Chapter 18
A steady, buzzing sound woke me from a lazy nap back in Alek’s bed. Both of us passed out after we’d managed to drag ourselves from the bath. My body was sore and spent, ready to rest for the entire weekend. Which, thankfully, I could do, because I didn’t have rehearsals for a couple of days.
Groaning, I rolled on my side and tried to bury my head into the pillow. Alek followed behind me, wrapping his whole body around me and placing sleepy kisses on my naked shoulder. I smiled, arching my body into his like a cat.
I wasn’t sure I could go another round, but if he asked me, I wouldn’t turn him down. Alek must have been thinking the same thing, because his hand started to slide down my body to my waiting thighs.
“I can’t get enough of you, solnyshka. I am addicted,” Alek said, his accent thickening as his voice roughened.
Sometimes, when his emotions clouded his head, it did that.
Alek once told me that both of his parents had heavy accents, and he’d inherited a mixture of the two, though he admitted his skewed more toward his father’s because he grew up surrounded more by the Russian side of his family.
His grandfather was the one who brought the Drakovs here to the city, though Alek said they visited Russia frequently.
His mother, on the other hand, emigrated from Italy when she was very young.
According to Alek, his family was very close-knit.
He was forced to go to multiple dinners a month with his mother, who kept insisting on meeting me, to my utter glee, and Nikolai was almost always glued to his side.
The Drakovs were fiercely protective of one another, a trait Alek had clearly inherited, as he’d insisted many times that he would do anything for me.
Even die for me.
It was that protectiveness, that possessiveness, I thought of as Alek’s hands spread my thighs apart and—
Bzzzt. Bzzzt.
I abruptly sat up, my mind awake enough to recognize that sound. “Crap,” I hissed under my breath, my hands searching everywhere for my phone. I jumped off the bed and began to search through the disarray on the floor, finally finding it in my purse.
Ten missed calls.
I had ten missed calls from my older brother.
“Crap, crap, crap,” I said before I clicked the green button, raising my phone to my ear with a wide smile. “Hi, Jules—”
“Where are you, Evangeline?” he seethed into the phone. I knew him well enough to know that his fury was barely contained. If he were a cartoon character, there would be steam coming out of his ears.
Alek’s eyes darkened as he stood from the bed and slowly stalked over to me, his posture stiff like a predator. Apparently, his wrath was at the surface, too.
His hand shot out to grab my throat, blue eyes almost black with fury. The morning—crap, it was afternoon, I realized—sunlight fell across his body, illuminating the dark tattoos on his naked torso. My mouth watered at the sight of them, my hands running over his sculpted chest.
“Jules?” he snarled lowly. His hand tightened around my neck, not in a painful or frightening way but in one that made heat travel down my body. “You’re mine.”
“My brother,” I mouthed, because apparently in all the stories about my older brother, I’d failed to ever say his name.
Alek relaxed, but only barely. He nodded once before pulling me back onto the bed with him, settling me on his lap, rocking up with his hips.
We were still naked from earlier, which meant that his cock was rubbing against my sore pussy.
I instantly became wet, my whole body tightening when his tip slipped inside of me.
I gasped, covering up the sound with a rushed question. “What are you up to?”
“‘What am I up to?’ What am I up to? I’m over here fucking worried about you, Evangeline! I’ve called you ten damn times and no answer! TEN TIMES, EVANGELINE!” he roared through the phone. I had to pull away to keep from getting a headache.
Alek—who had previously been teasing my slit with his hard shaft, his eyes so hungry that they were almost black—gritted his jaw.
“Like hell someone is going to speak to you like that,” he said with so much wrath that it made me shiver, my core warming at the darkness in his tone.
There is definitely something wrong with you, Eva. You’re on the phone with your brother, and you’re getting turned on.
Though anyone who heard Alek’s voice at that moment would have been horny, too. He sounded like a god of sex.
I held up my hand and gave Alek a look that I hoped said, trust me. His face turned cold, but he nodded, and that was enough for me.
“Who the fuck was that?” Jules screamed.
Despite how it might have appeared, my brother could be really sweet sometimes.
He was the most thoughtful person I’d ever met—well, maybe second-most now—always going to my shows, supporting my dreams, thinking about me when I most needed it.
But Jules was sometimes a stubborn bulldozer, while I had the tendency to be…
easily bulldozed. It was a combination that didn’t go well together.
I knew he meant well. He wanted to protect me in a world he thought was unsafe.
I just wished his form of protection didn’t feel so restricting.
“It’s the TV, Jules, calm down.”
“You don’t have a TV.”
“It’s Mia’s,” I said, trying to calm my racing heartbeat while Alek kissed down my body with a smirk that promised mischief.
“I’m at her place. And before you ask, she came and got me, I didn’t take the metro, and I didn’t answer because I was taking a nap.
You know, resting? Like you’ve been wanting me to do? ”
It frightened me how easy it was becoming to lie to him.
Once upon a time, Jules and I told each other everything.
We were best friends because we were the only people we had.
Jules didn’t trust anyone very much because he worried they would backstab him, and I was kept so sheltered that I couldn’t make friends even if I wanted to.
Yet despite the betrayal in my heart, I didn’t want to stop. The lies were the only thing letting me still see Alek.
Alek nudged my legs open. He reached forward, hands sliding up my thighs.
I tried to flash him a warning look, but it was right when his finger brushed across my clit.
All my breath left my lungs as Alek dipped one finger to me before pulling it out slowly, agonizingly, and bringing it up to his lips.
He stuck his finger in his mouth and sucked, opening it enough for me to watch the way his tongue swirled around my juices, greedily inhaling each drop.
My breath stuttered. I wanted him. I wanted more with him. I wasn’t sure I could ever get enough of Alek.
“—are you even fucking listening to me, Evangeline?”
“Yes, yes, I’m sorry. You cut out.”
I tried to shoo Alek away, but he smirked at me, his lips still moist with my juices. Then, he ran his finger along my slit, gathering more of my wetness. I watched, enraptured, as he brought it to his cock before pumping himself up and down, using me to lubricate himself.
My mouth watered at the sight. I wanted him in my mouth again, in my pussy, getting his cum all over my aching body.
I reached for his cock, needing to touch him, but he swatted my hands away, his eyes teasing me as if to say, That’s what you get for trying to push me away earlier.
Pouting, I leaned back and enjoyed the sight of him stroking himself.
Alek’s eyes darkened as they roamed over my body, lingering on my stiff nipples and drenched core.
My skin was littered with bite marks and subtle bruises from his hands.
I liked the sight of them—how they made me remember his tattooed, veiny forearms holding me close as he pushed into me.
“Evangeline,” Jules began, tone warning.
“It really is! I can’t control a bad signal, and I figured you didn’t want me to leave her apartment alone.” The pause told me how much he believed me, so I quickly added, “You know I answer your calls as soon as I see them. I know the rules.”
“Fine,” he bit out before his voice softened. “I was calling to see if you wanted to come over for dinner. I feel like it’s been a long time since I’ve seen you.”
Alek’s pace quickened, and I licked my lips, needing this phone call to be over with so I could feel him again. He gritted his jaw, mouthing, “Like what you see, baby?”
“Yes,” I breathed. Then, I blinked before saying, “I mean, yes, Jules, dinner tonight would be great. You can pick me up from Mia’s closer to dinnertime?”
“Sounds good.”
Alek winked.
“Very, very good,” I murmured. “Hey, Jules, I might go hop in the shower, but I’ll see you later.”
“Okay, Ann—”
I hung up on him immediately, planning on blaming the bad signal if he asked me about it later. I wasted no time seating myself on my cock, sighing with relief when we finally rejoined.
Alek thrust upward, his mouth already finding my neck while his hands settled on both of my breasts. “Such a naughty girl trying to keep me away from these. How should I punish you?”
“You could fuck me.”
“Mmm, but I think you’d like that too much.”
“Then ruin me, Alek.” I looked at him, my eyes hooded, and my lashes fluttering closed. I leaned into him, letting my lips brush against his. “Fuck me like I’m yours.”
Alek snapped.
He pounded into me from below, hitting that sweet spot over and over again with brutal thrusts.
I tried to gasp, but the sound was cut off by his hand grabbing my throat and squeezing until I saw stars.
The word stop balanced on my tongue. I knew he would do it if I asked, but I didn’t want him to stop.
He controlled the very air I breathed, whether I could gasp or moan or scream out for more.
And handing over that control—my life—was terrifying.
But I trusted him enough to take care of me.
Alek would never hurt me. Everything he did was to make me feel pleasure.
And in a world where every one of my decisions had the potential to send me into catastrophe, it was so freeing to trust someone like that.
To have them take away the buzzing and leave me in my silence.
“Mine,” Alek growled, biting my neck. “You are fucking mine, Evangeline.”
“I’m yours. All yours.”
“Forever. You’re mine forever, baby.”
I had a split second to decide what to say next. “Come with me to dinner then,” I murmured, rocking my hips back and forth, becoming more and more comfortable with having sex now that we’d done it a few times. “Get my brother’s permission, and we can have our forever.”
“I don’t need permission for you to be mine.”
“You do if you want us to ever get married in the future. My brother’s opinion means a lot to me.”
Alek groaned. “Fine. But only if I get to come inside you at least three times before.”
I grinned. “You'd better get started, then.”