Chapter 16 - Katya
The Lukovs weren’t what I was expecting.
After breaking through the initial awkwardness, they seemed far warmer than I expected from a family of their caliber. They’re a bunch of criminals, after all, but still. The meal admittedly wasn’t as horrible as I had anticipated.
But the silence settling between Sergey and me on the way back is oddly stifling.
Staring out the window with my arms folded over my chest, I watch as the Las Vegas strip blurs by in a smear of neon.
Surprisingly, Sergey hasn’t said much either, and I’m glad for it.
I’m still trying to process everything…the dinner, the conversation, the way his family took me in like I was something strange or exotic. It seemed as if they were trying to decide if I was someone to tolerate or crush. If I were worthy of being considered one of them.
What burrows and stays in the back of my mind, worst of all, is the ache from a few nights ago.
I still hate Sergey, and I hate what he has done, but I can’t lie to myself. I can’t pretend like that night wasn’t incredible, or that it didn’t leave my heart racing and anticipating more.
I swore I’d never surrender to Sergey, and yet, he was the man I shared my first time with.
Try as I might, I can’t stop thinking about the way he looked at me, not only during, but also after. As if it were the first time he experienced such softness within himself, and he couldn’t believe I managed to bring it out in him.
The tenderness he showed me shouldn’t exist in a man like him, and yet, it did. It only makes me angrier.
Shifting in my seat, I catch Sergey watching me from my peripheral vision. There’s something in his gaze that simmers beneath the surface.
It reminds me of hunger or possession…obsession, even.
I can’t pretend like I don’t know why, either. Not after I’ve been teasing him since the moment I started trying those dresses on.
It was obvious how easily he could lose himself in me and all of the complicated thoughts in his head, and while I’m still furious with him, I’ve been compelled to use that fact to my advantage.
Maybe then he’d loosen his stubborn grip on me and give me more power in this frustrating arrangement. I hope that he’ll at least let me return to my life before, even if it means staying legally bound to him.
Throughout dinner, Sergey couldn’t tear his eyes away from me, and I knew his brothers noticed.
They seemed prepared to rip into him for it at the table, but they managed to hold themselves back, and Sergey maintained his smugness.
He didn’t say anything about me challenging Roman, and that felt like a start.
I saw the tension in his jaw, however. He was trying his hardest to keep himself together.
Good. I want him to simmer in that agony just like he’s making me bear the pain of making such a hard adjustment in my life.
As we step inside the house at the end of the night, something in the room shifts. The air feels warmer and charged with something heavy.
I prepare to take my heels off when the door closes behind us, and I feel him behind me. I feel the way he draws closer.
“You’re quiet,” Sergey murmurs, voice low and laced with a touch of teasing.
I don’t bother turning around while I sigh and take my shoes off. “And you can’t handle silence.”
“I can take a lot of things…but not the way you look tonight,” he says, taking a subtle step closer before gently putting a hand on my waist and turning me around to face him. His eyes nearly burn into mine with want. “You wore that dress to torment me, didn’t you?”
“You wanted me to wear something nice,” I tell him, lifting a brow. “But what if I did?”
Sergey pulls in a slow, deep breath as if to calm himself. “Do you know what that does to me, Katya?”
Something about my name in his mouth sends a shiver down my spine. I hate how easily it affects me.
Closing the distance, his hands settle on my hips while his body grazes mine, and his lips lower to my ear. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you for weeks…you haunt me. And seeing you in something like this makes me feel like I’m about to lose my mind.”
Something in me shivers at his words and the raw honesty in them, wanting to melt further and just give in.
But as his hand slides to my back and down to the curve of my ass, the rational part of my brain snaps back into place. I put a hand against his chest to maintain some space.
“Don’t.”
He pulls back enough to look at me, and a hint of confusion lingers in his green eyes. “Don’t what?”
“Do this,” I murmur, fighting that urge inside myself too.
Sergey takes another breath, seemingly prepared to back off before moving a little closer again, as if trying to get me to give in.
“You’re killing me,” he murmurs, words almost breathy like he can’t stand waiting another moment. His hand grazes my hip, looking like he’s ready to undo me completely. “Please, Kat…”
“No,” I tell him flatly, reaching for his hands to pull them off me. “I agreed to dinner. I didn’t say I’d act like your obedient wife once we got home, too.”
Sergey’s expression falters as he flinches just enough for me to catch, but I see it. The words hit a bit harder than I anticipated.
I suck in a breath and try to remind myself that I need to stand my ground. I need to advocate for myself even while I’m at war with my own desires.
“That night…it never should’ve happened. It was a mistake.”
His jaw clenches, carefully adjusting my hold on him to take my hands in his. He studies my expression closely. “You don’t mean that.”
I don’t hesitate. “I do.”
Sergey moves back, running a hand through his hair while pacing a few feet like he doesn’t know what to do with himself.
He doesn’t say anything for a long, drawn-out moment, and when he finally looks at me again, the hunger is still there, but it has dulled enough to be more restrained than before.
On the surface, what looks like hurt remains.
I’m not one to revel in causing anyone to feel that way, and it takes incredible resolve to ignore the slight twist of guilt in my stomach.
I never asked to be here, and I never asked for any of this.
Regardless of what we shared that night or how incredible it was, I can’t let myself forget all the rest.
“Fine, no touching,” Sergey says with an attempt at resolve while he takes a breath, saying the words like they physically hurt to get out. “But you’re not sleeping in the spare room.”
My brows pinch together. “Excuse me?”
He’s already heading down the hall toward the staircase when he calls back to me, “You’ll sleep in the master with me. Sex or not.”
I stay in place, fighting against the subtle heat that moves through me at the mere mention of it. “You can’t be serious.”
Sergey stops at the bottom of the steps and glances over his shoulder at me. “I’m dead serious.”
I want to try and call his bluff, but I can tell from his tone that he genuinely means it, as if sleeping elsewhere would be the final nail in the coffin for him.
Weighing my options, I stand there a moment longer. I could fight him on it. I could shout at him, threaten him, or even sleep on the floor if I really want to. But regardless of how stubborn I am, he can be even worse at times.
For all I know, he’ll either barricade the room to keep me in with him or take the door off the spare to be done with it.
As willing as I normally am to fight him, I’m not in the mood.
So, I follow him.
The master bedroom is dim, quiet, and far too intimate for me to contend with, but I keep my distance and grab one of his oversized shirts hanging over the back of the armchair nearby before continuing to the bathroom.
There, I take my time getting out of my dress and washing up, hoping he’ll fall asleep before I return.
But when I come out again, reluctantly heading over to the bed, I find Sergey still sitting up in bed, shirtless, with the sheets bunched over his waist. He looks at me immediately, eyes drifting over me briefly.
“Don’t say a word,” I mumble while climbing into bed on the far side.
He smirks subtly to himself, as if the offence he took from my words before is long forgotten. “I wasn’t going to.”
Letting go of a breath, I keep my remarks to myself while I settle beneath the lush blankets, grateful that the bed is as big as physically possible, lending me plenty of space to put between us.
After a moment, Sergey follows suit and reaches for the lamp at his side, flicking it off before getting more comfortable.
Risking a glance, I catch him lying there with an arm tucked behind his head, looking up at the ceiling. The tension between us remains even while we don’t utter a word, and I try not to think about it too hard.
But eventually, his voice breaks the silence quietly.
“Do you really think it was a mistake?”
The question seems like an oddly vulnerable one for him, and it surprises me. But I do the same, looking up instead of glancing his way. “Does it matter?”
He doesn’t hesitate. “It does to me.”
Sighing, well aware I can’t escape the question, I settle for honesty. “Then you shouldn’t have abducted me, Sergey. Maybe if you treated me like a person instead of property, we wouldn’t be here.”
I hear him shift beside me. “I never saw you as property. I still don’t.”
Something in me doesn’t want to be swayed by his words, but it moves something in me. Barely.
“You call me yours in a way that says otherwise.”
“Because you are mine.”
That silences me.
Not because I’m conceding to the fact, but because the sincerity with which he speaks startles me. He believes it, and I know it. That might be the scariest part of all.
I can’t bring myself to say anything else, and instead, I let those words settle between us for reasons I don’t understand yet.
His breaths even out after a while, but I know he isn’t asleep either. Neither of us can bring ourselves to succumb to it, and the space between us is overcome with everything we refuse to say.
It seems that no matter how much I try to resist him, Sergey is getting under my skin and making me question everything I thought I knew about myself.