2. Artem
Artem
“My my, look who we have here. This feels like a trip down memory lane, doesn’t it?” I say. I toss the whiskey glass I was drinking from off to the side, the glass shattering as it hits the ground.
I take the moment to drink in the sight of her.
Her long, auburn brown hair flows in obnoxiously perfect waves down her shoulders, her plush lips are painted red, and her breasts are practically begging to be released from the corset she has them trapped in.
Her wet eyes stay locked on mine as she slightly jumps from the sound of the glass breaking, but then regains her fake air of confidence.
“Get fucking lost. I’m not in the mood tonight,” she says. She tries to push past me, but she can’t get away that easily.
“You can’t leave yet, solnishko,” I retort lowly as I grab her arm, and she resists with all her might. Feeling her struggling in my arms sends a shock wave straight down to my cock, and it’s just the distraction I needed tonight.
“What do you want, you asshole? To rub it in?” Her hazel eyes glint in the moonlight when she looks at me, and it’s only the third time in the last nine years that I’ve seen her cry.
“That was quite the announcement your father had tonight, although I don’t think he needed to even say it out loud.”
Her face contorts with rage and her jaw clenches.
There it is. The expression I needed to see.
“Why? What the hell is it to you anyway?” She starts hitting my chest with her free hand.
“Is that why you dressed like that tonight? A cry for attention? ‘Look at me daddy, please—” I mock, but her small fist meets with my jaw. I chuckle darkly as I bring my hand to my face adjust my jaw. “Did I hit the nail on the head, solnishko? Looks like I might have hit a nerve too.”
I move my hand to grab her chin, and she quickly whips her face out of my grasp, but she’s unable to stop the tear running down her cheek.
I lean into her face, and her weak effort to push me off just makes this all the more enjoyable.
I run my tongue up her cheek, and I feel her body tense as I see her tighten her thighs together.
“Your tears are fucking delicious. I wonder if there’s something else you’ll let me force out of you that tastes just as sweet.”
My hand feels up her bare thigh through the high slit in this fucking pathetic but divine excuse for a dress that leaves nothing to the imagination.
“Get your hands off me, you psycho!”
She finally breaks out of my grasp and kicks me as I drop to my knees before her, holding my balls with my hands.
“Fucking mind your own business,” she says coldly as she turns and opens the door before running downstairs.
I can’t help but mock-chuckle to myself and slowly get myself back up. She’ll pay for that.
I adjust my collar as I step back into the ballroom. My brother Roman laughs when he notices the small cut on my lip as I walk back up to him and my other brother, Maxim.
“This is probably the least beat up I’ve seen you at one of these, bro. Did she go easy on you tonight?”
I’m quiet as I clear my throat and adjust my shoulders, and Roman laughs at Maxim’s words.
“You know, if you guys would just fuck, I think you’d both be less tense,” Roman suggests.
Maxim chimes in with an annoying fucking smirk, “Nah, she’d never let him, that’s why he’s so fucking wound up over her.”
“Enough.” My word silences them, and they realize I’m in no fucking mood to hear them talk shit tonight. I run my hands through my hair as I storm off to the bar to get another drink.
I sit at the table with my drink in my hand. The voices echoing the ballroom fade into the background as a painful memory resurfaces.
“Artem, please, help! No!” Her screams fill the warehouse and my body is frozen, my arms held painfully behind my back.
The man behind me chuckles and hooks his arm around to grab my chin to lift it back up, before whispering in my ear the four words I’ll never forget. “Don’t look away, mal’chik . . . ”
“Artem? My lord, get a fucking grip,” my brother snaps as he slaps my back, jolting me back to reality.
No matter what I do, I can’t get Sara’s face out of my goddamn head. Not when I’m forced to see Giselle’s fucking eyes still full of resolve and determination to go against everything I throw at her at every turn.
“You look like shit tonight.” Roman says it with such a straight face that I know he’s actually worried about me.
“I’m tired, and I’m sober,” I spit out as I down the rest of the gin in my glass.
I can still feel the weight of her lifeless body in my arms. The way her head unnaturally lay to the side as I tried to lift her up from the cold, concrete floor.
Whenever I see Giselle, I can’t help but feel all my fucking rage boil to the surface.
She’s everything I hate, and I’m going to break her for it.
I feel a soft hand run down my back and lips press against my ear. Lana.
“Not tonight.”
She pouts and grabs my arm. “Please? Don’t tell me you’ve already gotten sick of me. I won’t ask again about that restaurant, we can just go straight to yours, I promise.”
Her desperate and submissive words are almost music to my ears, too bad her shrill voice is the one uttering them. “Only if you can manage to keep those sexy lips closed, I’m not in the mood for small-talk.”
She excitedly agrees, happy the future pakhan would even be willing to put his dick inside of her at all. Women like this disgust me, but I could use a quick fuck after this shit night.
I walk with Lana and my brothers as we make our way out of the ballroom, grabbing my coat from the attendant at the door as I overhear someone crying off to the side, a phone in her hand.
“You’re just going to blow me off like that? You told me you’d be here, Dad. I needed you here,” she pleads as she wipes her nose.
She looks familiar but I can’t quite place it.
“You’re never coming back, are you? You left her and I’m just lumped in too?”
I didn’t realize I was still staring until our eyes meet, and she turns around feeling embarrassed. We continue out of the building, and Roman speaks up, probably because of the contemplative look plastered on my face.
“That’s a Santoro, heard they were having some family drama.”
Of course he knows, since he keeps tabs on everyone so closely.
“What was her name again?”
Roman looks up thoughtfully, then responds to Maxim’s question. “Oh—that’s right, it’s Alcina, I remember because it was unique.”
I look down, ignoring the conversation as Lana shamelessly clings to me.
“I can see the family resemblance, she looks a lot like Giselle actually, except much less intimidating,” Maxim chimes in with a laugh.
Lana sees my eyes look towards Maxim when he utters Giselle’s name, and she squeezes my arm harder, trying to press her tits into me. We pile into Roman’s SUV and head back to the house.
I’m relieved when I finally see the large metal gates, dying to get a nut in to feel some sort of release after the tension of this night. I have to figure out a real way to deal with my fucked-up issues before I become pakhan, or it’s going to eat me alive and distract me from focusing.
I’m so lost in thought that by the time I come back to reality and out of my head, Lana is already on her knees in my room.
She unbuckles my belt and I try to get into the mood and wrap my hand tightly in her bright blond hair.
She pulls my cock out from my briefs and starts to slowly rub her hands up and down, taking a moment to enjoy the sight as she licks the bead of pre-cum off the tip.
She wraps her fake lips around the head and starts to take me. It’s the same as she always does, slow and seductive. She continues sucking and licking, and then her eyes look up at me.
Fuck.
What was that?
It takes me a moment to process what I just saw. She notices the look on my face and releases my cock, looking concerned. “Did I do something wrong?” She tries to look up at me with wide eyes and a pout.
The moment she looked at me, I saw Giselle’s fucking face looking up at me. Her siren eyes staring deep into my soul.
“Don’t look away, mal’chik . . . ”
As I blink and see Lana again, my cock instantly softens.
“You should go, I’ll call you a ride,” I dismiss her as I zip up my slacks again and move away from her. I let myself out of my bedroom, leaving her confused on the floor.
I need to get a fucking grip. And more alcohol.
“Huh? Where did the blond go?” Maxim asks as I enter the kitchen and reach for a bottle of anything I can find in the cabinet.
“You should start learning people’s names, Max, especially the decent whores.”
I snicker at Roman’s comment.
Roman is the type of man who silently observes everything.
He’s quiet and calculated, always trying to find the most advantageous way to deal with anything.
He deals with everything in life as if it’s a business deal, including women.
I’m still unsure if the man has a heart in there or just a fucking computer.
His only redeeming quality is that he’s always got a solution lined up for anything, he’s probably the most reliable person I know.
His cold blue eyes are always lifeless, devoid of any emotion, like nothing really matters to him at the end of the day and life is just a series of motions he goes through.
“I don’t like bimbos anyway, they’re not my type,” Maxim responds curtly. He pours himself a drink and quickly takes a sip, but spills some on his shirt.
“You’re a fucking mess,” I shake my head as I turn to go sit on a bar stool.