Chapter 34 Gabi
GABI
I bury my face into the pillow as I feel a tiny hand sneak up my cheek to my hair where it pulls tenderly at my hair.
“Hey, sweetheart,” I murmur, tugging Irisha closer, listening to her sucking her thumb in comfort. She shouldn’t be doing that. Not at this age. “How did you sleep?”
She pops her thumb from her mouth with a little plop. “You’re in Papa’s bed.”
“Hmm,” I say on a soft groan. And what a nice bed it is. All perfectly cozy with soft sheets and cloudy pillows and that scent I want to rub all over myself. “So are you.”
She giggles.
“Any good dreams?” I whisper since Katya is still asleep.
Somewhere, water turns off, and I glance over my shoulder at the room. On Ivan’s nightstand, the clock says it’s past seven already. Goodness, I overslept.
Where’s the man who kissed me into a delicious puddle of lust last night? He might have gone to work already.
“I dreamt about a unicorn and a pony.”
“Hmm, all those empty stables. Perfect spot for both unicorns and ponies.”
Behind me, the bathroom door opens, and I still.
Ivan is here.
I should get up, out of his bed, go shower and get dressed, but I’m still so tired. Not enough sleep last night, combined with the emotional upheaval, and here is Irisha, so peaceful, playing with my hair, I could just drift off again.
Ivan is busy in the dressing room, and now the intoxicating scent of his shower is infiltrating the space, and just the hint of it makes visuals of that night, when I walked in on him, flash through my mind’s eye.
I bite my lip. This can’t go on. Something’s got to give. And soon.
Something already has…
I’m not sure why he kissed me last night, but I can’t let it happen again. With the way I’m feeling now, pouring more fuel on the yearning in my body would only lead to misery.
“How are my girls this morning?” Ivan says as he walks into the bedroom.
I tense. Irisha shifts and peers over me. “Papa.”
“I’m still here, malyshka, but I’m going to the office soon.”
And then he’s right there, leaning over us, a finger stroking down Irisha’s forehead to the little slide of her nose. “Boop.”
I feel his body’s magnetic pull, so close I could just latch on to him.
“Gabi slept in your bed,” Irisha says, eyes wide as he now ruffles her hair.
“That’s because I told her to,” he says as I roll onto my back to look up at him.
My breath catches. First at the soft look in his gaze but then I look down.
Oh my…
He is bare-chested, he holding a black button-up in his one hand, while he feeds his belt through his pants loops with the other.
My gaze travels down his chest, lower, to where his half-zipped pants still fold open, a line of hair disappearing underneath his underwear’s black waistband with the white designer logo showing.
The whole visual from this angle…the need to be on my knees, to worship this god of a man—
“And how did you sleep, moya ptichka?” he asks, done with the belt.
As he pulls on his shirt, every muscle ripples with the movement, accentuating his six-pack, the perfect slopes of his pecs as they run over to his muscled shoulders.
The ink on his chest, the eye that stares at me, makes my own gaze jump to the two bullet wounds under his clavicle, just to be lured back by the fine dusting of hair that only leads the eye down south, to where the bulge in his pants is right there, within reach.
He’s leaning against the bed, and like this, it wouldn’t take much to inch closer, peel down those boxer briefs, let him spring free and take him in my mouth. The desire is hot and intense and so sudden—something I’ve never dreamt about before—that I meet his eyes, flustered.
A wildfire blush spreads over my cheeks as I find his gaze on me, serious but seeming to soak in every rogue thought, and when I don’t respond, he quirks a brow at me.
“Sweet dreams, I hope, Gabriella?”
At his words, his tone, the unfulfilled need seems to course through me, making that little pulse beat in my clit—again.
“Yes,” I croak, not knowing what else to say.
He hasn’t bothered with his buttons yet, and now he leans in, his open shirt brushing over my arm as he touches my temple, his thumb grazing the corner of my mouth before it sweeps over my lips, back and forth, making them split apart, reminding me where his lips were last night, the sensual intrusion of his tongue as he deepened our kiss.
Because it was ours. It wasn’t him kissing me, it wasn’t me kissing him—it was us, kissing each other.
“Take your time showering and getting ready for the day. I’ll take the girls down for breakfast.”
“Papa,” Katya’s voice comes from the far side of the bed. “Is Gabi going to be our mommy now?”
I freeze.
Ivan retracts his hand, straightens, and slowly starts buttoning his shirt, his eyes locked on mine as he moves from one button to the next, every movement sensual and not helping cool down the effervescent sparkles on my skin that his touch triggered.
“I wonder what she’ll say if I ask her,” he says, his voice light and easy as he tucks in his shirt.
Yes.
Yes to his girls whom I already love and would love to watch grow up.
Yes to this man who has shown me nothing but respect and gentle care, nothing of the horrors I’ve been exposed to early in life.
Yes to having more of what we had last night, but in the sanctity of marriage.
My mind is stewing in years of indoctrination when it comes to sex, and despite my new freedom and the modern lives my brothers live—they’re not religious at all—the only way I’d be able to freely cave into and enjoy desire, without an ounce of Catholic guilt, would be in the marriage bed.
Maybe then, I could let go of these hangups, but that’s a luxury none of us has. Ivan is getting married soon.
Suddenly, all I want is Ivan as my husband. Even if just for one night. For him to thrust into my body with his cock until every bottled-up orgasm in me is released.
God help me. He just joked about asking me.
But his question also gives me pause. Milana’s words that I should stop being so naive echoes in my mind, stressing I’m just a pawn played to this position, even if I thought I’d made every move myself.
Then there’s the vow she forced on me, to help her escape this house, to get away from the Bratva, with the promise of helping me run in return.
How weird that one person’s heaven is another person’s hell.
I toss the duvet aside, too hot. All eyes are on me, waiting for a clever answer I can’t give. The right answer is that I’ve been promised to someone else, but nobody can know that.
“I better get ready so you can go to work,” I say as I slip out of bed, and Ivan steps out of my way, his eyes never leaving my flushed face.
I rush off to my own room, the security gate already open, visualizing the exact reverse of Ivan’s movements as he got dressed.
But now, I see myself, already naked, skin tingling everywhere he’s been with his lips, undressing him, button for button…
belt buckle, zip, cock. I drop to my knees before him, praying to a whole different god.
Desperate to stop my thoughts, I strip and step into a cold shower, letting my hands wander, desperately stroking my skin where goosebumps spread like a rash, until I touch the reminder of the vile vows made on my behalf.
I pull back, press my forehead against the cold marble wall, and weep.