Chapter 30
I ’m alone when I wake up the next morning. Rolling to my side, I slide my hand out across the bed feeling for Rurik’s heat.
The sheets are cold.
After a small pep talk, I convince myself to get out of bed, shower, and get dressed. I feel slightly more human as I comb my fingers through my hair. The bruise on my cheek is less purple and more yellowish today. It’s still ugly.
A phone is on the nightstand. It’s not the one I had when Mario grabbed me from the street; it’s a new one with a new number. But all my contacts are inside.
I say a silent thank you to Sasha, as I know he’s the one behind it, and I fire off a text to Megan. She’s already sent me three this morning.
Is this how it would have been with Rurik? Every time there was some external threat, Megan and I would be put on lockdown and unable to even visit with each other?
Maybe it’s for the best I got all the signals wrong. Again.
After promising I’ll call her later, I make the bed and start pulling my clothes out of the closet.
There’re no suitcases in the closet or under the bed, though, so I need to venture out of the bedroom to find one.
My backpack isn’t around, either. Rurik probably had the damn thing burned; he hated it so much.
When I open the door, I walk straight into Rurik’s chest. I bounce back a step, and his big paw of a hand snags my arm, keeping me from falling straight onto my ass.
“Are you all right?” He questions the moment I’m steady.
“Yeah. I’m fine.” I pull my arm from his grasp. “Were you just standing there waiting for me to try to leave?”
“No.” He steps inside and closes the door, leaning back against it with one foot propped up on it.
He’s dressed in a pair of jeans that hug his thighs in a manner that makes me want to lie across them. And the black button-down with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows and the top two buttons undone only make my mouth water even more.
This is ridiculous. I need to remember he rejected me. I said I loved him, and he walked out.
“How do you feel?” He questions, his gaze settling on the bruise .
Like someone used a pair of dull, rusty scissors to cut my heart into a million pieces.
“Much better. It looks bad, but it doesn’t hurt anymore.” I graze the mark with my fingertips.
“You saw the phone?”
“I did. Thank you.” I shift my weight from one foot to the other.
How does this work now? We weren’t really a couple; I told him so too many times to count. So, we’re not really broken up, but we’re less than we were.
He hooks his thumbs into his jeans, exposing his knuckles. They’re scraped and bruised and swollen.
“Rurik.” I grab hold of them, pulling them up so I can get a better look. “What happened?”
He searches my features. “You’re worried about my knuckles?”
“I’m worried about what you did to get them to look like this.”
“I had to deal with something.”
“You mean someone?” I drop his hands and take a step back. “Mario or Marco?”
His expression darkens, but it’s not for me.
“Mario and his brothers won’t ever bother you again.”
I know what that means.
“You killed them.”
“Do you want to know how?”
I tilt my head. “No, not really. Does that mean there’s another mafia family that hates me?”
“No.” He pushes off the door. “The Gallo family wasn’t truly a syndicate.
They were allowed to run their gambling rings so long as they paid tributes where they were due.
Sebastian kept them from the business, but he let them run games now and then.
He had a feeling they were skimming; that’s what was on that iPad.
I don’t know for certain, but I think he wanted to see proof before he acted against his sons.
They killed him to take over, but they hadn’t been skimming just from him.
They’d been stealing from other families. ”
“Did you tell the other families?”
“They already knew, they just didn’t know who was involved. From the conversations I’ve had, it seems Sebastain wanted the information so he could make things right with them after he dealt with his sons.”
“So that was them that shot you?”
He nods. “The two younger brothers were handed over to the families that wanted to deal with them personally.” He tells me, gauging my reaction. “I killed Mario myself.”
I blink at the brutal honesty of it.
“Why are you telling me all this?” I ask softly.
With steady steps, he stalks to me. Feeling every bit his prey, I retreat until I’m butted up against the wall and he has me caged.
He presses his hands against the wall on either side of my head, leaning in until there’s no space between us.
“I’m telling you this because I trust you.”
“You do?” He knows I reached out to Calloway; how can he trust me now?
After a long pause, he nods. “I do. ”
“Even after I told you I was going to talk to the detective?”
His jaw flexes with the reminder.
“You wouldn’t have told him anything that would harm me or Alexander.” He takes a slow breath, like it’s taking everything in him to keep himself controlled.
“No, I wouldn’t have.”
“You thought you were protecting me.” His voice takes on a darker edge. “Promise me you’ll never go behind my back again, for any reason. Not even if you think it will save me. Promise me.”
“You’ll believe me if I do?” How can he be so trusting after all the mess I’ve dragged him into?
“I will.” He gives a firm nod.
Holding his gaze, I say, “I promise.”
He leans the rest of the way in, kissing me. It’s a hard, unyielding kiss that removes any worry I held that he’d changed his mind about me. He snakes one hand behind my head, fisting my hair and pulling me from the wall.
He doesn’t break the kiss even when he scoops me up from the floor and carries me to the bed.
“You didn’t come to bed last night,” I say breathlessly when he drops me onto the mattress.
He’s already tearing off his jeans, and I’m busy wiggling out of my leggings.
“I didn’t get in until early this morning. I didn’t want to wake you.” He drops his shirt to the floor and crawls onto the bed with me.
Grabbing one ankle, he yanks me until I’m flat on my back. My shirt is barely off, and I’m all tangled up in it. He uses the moment against me. Lying over me like a blanket, he rips the thin material between my bra cups and takes one of my nipples into his mouth.
I moan, still tearing the shirt from my body. His teeth rake over me.
“You walked out on me last night.” I capture his face with my hands, dragging him up to mine. “I thought you left me.”
“I would never.” He kisses me, easily escaping my grasp. “Tell me again what you said.”
“About the detective?”
He growls. “No. Never talk about him again. The other thing. The important thing.” He kisses the bruise on my cheek, then the scar on my eyebrow, and the spot on my chin where Brad clocked me that first night.
He drags his hands over my thighs, spreading them as he sinks between. He’s pressed against me. I can feel the heat, the urgency escaping from his body and soaking into mine.
“I love you.” I grin when he pushes himself up to stare down at me. He doesn’t like having to wait.
It’s fun to make him sometimes, though.
“I love you, too.” He thrusts into me with a satisfied groan, like he’s been waiting his entire life for this moment.
I sink my hands into his hair, dragging him close enough to kiss him.
He fucks me slow at first with deep, dragged-out thrusts that drives my body into overdrive. Pleasure spreads throughout my entire body. My breath comes in short bursts as he thrusts harder and harder .
He buries his head in my neck, licking and biting down as he fucks me with more fervor. I pull back my thighs, opening for him, taking him even deeper.
He wraps his arms beneath me, pulling me to him as he plows harder still.
When his teeth graze over my shoulder, I climax.
Bucking up at him, screaming out with the overload of pleasure rushing through my body, I lose myself in him.
He grunts, grabbing onto my shoulders tighter while he drives into me again and again, until his own orgasm rips through him.
Little aftershocks of pleasure ripple through me as he lies on top of me, catching his breath.
“I love you. You’re going to be the death of me, but I fucking love you,” he says before turning his head and kissing me. It’s sweet this time, a playful kiss between lovers.
Minutes later, we’re tangled up in the sheets, snuggling even though it’s not even noon. I’m sure he has a million things to do, and meetings to get to. And I need to start figuring out what all of this means for me.
Casually, he picks up my hand and slides a diamond ring onto my finger. It’s gigantic and would be tacky if it wasn’t so damn beautiful.
“Two questions. Where were you hiding this just now, and why are you giving it to me?”
“I shoved it under the pillow when I climbed into bed, and I’m giving it to you because it’s tradition for the woman to wear an engagement ring.” He kisses my bare shoulder.
I roll to my back. “Rurik, I didn’t say I’d marry you. ”
He shrugs. “That’s fine.” He points to the ring. “Last night, I left because I needed to get this.”
“You went shopping?”
“No. I went to pick it up. The jeweler had it waiting for me. I bought it days ago.”
I laugh. “You’re insane.”
“It’s what you’ve done to me. You’ve taken a civilized man and turned him inside out.”
“Civilized? If I remember right, we started this whole thing because you kidnapped me.”
“I picked you up and brought you home.” He corrects with a hint of a smile in his voice. “That’s what we’ll tell our children.”
“Now we’re having kids?”
“Five at least. All boys. Except the last one, she can be a girl.”
“Oh, she can?” I’m giggling now like a crazed loon. Because that’s what he’s done to me. “I’m still not sure about marriage, Rurik.”
“I’m sure enough for us both, but it doesn’t have to be tomorrow. We can wait.” He hugs me to him, kissing me again. “We’ll do it next month.”
“Rurik.” I elbow him.
“We’ll do it when you’re ready.” He relents. “Unless you take too long, and then we’ll do it when I say.”
“When you say?” I grin up at him.
He brushes a lock of hair from my eyes. “Yes.”
“And you expect me to just go along with it?” If he keeps looking at me like this, he’s not going to have to wait long. The man can talk me into almost anything with the right smile.
“I expect obedience.”
I laugh. “You’re going to have a lifetime of disappointment in that department then.”
He pulls me to him, tucking me under his chin again.
“I have a feeling it won’t be disappointing, for either of us.”
“You like smacking my ass.”
“Almost as much as you like me doing it.” He pinches my arm. “Now shush. I need a nap.”
I watch the light dance off the jewel.
“Mrs. Mira Mikhailov. I guess that’s not so bad.”