Chapter 18 Ilya
ILYA
Ican still taste her on my lips.
After she locks me out of the guest room, I retreat to my own bedroom and collapse back on the bed, staring at the ceiling as I run my tongue over my mouth and taste the sweetness of her arousal.
It tastes like absolution. Like proof that everything I've done, every line I've crossed, every boundary I've violated, was leading to this moment.
She kissed me first. When challenged with confronting her own desires, she chose to kiss me.
No matter how she feels about it afterward, she can’t take that back.
And now I’ve had her. She’s mine.
My dick twitches, half-hard just from the memory of being inside of her. So fucking tight, so hot, so fucking wet. I never want to wash her off of me, want to keep the scent and slickness of her arousal on my skin forever.
The only way to do that is to ensure that I’m inside her again. As soon, and as often, as possible.
I’d have fucked her tonight until we both passed out if I could.
I reach down, adjusting myself, and I can’t stop myself from sliding my hand beneath the waist of my pants, running my fingers over the hardening length.
I can still feel her arousal on my skin.
I wrap my hand around myself, stroking slowly, groaning at the sensation of jerking myself off with Mara’s arousal still slick and all over me.
I lean my head back into the pillow, jaw tight, eyes closed, running my tongue over my lips and tasting her pussy on my tongue as I remember the way she tensed for me, the way she cried out.
How it felt when she squeezed my cock, pulling me deeper into her.
How her nails clawed at the leather of the couch as she came for me, how she rode my tongue and my length while they were inside of her.
She feels it too. This connection that's been pulling us together since that first moment in Boston. This inevitability. But she ran from me.
She realized what she’d done, what she’d chosen, and she ran.
That lock clicking between us was a rejection of it, but I know it won’t hold.
I know what I felt, and what she felt too, even if she's not ready to admit it yet.
The kiss wasn't a mistake—it was the first honest thing that's happened between us.
Everything else has been pretense and distance, the careful dance of predator and prey.
But in that moment, when her mouth was on mine and her fingers were clutching my shirt, there was only truth.
She wants me as much as I want her.
The thought sends heat through my body, makes my hands clench in the sheets.
I want to go to her. Every instinct I have is screaming at me to get up, walk down the hall, break that flimsy lock and slip into her room.
I want to climb into bed beside her, pull her against me, feel her body curve into mine.
I want to fuck her raw and then hold her while she sleeps, show her that she's safe now. That she'll always be safe with me.
I want to fill her with my cum; keep her dripping with it, every moment of the day.
The thought has my cock throbbing and my balls aching from being aroused too much, for too long.
I’d never fucked a woman without protection before tonight. Never felt the hot, wet, velvet clutch of a pussy around my cock without a thin barrier between us. I’ve never given a woman my cum before.
I saved all that for her. And it was so fucking exquisite. I want to feel it again with a need that borders on a fervor. I want to feel her sliding over my hard length again, want to pump her full of my release, hear her moans, feel her clutch around me…
But I don't move.
She needs space. She needs time to process what happened, to understand that this isn't something to fear. Tomorrow I'll make her see. Tomorrow I'll find the words to explain that what's between us isn't wrong, isn't sick, isn't the violation she thinks it is. It's just... inevitable.
Some things are simply meant to be.
I keep stroking, my hand running over my length, so close to coming again.
I’m insatiable; I’ll never be able to get enough of her.
This is all that’s keeping me from going downstairs and fucking her again.
This—the feeling of her arousal on my palm and the memory of her orgasms in my mind, remembering how it felt to sink into her, to feel her coming on me right before I…
My cock throbs and erupts, spurting cum, and I keep stroking, mingling my release with hers, until my length is slick with both of us. My hips jerk upward, fucking my fist as I groan her name, pleasure arcing through me that can’t begin to compare to what it felt like to be inside of her.
I turn my head and look at the clock. 2:34 a.m. She's been locked in that room for hours now. Is she sleeping? Or is she lying awake like me, replaying the kiss, the feeling of me inside of her, trying to make sense of what she's feeling?
I imagine her in the guest bed, curled on her side, her dark hair spread across the pillow.
Did she find the sleepwear I bought her, or is she sleeping in her underwear?
Sleeping naked? Is my cum still smeared across her thighs and slick inside her pussy, or did she wash me off?
The thought makes my pulse quicken. I've imagined her in my home so many times, but the reality is so much better than the fantasy. She's here. Under my roof. In my space.
Mine.
If she did wash away my cum, she’ll be full of it again very soon.
The possessiveness that surges through me should probably concern me, but I’m past that, past the point where I can worry about whether or not I should stop.
There’s no stopping now. I've never been good at denying what I want, and I've never wanted anything the way I want Mara.
Not the empire I've built, not the power I've accumulated, not the respect I've commanded.
None of it means anything compared to the woman sleeping down the hall.
I get up and go to the shower to clean up.
I stand under the hot spray for a while, reluctantly washing her off of me, and then change into loose pants, going back to lie on the bed in hopes of getting some sleep.
I have no idea how successful that will be; lying here with her so close and still so far away feels like a new form of torture.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand, pulling me from my thoughts. I reach for it, already knowing who it is.
Kazimir.
Update on Sergei's movements. Call when you can.
I sit up, suddenly alert. The kiss, Mara's presence in my home, the way I just claimed her—it's all been a temporary distraction from the very real threat that brought her here in the first place.
Sergei doesn't make idle threats, and his interest in Mara isn't going to disappear just because she's under my protection now.
If anything, it makes her more valuable to him.
I change my clothes, then head down the stairs toward my office.
The penthouse is silent except for the ambient hum of the city far below.
I pause outside the guest room door, my hand hovering near the handle.
I could open it so easily. The lock is nothing, a token gesture of privacy that I could bypass in seconds.
But I don't. Not yet.
In my office, I close the door and call Kazimir. He answers on the first ring.
“What’s going on?” I ask, settling down into the leather chair behind my desk.
"Sergei's been busy." Kazimir's voice is rough with exhaustion. "He's pulled in help from the Italians, reached out to some of his independent connections. He's planning something."
“What about Mara?”
"He knows you took the girl, and he's trying to figure out why. Word is he's offering a substantial finder's fee for any information about her. Who she is, what she means to you, where she came from."
I feel my jaw tighten. "Has anyone talked?"
"Not yet. But it's only a matter of time. You know how this works—everyone has a price."
I do know. I've used that principle myself more times than I can count. Loyalty is a commodity like any other, bought and sold to the highest bidder.
"Increase surveillance on all of Sergei's operations," I say flatly, drumming my fingers against the top of the desk.
"I want to know every move he makes, every conversation he has that you can tap into. And fortify security around the building I’m in.
Double the guards, add another layer to the access protocols.
No one gets within a hundred feet of this building without us knowing about it. "
There's a pause on the other end of the line. Then Kazimir says, carefully, "Ilya. You know I respect you. You know I'd follow you into hell if you asked."
"But?" My teeth clench together.
"But keeping her here is dangerous. For you, for your organization, for her. Sergei already suspected you had a weakness—now you've confirmed it. You've shown him exactly where to strike if he wants to hurt you."
My hand curls into a fist. "He won't get to her."
"You can't guarantee that. No matter how good our security is, no matter how many men we have, there's always a way in. You know that better than anyone."
I lean back in my chair, staring at the city lights beyond my window.
He's right, of course. Keeping Mara here is a tactical error.
The smart move would be to send her away, hide her somewhere Sergei could never find her, or remove her from the equation entirely.
Break ties with her and send her somewhere else, far away from me.
But I can't.
The thought of her leaving, of putting distance between us again, is physically painful.
I've spent weeks watching her from afar, learning her routines, studying her life, waiting for the right moment to bring her into mine.
Now that she's here, now that I've tasted her, felt her in my arms, been inside her, I can't let her go.
I won't.
"She stays," I growl, and my voice leaves no room for argument.
Kazimir sighs. "Then we need to be smart about this. Sergei's going to make a move—it's just a question of when and how. We need to be ready."
"We will be. What else do you have?"
"He's been asking questions about the gallery. About her work, her connections, her finances. He's trying to understand why you'd risk everything for an art curator."
"And what's he concluded?"
"Probably that you're either fucking her or planning to. Either way, he’s going to think you've lost your edge. That you've gone soft."
I smile humorlessly. "Let him think that. Underestimating others is his weakness, I’ve heard.”
"And overconfidence has always been yours."
The words hang in the air between us. Kazimir is one of the few people who can speak to me like this. He's not wrong—I have a tendency to believe I can control any situation, bend any circumstance to my will. It's served me well in building my empire.
"I know what I'm doing," I say flatly, though I'm not entirely sure that's true.
"You can't control everything, Ilya. No matter how much you want to."
But I can try. I've spent my entire life taking control, shaping reality to match my vision. Mara will be no different.
"Just do what I asked," I say. "Increase surveillance, fortify security. I'll handle Sergei."
There’s a pause, and then Kazimir speaks again. "I'll have the security updates in place by morning." He hangs up before I can respond.
I lean back in my chair, unable to stop myself from thinking about going to her again. The urge is almost overwhelming, a physical need that makes my hands shake.
But as much as I want her, as much as I need her, I want her to come to me willingly, the way she kissed me tonight of her own volition. I want her to choose this, choose me, even knowing what I am. Even knowing what I've done.
I rehearse different approaches in my mind.
I could be apologetic, tell her I got carried away, promise it won't happen again.
But that would be a lie, and I'm done lying to her.
I could be commanding, remind her this is how things are now, that she belongs to me whether she accepts it or not.
But that would only drive her further away.
The truth is terrifying in its simplicity: I will never let her go.
Even if she hates me for it.
The thought should disturb me more than it does. I'm essentially holding her prisoner, using Sergei's threat as justification for keeping her here against her will. It's manipulation, coercion, everything she accused me of and worse.
But I can't bring myself to regret it.
She's safe here and she’s mine. Every moment she spends under my roof is another moment for her to see past the monster to the man underneath. Another chance for her to understand that what I feel for her isn't sick or twisted—it's the most real thing I've ever experienced.
She's here. That's what matters.
She's here, and I'm never letting her go.