Iskra
He didn’t stop. He continued to rock his hips, bumping against my ass as he worked to push his come deeper. I gripped the sheets when he moved his thumb again. He spat once more—the saliva still warm as he rubbed it with his thumb before pressing it back inside me.
I clamped down on him, feeling both parts of him inside me again.
A few moments later he pulled his thumb out and leaned over me to retrieve my sweater. I glanced back and watched him roll it up.
“Lie on your back, hips up,” he said.
I knew the drill. I got into position, ignoring my stiff muscles, and felt him tuck the rolled sweater beneath my hips. He pulled his shorts back on and walked to the door.
“I’ll be back shortly,” he said.
Of course he would.
I stared at the ceiling and placed a hand over my belly.
My womb never stood a chance.
The man was unstoppable.
I shuffled up the bed, taking my sweater with me before I reached for my iPad. Another purchase from one of his cards, but I needed entertainment while positioned for conception.
I forced myself not to go there and played the true crime podcast on my playlist.
The title was intriguing.
Before women could choose divorce, they chose poison.
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The door opened. I didn’t look up.
It closed.
He cleared his throat.
I glanced up to see him holding bottles of drinks, fruit, and a packet of chipsy hanging from his mouth.
How long was he planning on keeping me holed up in my room?
I looked back at the grainy image of Madame Popova on the screen, knowing—with complete certainty—that I would have been one of her customers.
“Did you know that when there was no legal or religious recourse for divorce, women used to poison their husbands?” I asked, keeping my voice entirely innocent.
His scowl was immediate. He piled everything onto the nightstand without a word.
“Quick, effective and satisfying, I’d imagine,” I continued.
His brow furrowed deeper.
“Is that a threat?” he growled, snatching the iPad from my hands.
Rude.
“I don’t know,” I said lightly. “Do you have rat poison in the house?”
He blinked at me for a moment. Then he pulled his phone from his pocket and stood there tapping at the screen before setting it beside the snacks.
“If there was, there won’t be by the end of the day,” he said, his voice cold and calm.
I smiled at him.
Poor man.
That was only one of the potential substances. And only one delivery method. And he’d have to remove rather a lot of things from this house before he could consider himself safe.
“Is that a hint of paranoia?” I asked, arching an eyebrow.
“People have been trying to kill me since I was six years old,” he scoffed.
My jaw dropped.
Well. That would do it.
It also explained why he had so much security around him.
Without a word he dragged the covers off me and began to assess the leakage situation as I lay back to study him. His body had many scars, most of which had faded, but when I ran my hands over him I could feel the subtle raised skin beneath some of the tattoos.
I was so wrapped up in my thoughts when he suddenly straddled my waist. His hand around my neck. The other palming my breast.
“Time to top up your supply of come,” he said, tracing his thumb down my neck.
My eyes trailed down his body and sure enough his cock was trying to poke a hole through his shorts.
“Can I listen to my podcast while you do me?”
The flare of outrage in his eyes made me laugh.
I wasn’t laughing for long.
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His fingers began to circle around me again, smearing his come before pushing back inside me. Three of them.
I tried to shake my head but I was exhausted.
“You did so well,” he crooned, and pulled his fingers back to collect more seed.
I glanced past him. The curtains were open and it was dark outside.
“No more,” I sighed.
“No more,” he repeated.
I didn’t believe him.
I lost count of the number of times he had unloaded inside me. And when I said I was too sore, he proceeded to wank himself off and deliver the final load manually.
Madame Popova’s story came back to me.
Such a dedicated lady who served her community well.
His lips brushed my neck. The bed creaked.
The rustle of his shorts followed.
He was leaving. It was over.
My eyes began to droop and I didn’t even hear the door close behind him.
I was out cold.
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Life resumed to what it had been before the ovulation period.
Vadim had given me a three-day reprieve.
Unfortunately he didn’t budge on the job front, citing that it was too dangerous.
After careful consideration—and after watching some of the men who went in and out of his office—I decided he was being truthful.
One man stood out. Not for his appearance, but for the dead look in his eyes.
Spartak had told me he was a torpedo—a contract killer.
A third-party hire who answered to no one but Vadim.
I didn’t know what had forged that man, but as beautiful as he was, he was severely damaged.
It lived in his eyes—a specific kind of blankness that had nothing to do with vacancy and everything to do with having seen too much and felt too little for too long.
I had found someone worse than Vadim.
Even from my hiding place at the top of the stairs, Tau’s eyes had found me without effort and sent me back to my room at speed.
Luckily Radovan wasn’t on duty that day. Or Vadim would have known within minutes.
Konstantin never spoke to me, despite technically being family. The most I received was a single nod on one occasion. He must have been feeling generous.
Their father never visited. Whether they went to him was anyone’s guess. No one told me anything. I had learned to piece together what I could from doorways and staircases and the fragments Spartak let slip when he forgot to be careful.
The days passed slowly.
Each night after Vadim left, my hand would find its way to my stomach before I could stop it. Hovering there in the dark. Dread, excitement and sorrow—three conflicting things with no resolution between them, all pulling in different directions at once.
It took me back to my mother.
What she might have felt when she was carrying us. Whether the feelings had been different then—before we became people who could disappoint her, before we became liabilities she had to manage rather than children she could simply love.
Perhaps feelings changed once the child became an adult.
Why else would we break what we claimed to love?