Chapter Four #4
“What do you want?” I asked.
“You.”
The word nearly ended me.
I bent and took her mouth again.
This time, I touched her.
One hand slid into her hair, ruining the last of the auction curls. The other went to her waist over the soft sweater, not skin yet, not until she pressed closer and dragged my hand lower with both of hers.
My palm settled over the curve of her hip.
She shivered.
I lifted my head. “Tell me if anything frightens you.”
“Everything frightens me.”
“Then tell me what makes you want to stop.”
Her eyes softened by one dangerous degree. “I can do that.”
“I need to hear the words.”
“I can tell you to stop.”
“And I will.”
She held my stare. “Take me to your room.”
The hallway went quiet.
“My room,” I said.
“Yes.”
“You have your own.”
“I know.”
Her voice trembled, but her chin stayed high.
I picked her up.
Nadia gasped and caught my shoulders. “You enjoy that.”
“Yes.”
“Carrying women around?”
“Carrying you.”
“That should not work on me.”
“Does it?”
Her lips pressed together.
I carried her through the penthouse to my bedroom.
The room was dark except for the city beyond the glass and one lamp burning near the bed. Black wood. Gray bedding. A chair near the window. No audience. No staff. No gold room. No stage.
I set her on her feet beside the bed.
She looked at the mattress, then at me.
I took off my jacket and laid it over the chair. My tie came next. I pulled it loose, watching her watch my hands, then stopped and let the silk hang open around my collar.
“I’m going to undress you slowly,” I said. “Unless you tell me not to.”
Her throat moved. “You say everything out loud.”
“I want no confusion between us.”
Her fingers went to the hem of the sweater.
I caught her hands gently. “Let me.”
She released the fabric.
I lifted the sweater over her head.
Her hair fell around her shoulders in dark waves. Beneath the sweater, she wore nothing but the pale chemise from the auction. She must have put the sweater over it rather than strip fully. The silk lay wrinkled now, straps thin over her shoulders, hem high on her thighs.
I hated it less on her in my room.
No.
I hated what it had been.
I loved that I would be the one to take it off.
Her nipples tightened under the silk.
I looked at her face, not because I didn’t notice, but because she needed to know I saw all of her before I took any part.
“You’re beautiful,” I said.
Her laugh came out uneven. “Don’t make it sound sweet.”
“It isn’t sweet.”
“No?”
“No. It is making me consider whether the auctioneer needs all his teeth.”
Her mouth opened, then curved despite herself. “That’s your compliment?”
“For now.”
“What’s the better one?”
I touched one fingertip to the strap on her shoulder. “That I want to see you wearing diamonds, my shirt, nothing, and my wedding ring. Not because any of it improves you. Because every version would tell the world you’re no longer standing alone.”
The smile faded.
Something raw moved in her eyes.
“You can’t say things like that,” she whispered.
“I can stop.”
“No.” She swallowed. “Don’t.”
I slid the first strap down.
Then the second.
The chemise loosened. Nadia grabbed my forearm, not to stop me. To steady herself.
“Still yes?” I asked.
“Yes.”
I eased the silk down her breasts, over her waist, past her hips. It fell to the floor around her socked feet.
For a moment, neither of us moved.
Nadia stood naked in front of me except for soft socks, her skin pale in the city light, dark hair loose over her shoulders, breasts full and tipped tight, thighs pressed together as if she could hide from my eyes and still keep me there.
I had killed men with less discipline than it took not to reach too quickly.
I lowered to one knee.
Her breath caught. “What are you doing?”
I picked up one foot and peeled off the sock. “You asked to come to my room. I’m removing another man’s night from you one piece at a time.”
Her fingers touched my hair, then pulled back.
“You can touch me,” I said.
Her hand returned, tentative at first. Then her fingers slid into my hair.
I removed the other sock.
Then I kissed her ankle.
Nadia’s fingers tightened.
I kissed the inside of her calf, her knee, the soft skin above it. Her breathing turned shallow. When my hands reached her thighs, I looked up.
“Open for me.”
She went still.
I kept my hands light. “Not because I ordered it. Because I want my mouth on you, and I want you to let me.”
Her cheeks flushed. “You’re very arrogant for a man on his knees.”
“I will be arrogant from any position you put me in.”
She laughed, startled and breathless.
Then she parted her thighs.
I kissed the inside of one, then the other. Slow. Reverent until she trembled, then less so. Her scent changed, warm and wet, and my grip tightened before I made myself ease it again.
“Vadim,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“I do.”
Her laugh shook. “That is not as comforting as you think.”
I looked up at her. “You tell me what feels good. You tell me what does not. You pull my hair if you want more, push my shoulder if you want less. I will learn you.”
Her lips parted.
I pressed one kiss to the dark curls between her thighs.
Nadia jolted.
I held her hips and put my mouth on her.
The first taste of her nearly took my manners with it.
She was wet already, hot against my tongue, and the small sound she made went straight into my blood. I licked her slowly at first, parting her with my thumbs, finding her clit with the flat of my tongue. Her knees bent.
I stood long enough to lift her onto the bed.
She landed on the edge with a soft gasp, hair spilling around her shoulders, one hand braced behind her. “You didn’t warn me.”
“I was afraid you’d argue.”
“I might have.”
“I know.”
I knelt between her thighs and pulled her closer. “Now lie back.”
Her eyes flashed.
I kissed the inside of her knee. “Please.”
She lay back.
Not because she yielded. Because she chose it while staring at me like she wanted me to know the difference.
I did.
I hooked my arms under her thighs and opened her to my mouth again.
This time, I didn’t go slow.
Nadia cried out, then clapped one hand over her mouth. I stopped at once.
Her hand flew down. “Don’t stop.”
“Then don’t hide from me.”
“There are people outside.”
“No one close enough to hear. No one alive tomorrow if they try.”
“That should not make me feel better.”
“Does it?”
She turned her face into the bedding. “Maybe.”
I smiled against her thigh and returned to her pussy.
She was sweeter when she stopped holding herself still. Her hips lifted in small, helpless movements, then bolder ones when I followed. I slid one finger through her wetness, circling her entrance without pushing in, and she gripped the bedding.
“Vadim.”
“I hear you.”
“It feels—” Her breath broke. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t need to know. Feel it.”
I sucked her clit gently, then harder when her thighs shook around my shoulders. Her hand found my hair and held on. Not pulling away. Pulling me closer.
I wanted to praise her.
I wanted to call her brave and perfect and mine.
Instead, I learned the pressure of her hand, the rhythm of her hips, the sounds she made when pleasure started to outrun fear.
I worked one finger into her slowly.
Her whole body tensed.
I lifted my mouth. “Pain?”
“No.” She sucked in a breath. “Strange.”
I stayed still. “Tell me when to move.”
Her eyes opened.
The city light caught in them. Dark. Furious. Wet at the edges for reasons that had nothing to do with sadness now.
“Move,” she said.
I did.
Slow strokes, shallow at first, my mouth returning to her clit while her body learned the rhythm. She got wetter around my finger. Her sounds changed, lower, less surprised. When I added the smallest stretch, she arched and pulled my hair hard enough to sting.
“There,” she gasped.
I kept it there.
She came with my name in her mouth.
Not softly.
Her back bowed off the bed, thighs clamping around my shoulders, pussy pulsing around my finger while I licked her through it. I held her down only enough to keep her from twisting away from the pleasure. She shook once, twice, then collapsed against the bedding, panting.
I kissed her inner thigh.
Then her hip.
Then her stomach.
By the time I rose over her, she was watching me with eyes that no longer looked drugged by fear. Dazed, yes. But aware. Hungry in a way she seemed angry to feel.
I wiped my mouth with my thumb.
Her gaze followed the movement.
“You look pleased with yourself,” she said, voice unsteady.
“I’m pleased with you.”
Her cheeks flushed darker. “That’s worse.”
“No,” I said. “It is much more dangerous.”
I stripped off my shirt.
Her eyes dropped at once.
I let her look.
My shoulders, chest, scars, the dark hair low on my stomach. Her attention stopped at the hard line of my cock behind my trousers, and her lips parted.
Fear came back, threaded through desire.
I saw it.
I slowed.
Belt. Button. Zipper.
Nadia pushed herself up on her elbows. “You’re very big.”
“Yes.”
Her eyes flew to mine. “That wasn’t the moment for confidence.”
“It seemed worse to lie.”
A nervous laugh escaped her.
I took out my cock and wrapped my hand around myself before I went to her. Her gaze dropped again, and my breath left through my teeth.
I was hard enough to hurt. Pre-cum slicked the head. The thought of pushing into her untouched pussy nearly bent me in half.
But not at her expense.
Never that.
I sat beside her instead of over her. “Touch me if you want.”
Her eyes widened.
“If you don’t, we stop here.”
“You would stop?”
“Yes.”
She looked at my cock again. “That seems uncomfortable.”
“It is.”
“And you’d stop anyway?”
I leaned closer, brushed my mouth over her shoulder, and kept my hand still around myself. “Nadia, I would rather spend the rest of the night hard and furious in a cold shower than see regret on your face after I’ve been inside you.”
Her breath trembled.
She reached out.