Chapter 34 Come In With the Rain
Come In With the Rain
Anika
Agaze reminiscent of frost covered blades of grass pinned her to the spot. His heat encompassed every exposed plane of her skin. Unable to speak the words caught in the back of her throat, Anika let Mikko’s faint touch graze along her skin.
And it felt so, so good.
His fingers danced across her forearms and shoulders. Lingered on her collar bones and skipped over the fluttering pulse in her neck. Her nerves had her knees trembling, a feeling she hadn’t experienced in years—since one night long ago.
What was happening to her?
“Oh, malyshka, you have no idea what you do to me.” His voice was smooth and deep, a hint of his Russian accent evident. He usually curbed it, unwilling to let people associate him with his father’s homeland, but right now, he didn’t seem to mind.
A single fingertip trailed along the edge of her jaw, the pad memorizing her bone structure.
“You should hate me,” she said, tongue coming unstuck from the roof of her mouth.
“I could never hate you.” Another touch. “It would be like hating myself.”
Anika was quick to retort. “Liar.”
“Look deeper, malyshka. We’re more alike than you’d like to admit.”
The intensity in his gaze was too much to look at, her mind struggling to stay put and not spiral.
Flicking her eyes up, she focused on a single dark strand of hair hanging over his forehead.
Why did he have to be so devastating? That was the only word she could think of when she saw him.
And untouchable. Certainly not someone she should be lusting after.
Mikko’s thumb pulled on her bottom lip. “This mouth,” her skin heated as he spoke, “it says things I wish I was bold enough to say.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do. And this heart…” his fingers settled over its rapid beating, “it’s wicked and corrupt. A mirror of mine.”
“No.”
Leaning down, he ignored her and planted a kiss right where his hand had been.
The thin material of her sleepwear did little to mitigate the heat of his lips.
And it hardly hid her nipples. Looking back up at her, Mikko grinned.
He’d noticed. Before she could protest or voice her embarrassment, his mouth closed over one of the hardened peaks.
The warmth of his mouth had her shuddering as he sucked, desire coiling low within her stomach.
A moan tore from her mouth as he pinched her other nipple.
Pulling away, the now cooling wet spot on her shirt was vastly at odds with the heat of his mouth.
The difference had her mind stuttering. Kneeling, Mikko’s touch slipped beneath the elastic waistband of her sleep shorts.
Anika’s spine was ramrod straight even as her muscles threatened to turn to liquid.
She was pulled between desire and guilt.
Either way, her body was on the edge of combusting.
“What are you doing?” she gasped.
In a wordless response, he leisurely pulled her shorts down. She knew she should’ve stopped him, yanked his hands away, but she did nothing. Anika was too entranced by him, his reverent position altering her brain chemistry.
Mikko kept her sleep shorts wrapped around her thighs, his hands clutching the delicate fabric as if he was sure she’d slip through his fingers. Maybe she would; her head was filled with buzzing, and a dizziness threatened to overtake her.
“Let me worship you.” His lips skimmed across her hip bone. “Let me make it up to you.” A soft kiss planted right atop her landing strip. “Let me beg.”
With a hand clasped over her mouth in an attempt to stifle the sounds she made—not that it mattered—Anika watched as the man she’d vowed to hate dipped his tongue between her legs.
At first, he was gentlemanly, a patient man who was waiting for the signal to feast. For a moment, he was content to let her quiver above him at the behest of his damn mouth.
A flutter of dark lashes and sinful glimmer in his eyes was the only image she needed to fall off the edge she’d been hanging onto. The pillowy softness embracing her heart as blood hummed in her ears and dampened the logic rattling around in her head.
Why had she held back for this long?
Her mind couldn’t remember, couldn’t find a reason to care.
One long lick of his tongue against her clit had the tensions holding her body together bursting free. Anika felt too big for her skin, the sensation tight all while another feeling coiled low in her stomach.
It was all too easy to fall into his touch, his lips expertly sucking at her clit while his tongue tasted honeyed ichor dripping from between her thighs.
She ached to weave her fingers into his hair and pull him close and thrust her wet cunt onto his face as punishment, but she had the feeling he’d like it.
Fuck.
Pulling back, his pale skin glistening with her arousal, Mikko grinned up at her. He was a madman finally given a taste of his cure. “You positively melt on my tongue, malyshka.” His fingers gripped her thighs tighter. “A sweetened essence I’ve been craving for far too long.”
It was as if cotton had been stuffed into her ears and mouth; her words were nonexistent as the world dimmed. She nodded along with his praise. It’d been too long since a man had made her feel this way.
Mikko had a habit of stealing everything from her, and she internally cursed his ability to do that.
Relenting as her body trembled, her hand finally slipped into his midnight hair.
Pulling him closer, his warm breath washed over her throbbing pussy.
Her muscles tightened, pleasure lapping at her insides just as he was licking at her most intimate parts.
Deep down, a darkness slithered free, her body ravenous—craving carnal desires she’d long since locked away.
Too late to stop it now…
A LARGE GUST of wind shook Anika’s house, and the sound of rain pitting against the panes accompanied it.
The storm raged on outside, the clamoring of nearby tree branches startling her awake though her eyes remained closed.
Her mind slowly surfaced from the depths of sleep, groggy and reluctant to relinquish the slumber she’d succumbed to.
Or maybe more so the dream she’d been having, desperately clinging to the fading memories she’d awoken from.
Fingertips skimming the surface of her skin.
Stolen kisses and breathless sighs.
Cool air brushed across her bare shoulder, her blanket tossed aside mindlessly in her sleep.
While she’d been warm inside the recesses of her mind, the air shifted as she continued to wake, goosebumps erupting over her skin.
Reluctant to move too much, Anika curled into herself, searching for warmth.
The storm outside rumbled, lightning flashing across her room.
What time was it?
She cracked open one eye, assessing the amount of light streaming in through her open curtains. It was almost completely dark, a hint of soft glow from the muted street lamps outside the only thing making its way into her bedroom. Dawn was still a couple hours away, if she had to guess.
Remaining relatively still, she burrowed down into her pillow, closing her eyes and hoping to slip back into sleep before the sun rose, but a noise echoed throughout her house.
Not a noise, but a creak.
Her muscles tensed.
The stairs.
Her old house made specific noises, settling and groaning under the touch of gravity and weather, but this was inconsistent. The stairs only creaked like that when she stepped on them. Which meant—
Someone was in her house.
Ice filled her veins, and a cold sweat collected on her skin.
Reaching across the remainder of her bed, her fingers brushed across the outline of her small gun safe. Quickly, she unlocked it, and only once the weapon was clutched in her grasp did her heart slow.
As quietly as she could she crawled across her mattress, angling herself toward the entrance into her room.
With one hand keeping the gun pointed at the closed door, the other kept her balance as she maneuvered over rumpled sheets.
Nearing the edge of her mattress, her mind prepped to face whatever was on the other side of her bedroom door—whoever dared to break in.
If it was Mikko again, she really was going to shoot him.
It’s what he gets for kissing me…again. And haunting my dreams.
All thoughts of violence in her head drained away as her free hand brushed across damp coldness on her mattress. Her pulse spiked.
“What the fuck,” she whispered, voice laced with uncertainty.
Eyes flicking between the door and the wet spot she’d stumbled across on her bed, her hand traced the indent of what had been a person.
Anika’s eyes pricked with tears, her lids unblinking because of adrenaline all while her heart galloped in her chest so forcefully she was sure it was going to burst through flesh.
Despite her dreams, she’d woken up dry. As if reaffirming her thoughts, the smell of wet earth assaulted her nose. Rainwater. And her mind instantly pictured a certain someone.
Emerald hued eyes and an incessant need to be right.
Sleep no longer clinging to her bones, she quietly slipped from her bed in hopes of catching him and showing him how good her aim had gotten.
Lightning flashed, the harsh light slanting across her wood floors.
The relief she should’ve felt at not seeing any silhouettes during that flicker was erased by a new discovery.
A more chilling one.
A puddle of rainwater had accumulated at her door along with stray droplets. It looked as if someone had come in from outside to stand there and watch her sleep. Anika shivered again, her tank top and shorts unable to keep the chill from her skin.
Not only had Mikko stood and watched her sleep, but he’d also been in her bed.
Anika’s eyes shifted from the puddle—one she could no longer see since the darkness had taken over again—and the wet spot on her bed.
How long had I slept with him watching me?