Twenty-Six
Amelia
We lie in the bed, pressed together, his arm around me, listening to our breathing return to normal.
My mind can’t focus, my thoughts in disarray. He’s been back barely half an hour, and I attacked him and then we fucked. He’s injured. How is he injured? What did he say to Lucy? Why is he bleeding?
I’m still furious with him, but it’s warring with the relief of seeing him again, my worry for him, and anger at myself. I didn’t just let him fuck me, I wanted him to. I’m awash with endorphins. His cum is leaking from me and trickling down my thigh.
Four weeks since he pinned me across a terrace table. Two weeks of breaking into my apartment, and now two weeks without him, and I all but throw myself at him when I see him again. How has it come to this?
“You’re thinking loudly,” Van Wyk murmurs. “Why don’t you relax, and enjoy the moment?”
Relaxed is what I am not.
I sit up, pulling my bathrobe around my nakedness, glaring down at him. It’s effort wasted; he has his eyes closed. “Why don’t you answer some questions? Where have you been? Why did you leave me without a word? What the hell did you say to my sister?”
He sighs, reaching out blindly to find my hip, like the contact is reassuring. “It’s complicated.”
“I don’t care how complicated it is,” I say, my anger rising. “I deserve to know.” Two weeks of nothing but frustration, and I’m ready to take it out on him. Again.
I pull away from his touch, climbing off the bed, needing to pace. My legs are still unsteady, but I don’t let that stop me.
“You abandoned me in this goddamn house! I’ve got nothing to do, I can’t even reach anyone, and no one will let me leave.”
He sits up, propping his back against the headboard, watching me. “You’re safe here.”
“I’m a prisoner! Tony and Jorge follow me everywhere.”
“They’re your bodyguards.”
“They’re my jailers.” I hiss the word. “Don’t try to deny it.” I gesture angrily. “And you! No word for two weeks, then you walk back in here bleeding!”
His lips twitch like he might smile if he knew how.
That earns him a glare. “Is this funny?”
“Not at all. I was only thinking how cute you always look when you’re angry, and your robe has slipped. It’s very distracting.”
I gape at him, then close my mouth with a snap and tighten my robe. “Don’t change the subject, Van Wyk.”
“Lukas,” he says, tapping his chest. He points at me. “Amelia.” Back to himself. “Lukas.”
I’m not in the mood for his Tarzan-Jane impressions. “You owe me answers, Van Wyk.”
He shakes his head, and this time the corner of his mouth curls up. “You’re so stubborn.”
“Answers.” I pull one of the chairs from the table, spin it around, and sit. Cross my legs and my arms, and look at him expectantly.
“We do need to talk,” he agrees, his tone flat.
I tense. I know that voice. It’s the one he uses before he threatens someone—or kills them.
“Steven Serranto was using artwork to launder money for the Volkov Bratva, a Russian mafia family,” he says without preamble. “He was a shestvorka, the lowest rank there is, but he still had enough influence to send them after you.”
His words take a moment to register, then fear rushes through me, chilling my blood. My throat closes, and it’s an effort to swallow. “The mafia? You can’t be serious.”
He lifts a hand to me. “Little Stray, come here.”
“No.” I stand up, pacing again. I need to think.
Serranto was a creepy bastard, but I thought he was all bluster, too weak to be part of some organized crime syndicate. It’s difficult to believe what Van Wyk is telling me, except he’s never lied to me—as far as I know.
Maybe it’s too much time hanging around with a man who always carries a knife and knows how to use it, but the more I think about it, the more the revelation doesn’t surprise me.
Shit. I introduced my sister to a man working for the Russian mafia.
This is all my fault.
The thought hits like a truck, blindsiding me, and my vision blurs. All this because I so catastrophically misjudged Serranto that I genuinely thought he’d be good for Lucy. How could I have been so foolish?
Everything that’s happened since that moment is my punishment. Karma, ensuring I get what I deserve.
“Those men in my apartment knew my gallery had burned,” I say bitterly. “They did it, didn’t they?” I press my hand to my forehead, swaying where I stand. “Then Serranto sent them after me.”
“Yes. They acted without knowing he was dead.”
That tracks, if Serranto instructed them after my last phone call with him. He knew when the exhibition was. He could’ve set it up in advance.
“They had Russian accents.” I have to suppress a shudder at the memory of what they said to me. “But you killed them. Does that mean it’s over?”
I know even as I ask that it isn’t. He wouldn’t be bleeding on the bed if it were.
“Rather the opposite,” he says grimly, confirming my fears. “It’s escalated.”
I look at him in horror. “You’re saying they’re going to keep coming. It’s why you’re injured, isn’t it? What about my sister?”
“I told you I have men watching your sister. She’s safe.”
My shoulders slump in relief. “Is she a prisoner too?”
“No. It’s better she doesn’t know the details.”
“And she accepted that?” I ask in disbelief. “Without a word from me?”
“I have convincing methods,” he says dryly. “On this occasion, it didn’t take that much. We told her about your gallery and Serranto’s involvement, and let her draw her own conclusions. She knows you’re somewhere secure, still under threat, and that any contact might be traced.”
I pause, considering it. I kept Serranto’s threats from her, but she already knew him well enough for Van Wyk to convince her, even as a well-informed stranger.
“What did she say?”
“I don’t know the specifics; I wasn’t there.”
I hug my arms, trying to stop myself from trembling. “Van Wyk, you can’t take on the goddamn mafia. What about—”
He holds up a hand. “We can. I’m not alone.”
“Who do you work for? At the gala, you said you work in security…” I look around at the enormous bedroom, this ridiculous mansion. But of course. “Are you a spy? Is this a government safehouse?”
Van Wyk chuckles softly. “No, it’s mine. And I work for Bastien Fournier. But you’re cute, Little Stray. A spy? That’s almost romantic.”
I blush, looking down. I knew about Fournier already, but it could’ve been a cover. Maybe I got carried away, but I’m not used to dealing with dead bodies, the mafia, and threats to my life.
And now I’ve got Van Wyk involved. His injuries prove that. He’s endangered himself, protecting me. That’s what he’s been doing these last two weeks, when I thought he had simply abandoned me.
My monster. My protector. Sitting there, watching me, while he bleeds on the sheets. It doesn’t erase the anger or loneliness, but it softens the harshest edges. Van Wyk is such a powerful man, it feels wrong seeing him in any state of vulnerability.
“How badly are you injured?”
“It’s a scratch.” He pulls up the side of his shirt. There’s a white pad strapped to his flank with surgical tape, but the center of it has soaked through bright crimson, glistening wet with his blood.
“Jesus.” I cross to the end of the bed, unable to take my eyes off him. “That’s not a goddamn scratch.”
“It looks worse than it is. Our earlier… exuberance tore my stitches.”
When I attacked him. Or when he spanked and fucked me. Or all three.
But no matter how he downplays it, it’s obvious the wound isn’t minor at all. Bad enough to be stitched up, and there’s so much blood.
Guilt swells through me, and I have to swallow bile. He’s injured because of me. All of this is because of me and my stupidity, my na?veté.
“It’s all my fault.” Tears prickle my eyes, and I blink them back.
“Like I said, it’s complicated.” He lets his shirt fall and gestures at the bed. “Sit down, Little Stray.”
I slump on the foot of the bed. “I’m so sorry I dragged you into this.”
“I’m not,” he says bluntly. “I know how these men work, and how they treat their women. If we hadn’t met, you’d be Serranto’s toy by now.”
I cringe at the thought, hugging my arms, my skin crawling.
“Instead, I’m yours,” I whisper.
“Do you think that’s the same thing?” he asks, voice hardening. “I assure you it’s not. I would never harm you. They, on the other hand…” He trails off, clenching his jaw, letting the words hang.
I shiver, thinking of the men in my apartment and how evil they were, just like Serranto. Sometimes, I hate being a woman. So weak and vulnerable, prey to men like that.
“No,” I say. “I don’t think it’s the same.” Van Wyk is different. Dominant and controlling, yes, but he also honors his word, acts with civility and is strangely playful. “I don’t think it’s the same at all.”
Yet I’m still his prey.
“Good,” he says, with obvious relief. “That will make this next bit easier.”
My stress spikes. How can there be anything worse than what he’s already told me? “What next bit?”
“You already know the Volkovs are aware of you,” he says. “But it’s not just you. They’re also aware of Bastien. And… of me.”
I hold up a hand. “Wait, wait, wait. Are you saying you’ve dragged me into some kind of turf war?”
“Crude, but not inaccurate.”
So it’s not my fault after all. It’s entirely his.
My anger returns with a vengeance, and I’m on my feet, pacing through the room again. I spin, glaring at him. “I’m a prisoner in this goddamn house because you started a war with the Volkovs, and now they’re targeting me?”
He shifts on the bed, looking awkward. “We were stepping around each other until it… escalated.”
“That’s what you said earlier.”
“Right. Technically, there was no conflict until I killed Serranto and two of their boyeviki—their soldiers. So the fault is mine.”
Yet he did that because of me. So it’s not on him, after all. It’s absolutely on me.
“So now there’s a conflict?” I ask, voice small, my anger fading as quickly as it came, leaving only guilt and fear.
“Yes, now there is.” He pauses. “They may also be aware of your sister, even though they haven’t yet acted.”
My pulse thuds in my ears. “You said she was safe!”
“She will be, yes.”
“Will be?” I echo, my voice rising in alarm. “What the hell does that mean?”
“I’ve… made arrangements to ensure her safety. And yours.”
There’s something in his tone, and the way he’s looking at me. I know whatever he’s done will come at a price. Who is paying it? Him? Me?
“What arrangements?” I breathe, not wanting to know.
“I told you how the Volkovs treat women.”
“Like dirt,” I say bitterly. I saw that from the men in my apartment in the few seconds they were alive. Their deaths don’t trouble me in the slightest.
His voice falls flat. “They have no compunction targeting you to get to me.”
I swallow hard. “So the bodyguards are actually bodyguards, not merely jailers.” Is that my safety? Tony and Jorge between me and the Bratva? It doesn’t feel particularly safe. Is anything enough against something like this?
“Indeed. However, family comes under different rules. Family is protected.”
“Family?” I don’t miss that he uses the word twice. I grip my arms until my knuckles whiten, watching him as a horrible suspicion forms.
“It’s something of an honor system,” he continues. “If they know you’re linked to me, they won’t touch you, or by association, your sister.”
“What do you mean linked?”
“We’re getting married,” he says.
I laugh, a hysterical note to it. It has to be a joke.
But he’s not smiling, just sitting there watching me.
My laughter fades. “Are you serious?”
“Never more so.”
I can’t believe this. “You’re proposing to me while you’re sitting there, bleeding on the bed?”
“Technically, I didn’t propose to you,” he says, voice emotionless. “I’m informing you. It’s going to happen.”
I hold up a hand, trying desperately to get a grip on the moment. But how can I get a grip on something as outlandish as this? “You’re saying the only way to protect my sister and me is if I marry you.”
“It protects me, too,” he says. “This way, you can’t be used against me.”
“That almost implies you care.”
“Of course I care, Little Stray,” he says softly.
“A marriage of convenience.” I laugh bitterly. Who still does that?
He inclines his head. “If it helps.”
I bite my lip, thinking of my sister unaware of all of this, and completely unprotected. Thinking of myself, locked in this gilded prison.
“How long?” I need to know before I agree.
“In two weeks,” he says.
Shit. That’s fast.
“That’s not what I meant,” I say, my voice sounding distant in my own ears. “How long will we need to be married for?”
“It won’t be a sham.” He says it like the idea offends him. “Make no mistake, Amelia. You’ll be wearing my ring, using my last name, and taking my cock for the rest of your life.”
I stare at him, desperately trying to think of something to say, and not focusing on what he plans to do with his cock.
“That’s ludicrous,” I blurt, but the word isn’t strong enough. “I’ve known you four weeks, and you’ve been away half of that time.”
“So we’ve been together two. Long enough.”
“Long enough?” My eyebrows go up. “Been together? Is that what you call it when you break into my apartment and chain me to my bed?”
He stands up, prowling toward me. I take a pace back, swallowing hard. He keeps coming, and I hit the table behind me, hemmed in against it.
“I know everything I need to know,” he says softly. “I’m taking you as my wife.”
Why can I only focus on taking you? I swallow, my mouth dry.
He leans in, his chest inches from mine, and I can’t look away. “This is the only choice,” he says. “The only way to ensure you and your sister are protected.”
“Is that why you’re doing it?” I ask, voice tight. “For us?”
“Every marriage is a balance.” His hand closes gently around my throat, and I shiver at the touch. His thumb presses beneath my chin, pushing it up. Is he going to kiss me? “You need a protector, and I need a wife.”
He’s already had one, and I still don’t know what happened to her. “What for?”
“Someone to hold at night,” he murmurs.
He’s so close, our breath is mingling. His subtle cologne drifts over me, sandalwood and bergamot. Beneath lies the scent of our sex and the sharp metallic tang of his blood.
“What about happiness?” I ask desperately. “Doesn’t that matter?”
“Yes, but your life matters more. So does your sister’s.” His head tilts as he regards me. “Will you choose what’s most important?”
My hands are gripping the table behind me so hard that my fingers ache.
I need that pain, only wishing it was stronger.
He’s inches away, his blood on my robe, his breath on my cheek, and I look at him.
Really look at him. The stubble, the dark stain on his black shirt, the steadiness of those steel-grey eyes, and I think of Lucy, of the terrace, and his name on my lips in the dark.
“I… will.” We both know what I’m really agreeing to.
He grins at me, natural and open. There are even dimples. I’ve never seen them before, and they’re kind of cute. “I’m getting married,” he says. “I couldn’t be happier.”
Then he pulls me against him, and his mouth finds mine.