Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Vittoria
Iopen the door.
Dmitri moves so fast I don't register it until my back hits the wall. His body cages mine, one hand flat against the wallpaper beside my head, the other—
His fingers wrap around my throat. Not hard. Not painful. Just there. A promise and a threat braided together.
"Dmitri—" I start to protest, but the word dies in my mouth because I don't actually want him to stop.
His eyes burn into mine, reading every micro-expression, every flutter of my pulse against his palm. He knows. He always knows.
Then he kisses me.
It's not gentle. It's not sweet. His mouth claims mine like he's been starving for weeks and I'm the only thing that can save him. His tongue sweeps past my lips, tasting, taking, demanding everything I have.
My hands find his chest, fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt.
His grip on my throat tightens just enough to make my head spin, and I melt into him instead.
When he pulls back, we're both breathing hard. His thumb traces my jaw, feather-light against my flushed skin.
"Beautiful," he murmurs, more to himself than to me.
Then he lifts his other hand.
The controller sits in his palm like a grenade with the pin already pulled.
Panic floods my system. "Don't you dare—"
His thumb presses the button.
The vibration hits me like lightning, stealing every thought from my head. My knees buckle, and I grab his forearms just to stay upright. The moan that escapes my lips is embarrassing—desperate and needy and loud.
"That's it, solnyshko." His voice drops to a rough whisper against my ear. "Let me hear you."
"I can't—" I gasp, nails digging into his skin through the shirt. "Someone will—"
"No one's coming." His lips brush my temple. "Just you."
The vibration intensifies. Or maybe it's the same and I'm just losing my mind. Every nerve ending in my body focuses on that single point of sensation, building and building until I can't breathe.
"You're so wet for me." His teeth graze my earlobe. "Have been all night. Sitting across from me, pretending you weren't dripping, pretending you didn't want exactly this."
"Dmitri—" His name comes out broken, fractured.
"I know, malyshka." He kisses the corner of my mouth. "I know what you need."
His free hand slides down my body, over my hip, fingers pressing against my thigh through the dress. Not touching where I need him most. Just there. Adding pressure without relief.
"Please—"
The word slips out before I can stop it.
His smile curves against my cheek. "There it is."
He kisses me again, swallowing my moans as the pleasure crests. His tongue strokes mine in the same rhythm as the vibrations, and I shatter.
The orgasm tears through me like wildfire, stealing my breath, my balance, my sanity. I grip his arms so hard I might leave bruises, and I don't care. Can't care. Can't think about anything except the waves of sensation rolling through my body.
When I finally come down, trembling and boneless against the wall, Dmitri clicks off the controller.
His hand leaves my throat to cup my face, tilting it up. His kiss this time is softer. Almost tender. A reward for giving him what he wanted.
What I wanted, a treacherous voice whispers.
He pulls back, his eyes searching my face.
"Good girl," he murmurs.
Then he steps away.
Cool air rushes into the space between us, and I sag against the wall, legs still shaking.
Dmitri straightens his cuffs like nothing happened. Like he didn't just make me come apart in a restaurant toilet.
"Dinner's getting cold," he says, that infuriating smirk playing at his lips. "I'll tell Elio you needed a moment."
He walks away.
I stand there, heart pounding, dress askew, mind reeling.
I press my palms flat against the cool tile wall and force myself to breathe.
In. Out. In. Out.
My legs still tremble.
That bastard.
He walked away. Just walked away.
I catch my reflection in the mirror. Flushed cheeks. Swollen lips. Eyes too bright, too wild. I look like a woman who just got thoroughly ruined.
Because I did.
A laugh bubbles up from my chest. I clamp my hand over my mouth to muffle it.
He's going to regret that so fucking bad.
The thought settles into my bones, and suddenly I'm not trembling anymore. A slow smile spreads across my face.
Dmitri Baganov thinks he won this round.
He thinks he broke me, reduced me to a begging, moaning mess he can control with a button.
He's wrong.
This was perfect. This was exactly what I needed to understand him. He showed me his hand tonight. His need for control, his obsession with my reactions, his weakness for my surrender.
Information is power. And Dmitri just handed me a loaded weapon.
I turn on the faucet and wet a paper towel, pressing it against my heated cheeks. The cool dampness helps clear my head. I clean myself up as best I can, grimacing at the slickness between my thighs. Dripping wasn't an exaggeration.
My hand pauses at my hip.
The vibrator.
I should take it out. The logical part of my brain screams at me to remove the evidence of his control.
But where would I put it?
This dress has no pockets. My clutch is the size of a credit card. I can't exactly stroll back to the table with a rose gold vibrator in my hand while Elio watches.
Cazzo.
I adjust my dress, smooth down the silk, and decide the vibrator stays where it is.
I check my reflection one final time. Perfect. Composed. Like nothing happened at all.
Game on, Baganov.
I push open the bathroom door and step into the restaurant.
The ambient noise washes over me. Everything looks exactly as it did before. The other diners have no idea that ten feet away, a Russian mobster made a Sartori princess come so hard in the toilet.
I keep my spine straight, my chin high.
Then I see him.
Dmitri sits at our table, one arm draped casually over the back of his chair, a glass of wine in his other hand. He looks completely relaxed. Satisfied. Like a predator who just finished a successful hunt.
Our eyes meet across the room.
His gaze tracks my approach, cataloging every detail. I watch his expression shift, just barely. A flicker of surprise. Then something darker. Hungrier.
Good.
He expected me to come back shaken. Embarrassed. Maybe even angry enough to storm out.
Instead, I'm walking toward him like I own this restaurant and everyone in it.
I slide into my seat across from him, reaching for my wine glass like nothing happened.
Elio is standing closer now. He's sensed that there is tension between us.
"Elio," I say sweetly, not breaking eye contact with Dmitri. "Could you give us a moment?"
My guard hesitates. I feel his confusion without looking at him.
"Just five minutes," I add. "I promise I won't stab him with a butter knife."
Elio mutters something under his breath but moves to a table near the entrance, far enough to give us privacy but close enough to intervene if needed.
Dmitri watches me with those calculating eyes, trying to read the shift in my demeanor.
"You seem... recovered," he says carefully.
"I am." I take a slow sip of wine, letting the silence stretch. "That was fun."
His eyebrow twitches. "Fun."
"Mmm." I set down my glass.
I lean forward slightly, lowering my voice.
"Sooner or later, you're going to fuck me, Dmitri. We both know it." The words come out steadier than I feel. "I want you to. I'm not going to pretend otherwise."
His grip tightens on his wine glass. The only crack in his composure.
"But." I hold up one finger. "You're not going to win that easy. You think sending me a toy and making me come in public means you've got me figured out?"
I stand, smoothing down my dress.
"You haven't even scratched the surface."
I turn and walk away, feeling his stare burn into my back with every step.
Your move, Baganov.
Dmitri
I sit at the table like a man who's been shot but hasn't noticed the wound yet. The waiter approaches, takes one look at my face, and retreats.
Her words loop through my skull. The confidence in her voice. The way she walked away without looking back, spine straight, chin lifted, that fucking dress clinging to curves I can still feel under my palms.
She's wrong. I've figured her out perfectly.
What I miscalculated was myself.
The controller sits heavy in my pocket. Useless now. I pull it out, turn it over in my fingers. Rose gold. Completely inadequate for the woman who wore its companion piece to dinner with her bodyguard three feet away.
Vittoria Sartori looked me dead in the eyes and told me I hadn't won.
Blyad.
I drain my whiskey. The burn does nothing to settle the heat coiling low in my gut. Her moans still echo in my ears—those desperate little sounds she tried to swallow, the way her body arched into mine, her nails digging into my forearm hard enough to leave marks.
The waiter reappears with the check. I sign without looking, leave enough cash to buy his silence, and pull out my phone.
Yuri answers on the first ring. "Boss."
"Where is she?"
"SUV just passed the Lake Forest exit. Heading to the compound."
Home. Safe behind walls and guards and brothers who would gut me if they knew what I just did to their sister in a restaurant bathroom.
"Keep eyes on her until she's inside."
"Understood." Another pause. "Everything went well?"
I laugh. It sounds hollow even to me. "She's going to be the death of me, Yuri."
"You say this like it's news."
I end the call and sit back, letting the weight of the evening press down on my chest.
Tonight, I proved exactly what I am.
I pushed too hard, too fast. But she wore it. Sat across from me with that challenge burning in her dark eyes, daring me to do something about it.
So I did.
And now I'm sitting alone in a restaurant with a raging erection and the taste of her still on my lips.
Maybe not. But I know this: she didn't take it out. I'm sure she didn't. When she walked away, when she dismissed her guard, when she leaned across the table and delivered that devastating line, she was still wearing my gift.
My cock throbs at the thought.
I adjust myself under the table, grateful the restaurant is nearly empty. The staff pretends not to notice their most dangerous customer sitting motionless in a private booth, staring at nothing.
I should go home. Take a cold shower. Review the security reports Igor left on my desk. Do anything except what I actually want to do, which is follow her back to that compound, climb through her bedroom, and finish what we started.
Balls deep inside her.
The image hits me like a fist to the gut. Vittoria spread beneath me, all that fire and defiance softening as I push inside her. Those sharp eyes going hazy. Her mouth forming my name.
I've imagined it a thousand times since the gala. Since she looked at me like I was something dangerous and then ran.
My phone buzzes. Yuri again.
She's inside. Gate secured.
I type back: Good. Stand down for tonight.
I'm halfway to my car when my phone buzzes again. Not Yuri this time.
Aleksander.
My thumb hovers over the screen. I should have called him after what happened with Natalia. Should have checked in, made sure she was okay after discovering those journals. Instead, I've been too consumed with Vittoria.
I answer. "Brother."
"You didn't call." Aleksander's voice carries no accusation. Just fact. He's always been the calm one, the peacemaker among us. The one who smooths over the damage I leave in my wake.
"I know." I lean against the car, letting the cold Chicago air cut through the heat still simmering under my skin. "How is she?"
"Better." A pause. Aleksander exhales. "The horse thing helped. She spent three hours in the stables yesterday. Named the foal Mishka."
Little bear. Something loosens in my chest. "Good."
"It was a kind lie, Dmitri. Telling her Papa wanted her to name it."
"Papa would have wanted her to stop crying." The words come out harsher than I intend. "I gave her something to do. That's all."
Aleksander doesn't push. He never does. That's what makes him dangerous in his own way. He waits, patient as stone, until you crack open on your own.
"Karolina's staying at the estate for a few more days," he continues. "She's worried about Natalia being alone."
"Natalia has staff. Guards. She's not alone."
"You know what I mean."
I do. Karolina has always been the mother hen, even though she's younger than me by eleven years.
"Tell Karolina to take whatever time she needs," I say. "The family can spare her."
"I will." Another pause. Longer this time. I hear ice clinking in a glass. Aleksander's drinking. That's not like him. "How is he, Dmitri? Papa. How is he really?"
The question lands like a blow to the solar plexus.
I stare at the restaurant entrance, watching a young couple emerge laughing. They have no idea that twenty feet away, a man stands contemplating how to tell his brother their father is dying.
"Not well." The admission scrapes my throat raw.
Silence. Then Aleksander's breath, shaky and sharp.
"Blyad." His voice cracks. "Does he—is he in pain?"
"They manage it. Morphine. Other things." I run a hand through my hair, suddenly exhausted. "He's lucid most days. Still giving orders. Still telling me I'm not ready to be pakhan."
"You've been ready for years."
"He doesn't think so." The bitterness leaks through before I can stop it. "He wants me married. Settled. A wife to show the other families I'm stable."
"And the Sartori girl?"
My jaw tightens. "What about her?"
"You're pursuing her. Igor told me."
Of course he did. Igor and Aleksander have been close since childhood. No secrets between them.
"It's complicated."
Aleksander laughs, but there's no humor in it. "With you, brother, it's always complicated. You don't do anything the simple way."
"She's..." I trail off, searching for words that don't exist. How do I explain Vittoria Sartori?
"She's unique," I finally say. "She's not afraid of me."
"Everyone's afraid of you, Dmitri."
"Not her." I think of her eyes in that bathroom, dark and defiant even as she shattered in my arms. "She looks at me like I'm a problem with a solution."
"Maybe you are."
"Maybe." I push off the car. "I should let you go. It's late."