue.
A shudder rocked my body. I was so close. Writhing under his devouring mouth, I let go. Pleasure washed over me in white-capped waves.
“Luka!” I screamed, coming undone out here.
His hand clamped over my mouth, hot breath singing in my ear. “Hush, little darlin. We can’t have my family lumbering through the woods to answer your call. You offered yourself here on the altar of nature, and I took what was mine. No one else is allowed to see you like this.”
I panted, staring into his blazing eyes. The trees stood as silent sentinels, tall and ancient, their leaves whispering secrets to the night. The moonlight filtered through the fluttering canopy, creating intricate patterns of light and shadow around us. Under their protective shroud, I knew one thing with absolute certainty. I was crazy about this man.