by Dani Collins
“You keep surprising me. I thought you were a hardened...” She cut him a glance of apology. “Criminal. You’re actually quite nice, aren’t you? Wanting to teach me how to defend myself.”
“Everyone who surrounds me is a strength, not a liability. That’s all this is.”
“Liability.” The label winded her, making her look away. It was familiar, but she had hoped there was a growing regard between them. But no. He might be attracted to her sexually, last night might have changed her forever, but she was still that thing he was saddled with.
“Right. Whatever you need me to be, wherever.” She fought not to let her smarting show, but from her throat to her navel she burned.
“Do you like feeling helpless?” he demanded.
“No,” she choked. This feeling of being at his mercy was excruciating.
“Then be here at six prepared to work.”
* * *
What had he been thinking? Mikolas asked himself the next morning. This was hell.
Viveka showed up in a pair of clinging purple pants that ended below her knees. The spandex was shiny enough to accent every dip and curve of her trim thighs. Her pink T-shirt came off after they’d warmed up with cardio, revealing the unique landscape of her abdomen. Now she wore only a snug blue sports bra that flattened her modest breasts and showed off her creamy shoulders and chest and flat midriff.
He was so distracted by lust, he would get his lights blacked out for sure.
He would deserve it. And he couldn’t even make a pass to slake it. He’d told two of his guards who had come in to use the gym that they could stay. They were spotting each other, grunting over the weights, while Mikolas put his hands on Viveka to adjust her stance and coached her through stepping into a punch. She smelled like shampoo and woman sweat. Like they’d been petting each other into acute arousal.
“You’re holding back because you’re afraid you’ll hurt yourself,” he told her when she struck his palm. He stopped her to correct her wrist position and traced up the soft skin of her forearm. “Humans have evolved the bone structure in here to withstand the impact of a punch.”
“My bones aren’t as big as yours,” she protested. “I will hurt myself in a real fight. Especially if I don’t have this.” She held up her arm to indicate where he’d wrapped her hands to protect them.
“You might even break your hand,” he told her frankly. “But that’s better than losing your life, isn’t it? I want you on the heavy bag twice a day for half an hour. Get used to how it feels to connect so you won’t hesitate when it counts. Learn to use your left with as much power as the right.”
Her brow wrinkled with concentration as she went back to jabbing into his palms. She was taking this seriously, at least.
That earnestness worried him, though. It would be just like her to take it to heart that she should protect him. He’d blurted out that remark about liability last night because he hadn’t wanted to admit that her inability to protect herself had been eating at him from the moment he’d seen Grigor throw her around on the deck of a stranger’s yacht.
He’d hurt her feelings, of course. She’d made enough mentions of Grigor’s disparagement and her aunt’s indifference that he understood Viveka had been made to feel like a burden and was very sensitive to it. That heart of hers was so easily bruised!
The more time he spent with her, the more he could see how utterly wrong they were for each other. He could wind up hurting her quite deeply.
I do want sex. I just don’t want it to hurt.
Her jab was off-center, glancing off his palm so she stumbled into him.
“Sorry. I’m getting tired,” she said breathlessly.
“I wasn’t paying attention,” he allowed, helping her find her feet.
Damn it, if he didn’t keep his guard up, they were both going to get hurt.
* * *
Viveka was still shaking from the most intense workout of her life. Her arms felt like rubber and she needed the seamstress’s help to dress as they worked through the gowns in her closet. She would have consigned Mikolas firmly to hell for this morning’s punishment, but then his grandfather’s physiotherapist arrived on Mikolas’s instruction to offer her a massage.
“He said you would need one every day for at least a week.”
Viveka had collapsed on the table, groaned with bliss and went without prompting back to the gym that afternoon to spend another half hour on the wretched heavy bag.
“You’ll get used to it,” Mikolas said without pity at dinner, when she could barely lift her fork.
“Surely that’s not necessary, is it?” Erebus admonished Mikolas, once his grandson had explained why Viveka was so done in.
“She wants to learn. Don’t you?” Mikolas’s tone dared her to contradict him, but he wasn’t demanding she agree with him in front of his grandfather. He was insisting on honesty.
“I do,” she admitted with a weighted sigh, even though the very last thing she ever wanted was to engage in a fistfight. She couldn’t help wondering if Grigor would have been as quick to hit her if she’d ever hit him back, though. She’d never had the nerve, fearing she’d only make things worse.
Mikolas’s treatment of her in the gym, as dispassionate as it had been, had also been heartening. He seemed to have every confidence in her ability to defend herself if she only practiced. That was an incredibly compelling thought. Empowering.
It made her grateful to him all over again. And yes, deep down, it made her want to make him proud. To show him what she was capable of. Show herself.
Of course, the other side of that desire to be plucky and capable was a churning knowledge that she was being a coward when it came to sex. She wanted to be proficient in that arena, too.
The music was on low when they came into the lounge of his penthouse later, the fire glowing and a bottle of wine and glasses waiting. Beyond the windows, stars sparkled in the velvet black sky and moonlight glittered on the sea.
Had he planned this? To seduce her?
Did she want to be seduced?
She sighed a little, not sure what she wanted anymore.
“Sore?” he asked, moving to pour the wine.
“Hmm? Oh, it’s not that bad. The massage helped. No, I was just thinking that I’m stuck in a holding pattern.”
He lifted his brows with inquiry.
“I thought once Hildy was sorted, I would begin taking my life in hand. Trina was supposed to come live with me. I had some plan that we would rent a flat and take online quizzes, choose a career and register for classes...” She had been looking forward to that, but her sister’s life had skewed off from hers and she didn’t even have the worry of Hildy any longer. “Instead, my future is a blank page.”
On Petrides letterhead, she thought wryly.
“I’ll figure it out,” she assured herself. “Eventually. I won’t be here forever, right?”
That knowledge was the clincher. If it had taken her twenty-three years to find a man who stirred her physically, how long would it take to find another?
She looked over to him.
Whatever was in her face made him set down the bottle, corkscrew angled into the unpopped cork.
“I keep telling myself to give you time.” His voice was low and heavy, almost defeated. “But bringing you into my bed is all I can think about. Will you let me? I just want to touch you. Kiss you. Give you what you gave me.”
Her belly clenched in anticipation. She couldn’t imagine being that uninhibited, but she couldn’t imagine not going to bed with him. She wanted him so much and she honestly didn’t know how to resist any longer.
Surrender happened with one shaken, “Yes.”
He kind of jolted, like he hadn’t expected that. Then he came across and took her face in his two hands, covering her
lips with his hot, hungry mouth. They kissed like lovers. Like people who had been separated by time and distance and deep misunderstanding. She curled her arms around his neck and he broke away long enough to scoop her up against his chest, then kissed her again as he carried her to his bedroom.
She waited for misgivings and none struck. Her fingers went into his hair as she kissed him back.
He came down on the mattress with her and she opened her eyes only long enough to catch an impression of monochromatic shades lit by the bluish half-moon. The carpet was white, the furniture silver-gray, the bedspread black.
Then Mikolas tucked her beneath him and stroked without hurry from her shoulder, down her rib cage, past her waist and along her hip.
“You can—” she started to say, but he brushed another kiss over her lips, lazy and giving and thorough.
“Don’t worry,” he murmured and kissed her again. “I just want to touch you.” Another soft, sweet, lingering kiss. “I’ll stop if you tell me to.” Kissing and kissing and kissing.
It was delicious and tender and not the least bit threatening with his heavy hand only making slow, restless circles where her hip met her waist.
She wanted more. She wanted sex. It wasn’t like the other times she’d wanted sex. Then it had been something between an obligation and a frustrating goal she was determined to achieve.
This was nothing like that. She wanted him. She wanted to share her body with Mikolas, feel him inside her, feel close to him.
Make love to me, she begged him with her lips, and ran her hands over him in a silent message of encouragement. When she rolled and tried to open the zip on her dress, he made a ragged noise and found it for her, dragging it down. He lifted away to draw her sleeve off her arm, exposing her bra. One efficient flick of his fingers and the bra was loose.
With reverence, he eased the strap down her arm, dislodging the cup so her breast thrust round and white, nipple turgid with wanton need.
Insecurity didn’t have time to strike. He lowered his head and tongued lightly, cupped with a warm hand, then with another groan of appreciation, opened his mouth in a hot branding, letting her get used to the delicate suction before pulling a little harder.
Her toes curled. She wanted to speak, to tell him this was good, that he wouldn’t have to stop, but sensation rocked her, coiling in her abdomen, making her loins weep with need. When his hand stroked to rub her bottom, she dragged at her skirt herself, earning a noise of approval as she drew the ruffled fabric out of the way.
He teased her, tracing patterns on her bare thighs, lifting his head to kiss her again and give her his tongue as he made her wait and wait.
“Mikolas,” she gasped.
“This?” He brought his hand to the juncture of her thighs and settled his palm there, letting her get used to the sensation. The intimacy. “I want that, too,” he breathed against her mouth.
She bit back a cry of pure joy as the weight of his hand covered her, hot and confident. He rocked slowly, increasing the pressure in increments, inciting her to crook her knee so she was open to his touch. Eyes closed, she let herself bask in this wonderful feeling, tension climbing.
When he lifted his hand, she caught her breath in loss, opening her eyes.
He was watching her while his fingertips traced the edge of her knickers, then began to draw them down her thighs.
The friction of lace against her sensitized skin made her shiver. As the coolness of the room struck her damp, eager flesh, she became starkly aware of how her clothing was askew, her breast exposed, her sex pouted and needy, her body trembling with ridiculously high desire.
For a moment anxiety struck. She wanted to rush past this moment, rush through the hard part, have done with this interminable impasse. She lifted her hips so he could finish skimming them away, but when he came down beside her again, he only combed her hair back from her face.
“I just want to feel you. I’ll be gentle,” he promised, and kissed her lightly.
Yes, she almost screamed.
Embarrassment ought to be killing her, but arousal was pulsing in her like an electrical current. And when he cradled her against him this way, she felt very safe.
They kissed and his hand covered her again. This time she was naked. The sensation was so acute she jolted under his touch.
“Just feel,” he cajoled softly. “Tell me what you like. Is that good?”
He did things then that were gorgeous and honeyed. She knew how her body worked, but she had never felt this turned on. She didn’t let herself think, just floated in the deep currents of pleasure he swirled through her.
“Like that?” He kept up the magical play, making tension coil through her so she moaned beneath his kiss, encouraging him. Yes, like that. Exactly like that.
He pressed one finger into her.
She gasped.
“Okay?” he breathed against her cheek.
She clasped him with her inner muscles, loving the sensation even though it felt very snug. She was so aroused, so close, she covered his hand with her own and pressed. She rocked her hips as he made love to her with his hand and shattered into a million pieces, cries muffled by his smothering kiss.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THEY WERE GOING to kill each other.
Mikolas was fully clothed and if she shaped him through his pants right now, he would explode.
But oh, she was amazing. He licked at her panting lips, wanting to smile at the way she clung to his mouth with her own, but weakly. She was still shivering with the aftershocks of her beautiful, stunning orgasm.
He caressed her very, very gently, coaxing her to remain aroused. He wanted to do that to her again. Taste her. Drown in her.
She made a noise and kissed him back with more response, restless hands picking at his shirt, looking for the buttons.
He broke them open with a couple of yanks, then shrugged it off and discarded it, too hot for clothes. On fire for her.
She pulled her other arm free of her dress and held up her arms for him to come back. Soft curves, velvety skin. He loved the feel of her against his bare chest and biceps. Delicate, but spry. So warm, smelling of rain and tea and the drugging scent of sexual fulfillment.
Her smooth hands traced over his torso and back, making him groan at how good it felt on skin that was taut and sensitized. She tasted like nectarines, he thought, opening his mouth on the swell of her breast. He tongued her nipple, more aggressive than he had been the first time.
She arched for more.
He was going too fast, he cautioned himself, but he wanted to consume her. He wanted her dress out of the way, he wanted her hands everywhere on him—
She arched to strip the garment down.
He slid down the bed as he whisked the dress away, pressing his lips to her quivering belly, blowing softly on the fine hairs of her mound, laughing with delight at finally being here. He was so filled with desire his heart was slamming, pulse reverberating through his entire body.
“Mikolas,” she breathed.
Her fingers were in his hair like she was petting a wolf, tugging hard enough to force him to lift his head before he’d barely nuzzled her.
“Make love to me.”
A lightning rod of lust went through him. He steeled himself to maintain his control when all he wanted was to push her legs apart and rise over her.
“I am.” He was going to make her scream with release.
“I mean really.” Her hand moved to cradle his jaw, her touch light against the clenched muscle in his cheek. Entreaty filled her eyes. “Please.”
She had come into his life to destroy him in the most subversive yet effective way possible.
He could barely move, but he drew back, coming up on an elbow, trying to hold on to what shreds of gentlemanly conduct he po
ssessed.
“Do you ever do what’s expected of you?”
“You don’t want to?” The appalled humiliation that crept into her tone scared the hell out of him.
“Of course I want to.” He spoke too harshly. He was barely hanging on to rational thought over here.
She tensed, wary.
He set his hand on her navel, breathed, tried to find something that passed for civilized behavior, but found only the thief he had once been. His hand stole lower, unable to help himself. His thumb detoured along her cleft, finding her slick and ready. Need pearled into one place that made her gasp raggedly when he found it, circling and teasing.
Her thighs relaxed open. She arched to his touch. “Please,” she begged. “I want to know how it feels.”
He was only human, not a superhero. He pulled away, hearing her catch back a noise of injury.
Her breath caught in the next instant as she saw he was rising to open his pants. He stripped in jerky, uncoordinated movements, watching her swallow and bite her bottom lip. He made himself take his time retrieving the condom so she had lots of opportunity to change her mind.
“I’ll stop if you want me to,” he promised as he covered himself, then settled over her. He would. He didn’t know how, but he would.
Please don’t make me stop.
* * *
It would really happen this time. Viveka’s nerves sizzled as Mikolas covered her. He was such a big person compared with her. He loomed. She skimmed her fingertips over his broad shoulders and was starkly aware of how much space his hips and thighs took up as he settled without hesitation between her own.
She tensed, nervous.
He kissed her in abbreviated catches of her mouth that didn’t quite satisfy before he pulled away, then did it again.
She made a noise of impatience and wiggled beneath him. “I want—”
“Me, too,” he growled against her mouth. Then he lifted to trace himself against her folds. “You’re sure?” he murmured, looking down to where they touched.
So sure. “Yes,” she breathed.
He positioned himself and pressed.