Chapter 2
TWO
MICAH
Kissing Ilya isn’t like kissing Adam.
It’s both more intense and less all at the same time, like something wonderful and forbidden and satisfying. It’s electrifying.
It makes me feel alive.
It should be a good thing. It should make me smile.
Instead, it makes me want to cry.
It’s not real.
None of this is real.
It’s never going to be real.
I pull back, blinking a few times to clear my vision.
I can’t do this.
I have to do this.
I lick my lips, chasing the taste of him. It should be foul; I know who he is, what he is, and that knowledge should make this unbearable.
Instead, I’m all too aware of how gently he kisses, how gently he smiles, and it’s so at odds with how Adam looks at me that I can’t quite reconcile it in my head.
So I don’t bother trying.
“I like kissing you,” I whisper instead. “Do you want to do it some more?”
“I do.” Ilya pulls me closer, until our thighs are touching. He gently strokes my jaw, rubbing his thumb over my lips. “I liked it.”
Is that true? I love kissing, but Adam only does it when he wants to butter me up, when he wants something from me—or when he’s trying to atone for things I’d rather not think about. Maybe Ilya is the same.
I have to play along, though, whether Ilya’s lying or telling the truth.
“I did too.” I feel like I can’t catch my breath.
This isn’t the plan at all.
I wasn’t supposed to try to seduce one of the foremost figures in the Russian underground in New Bristol. I don’t know anything about seduction.
But this is better than our original plan, isn’t it?
I was already shaky about convincing Ilya Zima to hire me as a drug dealer in his organization. I know the slang and the business, but nobody took me seriously even back when I was actively dealing.
Ilya never would have trusted me.
This way, I have something he wants: Me.
My body.
I simply need to convince him to keep me close.
The easiest way to do this is to let him believe he’s sweeping me off my feet.
Ilya kisses me again, more firmly this time, taking control in a way that feels familiar but good at the same time. His salt-and-pepper beard rubs against my skin. It’s softer than I expected, but I’m used to rough stubble, not a well-maintained beard.
Ilya doesn’t move his hand immediately to my groin, and he doesn’t pull my shirt up.
He doesn’t needle me about how boring kisses are and that there’s no point to it.
He’s not only kissing me because he’s trying to be sweet to me after I fucked up and he hit me again.
I push those thoughts away, trying so hard to focus on the here and now. On Ilya.
It feels really, really nice to just kiss someone for once, even if I know Ilya’s only trying to get into my pants.
Ilya groans against my mouth before pulling away. I try to follow his lips, and he laughs again.
“Sorry,” Ilya says. “I should be gentler with you. Your lips will be completely red if I keep going like this.”
“I would be okay with that,” I say. I mean it. I like this. I like this a lot.
I shouldn’t.
I should remember who he is; I shouldn’t get swept up in some illusion that I’m weaving.
I lean in closer to Ilya, beseeching him for another kiss so I don’t have to think about it.
Ilya obliges, and this time he runs his tongue along the seam of my lips.
It’s like he’s asking for permission, although his tongue against my lips feels good on its own.
I open my mouth for him. Ilya moans and slowly winds his tongue inside, exploring my mouth like he truly enjoys all of this for its own sake.
Maybe he does.
Maybe this will be easier than I expected.
Adam’s commands ring in my ears. If you want this, if you want me, you’ll do this. I’m the only thing keeping you out of jail. I don’t care what it takes. You will get close to him, you will find out what he’s up to, and you will report back to me.
This is what I have to do. This is what it takes.
But right now, it feels too easy, like I’m the one being set up instead of the other way around, and I’m wary that I’ve already gotten caught. It’s not likely. More realistically, Ilya will use me and throw me away, and I’ll never have the chance to get close.
I have to try, though.
Ilya cups my jaw and rubs his thumb gently across my chin. “This kissing, it arouses you?” he asks in a whisper.
My face turns red. “What? How—I mean…”
Ilya smiles gently. “It’s fairly easy to tell when a man wants something.” He looks down briefly, and I follow his gaze, down to where my slacks are very clearly tented.
I should’ve realized it was so obvious, but I’m mortified that a simple kiss is getting me hard. I glance at his groin, and I’m at least relieved to find that he’s reacting the same way.
He really does like men, and his only ulterior motive right now is to seduce me.
“Y-yes,” I admit quietly. “Is that too much? I’m sorry.”
My nervousness isn’t even faked. If he finds out what I’m doing, who I am, he’s going to kill me. If I think about that, I’ll mess up. Instead, I need to focus on his kindness, his arousal, the way he’s treating me like I’m something to treasure instead of use.
“No. It’s good. I like seeing that you’re enjoying yourself.” Ilya brushes a strand of my hair aside. “But I need to stop, before I do things that are ungentlemanly to you. Things we can’t do in public.”
Ungentlemanly.
As though a mobster like him could even be gentlemanly at all.
“Who says we need to stay in public?” I blurt out the words, desperate for an in.
He’d invited me home with him. All I have to do is say yes — assuming, of course, that he meant the offer. Adam will want me to establish a… relationship. I think. It was only by chance that Ilya approached me before I got up the nerve to approach him.
Only by luck.
Adam hadn’t said anything about Ilya being gay. Does he know? If he’d known, would he have given me the same cover story?
Maybe they would have sent in a professional instead of me.
I’d have escaped this entire stressful scenario.
I would still be stuck at home, playing my cello for nobody.
Is it bad or good luck that I’m apparently Ilya’s type?
Ilya smiles again. “You are very tempting, Micah.” He leans in to kiss me again. “But I do not want you to think I only want sex. You are too beautiful a man to be a… what do you call them? One night fuck.”
Am I?
Or maybe he’s already rescinding his offer to let me stay with him.
“Thanks,” I say softly.
As though sensing my thoughts, Ilya’s lips find mine again, and the urgency in that kiss is reassuring.
For a few moments, everything is perfect. Nothing feels fake or contrived.
A shadow falls over us.
“What the fuck?” a rough, familiar voice asks.
Ilya breaks the kiss and glares at the man. “You have a problem with two men kissing?”
Adam stares down at us, giving me that look that I know all too well, the one that makes me hyper-aware of how utterly screwed I am.
I don’t understand it.
I don’t understand why Adam is interrupting.
I thought this was what he had wanted, so I don’t understand why the anger in his expression seems real.
This is the opportunity I’ve been waiting for, the reason I’ve come to this particular bar again and again.
Why is he pissed off at me for doing what he’d ordered me to do?
“I have a problem with my partner kissing another man,” Adam says quietly, but not so quietly that I can’t recognize the menace in it. “Micah, get up. We’ll talk about this when we get home.”
Home.
My blood has frozen in my veins.
Did I make a terrible mistake?
Isn’t this what he wanted?
I’d looked at Adam for support, and he’d given me a thumbs up right as Ilya was starting to kiss me. He knew what was about to happen and he’d given me the go-ahead to… to…
To whore myself out.
“I— I—” I stammer.
Ilya pulls me even closer to him, so that I’m half on his lap. “He is coming home with me,” he says in a curt voice. “You can fuck off.”
Something tugs at me as I realize he hadn’t been trying to let me down at all.
Either this mafia man wants to get laid, or he has a heart.
It has to be the former. I can’t believe even for a moment that there might be something good inside of him.
Adam’s face twists into something dark and dangerous for a fraction of a second, just long enough to remind me of what lies under this quiet, mild mask. As it is, he’s barely even trying for his charismatic front. “Micah.”
I squirm against Ilya’s arm and try to pull away, but he doesn’t let go of me. “I need to go,” I whisper.
“You don’t need to go,” Ilya answers flatly, his accent much thicker. “Because you don’t want to go, and no man should make you do something you don’t want to.”
“He’s my partner. I… I misunderstood our… situation.”
Adam had told me in no uncertain terms to get close to Ilya Zima.
Now I’m scared to death that I did misunderstand, that I did something wrong — and I have never, ever fucked up as badly as I have this time.
Not with Adam, at least.
Adam turns his full attention to Ilya. “What do you want?” Adam asks Ilya, less hostile but still on edge. “If you just want a twink to fuck, I see a few out there. You don’t need Micah.”
Ilya’s arm is solid and warm against me. “I don’t want ‘a twink to fuck.’ I was having nice time with Micah, and I want to keep having nice time with Micah.”
I try to keep breathing, but it’s so, so fucking hard. “He didn’t mean it that way,” I say, trying for reassuring but finding my voice cracking. “Ilya and I were just talking—”
“Get a lot of talking done with your tongue down his throat?” Adam snaps at me.
Ilya suddenly stands up and crowds Adam. “Don’t talk to him like that.”