Chapter 17 Leanna #2
Still, a plan is forming in my head, and it will require significant resources that my father can’t track. So I accepted it, a pile of bound bills that I added to the money already stashed in a box in my closet.
“Hello,” I say softly, even though I know he heard the handle turn, the door open, the faint click as it shut behind me.
The slow, sensual music fills the room like a breath.
“Ana,” he answers.
I close the space between us, eager to get to him.
He reaches out for my hand, pulling me close. I straddle his legs as he puts both hands on my back, lips finding my neck. He inhales deeply.
“Have I ever told you how much I love this smell?”
I feel heat rising to my cheeks at the compliment. “No, you haven’t.”
“Well, it drives me fucking crazy,” he nearly growls. “I dream of it. I look for you whenever I smell something even close. I wonder, could this be her? Could this be my Ana?”
His Ana.
My core goes molten at this idea, at the thought of belonging to this man.
And I know, pragmatically, that it’s not love he feels.
Not really.
It’s ownership, a sense of control.
I only dance for him. He pays me to be his.
Even if things had been different, if we hadn’t met this way, if this hadn’t tainted our experience, it could never have worked for either of us.
My useless, inexperienced heart, however, lurches at the thought. It doesn’t want some man my father vetted and deemed acceptable.
It wants Nik.
Aloof, strange, enigmatic Nik.
Nik, who clearly has a dark side.
Nik, who seemingly never stops working.
Nik, who raised his teenage sister when he was barely a teenager himself.
Nik, who told me just last week that he barely showed up for school some years, said he was so angry at the loss of his parents. There was nothing for his adoptive family to do but give him hockey as an outlet.
“You’ve never seen me,” I say. “Do you think, if you passed me on the street, you would sense it was me?”
“If you were wearing that perfume, yes,” he answers, pulling me closer, teeth scraping across my collarbone.
A shiver races down my spine at the thought of him spotting me in a crowd, recognizing me by scent alone.
“I hope that happens someday,” I say, head falling back to give his talented mouth more access to my bare skin.
Nik’s fingers tangle in my hair, holding me steady while his lips and teeth explore sensitive places I never knew existed. I gasp, hips pressing against the hard length straining beneath his pants.
His chuckle vibrates against my skin. “Do you?”
“Mmmhmm.” The sound escapes on a breathy hum as I grind closer.
“What do you think would happen, malyskha, if I found you on the street one day?
I can only imagine. “I don’t know,” I say, but even I can hear that I don’t sound convincing.
Nik chuckles again, his breath and sounds reverberating against my chest. “Liar. You’ve thought about it. Tell me.”
I have thought about it.
A lot.
Too often.
Alone in the dark, with my hand between my thighs, whispering his name like a sin.
He yanks my head back with the hand twisted in my hair, enough to remind me who’s in control, not enough to hurt.
“You’re safe here, Ana. Tell me what you fantasize about.”
I swallow, close my eyes, and let the words spill.
“I’m walking down the street. I’ve got a dress on and heels.
Maybe I’m looking at my phone, so we bump into each other.
Not so hard, just enough that I have to lift my head and mumble an apology.
And you’re just really big, tall, broad-shouldered.
So much taller than me that I have to tilt my head back to meet your eyes.
And I notice your mouth. I’d know those lips anywhere. But you… You don’t recognize me.”
“You’d know these lips anywhere?” Nik says in his low, growling bass.
His mouth crashes onto mine—hard, claiming. Teeth clashing, tongues tangling. I moan into him, already wet, already desperate for his hands on me.
He pulls back just enough to rasp, “Don’t I know you, though, Ana? Don’t I know this hair, these breasts? Don’t I know the sounds you make when you come? Haven’t I tasted you? Touched every inch of these legs, the softness of this face? I would know you. I do know you.”
“You know my body,” I breathe. “Not me. Not truly.”
“Oh?” he asks, and there is a challenge in that word.
“I know you’re educated, smart. I know your family has high expectations for your role in the family business and that you’re conflicted about it.
I know you believe in duty and loyalty, but struggle with whether or not you can offer those things to your family. ”
“But that’s not…me.”
“You. You’re the woman who doesn’t back down. The one who would walk into an unknown place on a dare. Who would come with a masked stranger and then come back again, and again, just to find a place to retreat? A woman who does not give her body freely yet somehow found solace with a monster.”
“Is that what you are?” I whisper. “A monster?”
“Some would say that, yes.”
I should be afraid. Any other woman would be frightened. But I’m a Campisi, and I know monsters. Nik isn’t one. Not to me.
“You didn’t finish your story,” he says when I don’t respond. “Do I know you? When we meet on the street. When you look up and meet my gaze, do I know you?”
“You do,” I say.
And I tell him my fantasy as he fingers me to glorious release.