26. Chapter 26 #2
He leveled me with an unimpressed look. “It’s not.”
As we moved further into the villa, he shifted seamlessly back into Russian, issuing instructions to the men near the terrace.
His voice changed when he did so — it was lower, steadier and less teasing.
There was no hint of seduction, just authority, yet my nipples still hardened at the guttural, gravelly quality of his voice.
The men listened to him without question, and I got the feeling they truly trusted him.
I leaned against the edge of the kitchen island, pretending to observe casually while actually staring intently.
He gestured once toward the windows and the perimeter, speaking quickly, decisively. One of the men asked a question. Sasha didn’t hesitate before answering. No second-guessing or over-explaining.
It was fucking sexy, and I could feel a slow, molten wave of heat spreading through my body.
Sasha looked like he’d been waiting to stand in this exact spot for years. He switched back to English with his intense, piercing gaze now focused entirely on me, pinning me to the spot.
“You will not go outside the compound alone,” he explained calmly.
My eyebrows lifted. “I just got here.”
“Yes.”
“A little restrictive, don’t you think?”
“It’s supposed to be. If you want to go out, I’m going to assign you guards.”
I folded my arms. “You can’t just impose boundaries on me without discussion.”
“I can …” He walked towards me slowly, his eyes never leaving mine. “And I will. For my sanity and for your security.”
My pulse kicked up in a way that had nothing to do with rebellion.
“Your sanity?” I echoed, my disbelief dripping off the words.
“My sanity, baby. If there is even a single hair maimed on your pretty little head, I will tear this fucking place apart. So do me a favor — be a good girl for me and stay within our compound so I don’t have to hurt anyone, alright?”
“You’re very bossy,” I muttered. “In two languages.”
His mouth curved faintly. “You like it.”
I absolutely did and I hated myself for it.
Sasha crowded me against the marble counter. His hand came up, his silver rings glinting in the sunlight as his tattooed knuckles brushed under my chin and tilted my face upwards.
“This place doesn’t make me safer,” he said softly. “It just makes it easier to protect what’s mine.”
My breath caught. “I’m not your property.”
“No,” he agreed calmly. His thumb traced the edge of my jaw. “You’re my priority.”
Something shifted in Sasha’s expression, then. It wasn’t anger or irritation, and I struggled for a moment to identify it. It was possession. Not the playful kind, but the very real kind that should’ve had me running for the hills.
“If any of them forget that,” he added softly, “I will remind them.”
That should not have been attractive, but it absolutely was.
“Are you jealous?” Apparently I just couldn’t fucking help but poke the goddamn Russian bear.
Sasha’s eyes darkened immediately. “Yes.”
The honesty of it hit harder than denial would have, and I blinked. “I just shook someone’s hand.”
“You smiled at him.”
“That’s illegal now?”
“Here?” His thumb pressed slightly into my lower lip before dragging away. “It can be.”
My brain short-circuited briefly. He leaned closer, his mouth near my ear, and spoke a few quiet words in Russian I didn’t understand but absolutely felt.
Heat bloomed under my skin.
“What did you just say?” I asked.
“I told them they’ll have to address you through me.”
I raised an eyebrow. “That’s kind of excessive.”
“That is how this works.”
Sasha was being territorial, and I felt a swoop in my stomach as I realized the extent of his obsession. Why did it feel good to be wanted like this? Unapologetically and wholly.
Suddenly, I was acutely aware of how tightly wound he had been since we docked. Over a decade of being locked up. Over a decade of having very little power and almost no control and of not being able to truly claim anything.
Now he had territory again. Men. Infrastructure.
… and me.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
I could feel the heat rising to my cheeks and averted my gaze.
His jaw flexed as he pulled me closer by my hip, showing me he was affected by my presence too. My pulse stuttered and I couldn’t help the teasing tone in my voice. “So … you’re territorial, huh?”
“All of this,” he murmured, his voice low and deliberate, “is about keeping what is mine.”
Even saying it like that, calmly and unyieldingly, made the air between us thrum as if it were vibrating. My breath caught, and I couldn’t stop the goosebumps from spreading.
His lips brushed my cheek in the softest caress. “Stop tempting me.”
“I wasn’t—” I started, then stopped because yes, I totally was.
“You were. And I have over a decade to make up for, so you better be sure this is what you want.”
I tilted my head, teasing him, testing the line between fear and desire. “So what are you gonna do about it?”
Sasha’s gaze dropped to my lips, and I felt the pull of it like gravity, like there was no distance left in the world he didn’t already own.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’ve got a lot of plans involving you, Little Devil.”
I sucked in a sharp breath, suddenly unable to withstand his piercing gaze any longer. Instead I let my eyes drift past him to the terraces and the ocean stretching beyond the hill, the sunlight sparkling off the waves.
“This all seems awfully well equipped.”
“It is.” His gaze sharpened slightly, but there was something else there too. Something almost satisfied. “You think I would bring you somewhere unprepared?”
His words hung between us, deliberate and pointed. I studied his face, really looked at it, and watched him move through the villa as though it had been waiting for him all along. I saw the way the men deferred to him, not out of submission, and I noticed nothing here was improvised.
“You planned this,” I said slowly.
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
His thumb traced the curve of my hip slowly and absentmindedly, as though he was grounding himself. “Long enough.”
I realized this wasn’t just an escape; it was a careful and deliberate expansion of a system so well-established and broad I couldn’t possibly grasp it yet.
Sasha had come here to build and claim, and somehow, impossibly, he had brought me into it with him. Ten years in prison doesn’t disappear just because you change scenery.
“You’re overwhelmed,” he observed.
“I’m recalibrating,” I corrected, even though my pulse was doing something traitorous in my throat.
Sasha leaned in close but didn’t kiss me. I could feel the heat from his body and the restraint vibrating under his skin.
“Do you trust me?”
That was unfair. He knew the answer.
“Yes,” I said anyway.
Sasha’s jaw tightened for a fraction of a second, like that word had affected him physically.
“We’re here to stay, and everything definitely won’t be sunshine and roses … but I will not let anything or anyone touch you here,” he murmured. “And that’s a fucking promise.”
His fingers flexed at my waist and I could feel the barely contained hunger there. It was more than just desire, it was like he craved me. After a decade of deprivation, all his focus was now on me.
I audibly swallowed and stared into his eyes.
“Are you going to keep looking at me like this in front of your entire … empire?” I asked lightly.
“Probably.”
“Seems unprofessional.”
“Some things are more important than business.”
The way he said it made my stomach flip and I had to look away again. He was so fucking intense, I almost couldn’t take it. I glanced around the villa, taking in the ocean and the quiet power humming under the surface of everything.
I thought I was following a man who needed to hide. Instead, I had walked into a world just waiting for him to ascend to the throne. Apparently, I had also decided to crown myself his queen.
I was having one of those dreams again. Ever since I crossed the line into risky texting territory with Sasha, I’ve had dreams about him almost every night. About all the things he could do to me.
But this time it was different; this time it felt so real. Normally, his face was blurred, and he was just a hulking figure manhandling me, but there were no clear features. It was a voice in the dark, changing in pitch and timbre, and always leaving me wondering if he actually sounded like this.
This time, however, there was no doubt in my mind; everything was crystal clear and sharp. The dream was vivid; every sensation was magnified.
The pressure in my core, the breath ghosting over my heated skin, the rough hands holding me down. It all felt so real.
Usually, I would wake up hot and bothered, just before I reached the point of no return, leaving me with no choice but to take care of myself. But not this time. I was so fucking close, I could taste it.
A tremor shook my entire body, my clit throbbing and sending a rush of heat through my veins. I was hot, so fucking hot, and I could’ve sworn actual thrusts were rhythmically rocking my body.
Fuck, this is the hottest dream I’ve ever had.
The pressure between my legs mounted higher and higher until, with a final push, I careened over the edge of the cliff I’d been teetering on. I rolled my hips, little whimpers escaping me, and slowly drifted into consciousness.
I didn’t want to wake up.
“Oh, fuck yes! Come on my cock!” a deep voice rasped from above me. I mewled sleepily; my mind was still struggling to catch up, but my body was responding just fine. My back was arched, pushing my ass out, and the throbbing between my legs was almost unbearable.
“You feel so fucking good, squeezing me like that, baby. Gonna ride this tight little pussy until it’s always drooling for me.”
My face was pressed into the fabric and my breath was coming out in pants. I lifted my head out of the pillows it had been wedged between and blinked.
“Wha—” I gasped softly, trying to make sense of the situation. “W-what’s going o-on?”