by Leslie North
He pumped her, filled her, bringing her ever closer to that ultimate agonizing brink. Madison wanted to say something, maybe even to shout it until it echoed in every empty room of her apartment, but all she could do was plead wordlessly for more, her voice rising, catching, and calling for an end to her agony, a release that only he could give her…
And then her quivering legs locked and she was coming, riding every savage roll of his pelvis as if he was a wild steed that might unseat her at any moment. Vlad never slowed his pace, not even when she gave over to a shuddering wail and let her head fall back; his lips, his teeth, found the base of her throat exposed, and he ravished her neck until what remained of her senses fled completely. When he began to jerk himself harder inside of her, she knew he was close; when he came, it was with a Russian oath, and she felt the hot jet of his seed fill her. She took it all, every ounce of it, knowing she shouldn't, relishing the forbidden nature of giving herself over to his male virility.
Madison woke a half hour later. She hadn't intended to drowse, but her body ached with delicious exhaustion. Vlad lay beside her, his naked body lounging atop a heap of discarded clothes; she had no way of knowing anymore if they were his or hers. Maybe she hadn't been so far off-base in calling him a prince in exile, she thought. If ever there was an image of tarnished royalty, it was this sexually-sated son of the mob lying beside her.
"So." Madison rolled over to face her lover, propping her chin in her hand. "Can I assume I'm off your suspect list?"
7
"It's just sex, Dmitry."
Vlad's brother had stopped pretending to read a while ago; now, he gazed up from beneath the transparent lenses of his reading glasses as if they could lend a similar transparency to the world misrepresenting itself around him.
"You've been seeing this girl for almost a month now. Does she know that?" Dmitry asked. "Do you know that?
Vlad wasn't in the mood to discuss his relationship with Madison O’Connor. It wasn't the reason he had come to the bookstore today, yet all conversations seemed to keep leading back to her.
"I just said it, didn't I?" Vlad plucked the cigarette from behind his ear and pushed it past his lips, even though he had no intention of smoking it indoors. Let his brother squirm a bit with the possibility.
"Right. Because honesty is a Mafioso’s strongest point. Excuse me; I've been gone so long I'd forgotten."
Madison valued honesty, Vlad reflected. She also valued his thrusting body behind hers, in front of hers, beneath hers… he would have been worn out if he wasn't so God damn addicted to the things she could do to him. He didn't feel like relating to Dmitry that the sex was near-constant, and their time spent together was becoming almost indistinguishable from their time spent apart. It just came with being neighbors who enjoyed each other's company, Vlad assumed, even though he had no previous experience with an arrangement like this one. If they had dinner together, it was only to rebuild their stamina so they were ready when one of them inevitably pounced; if they quarreled or traded insults, it was only to recharge the air between them with the frenetic electricity that had become the hallmark of their sex life.
If Madison chose to spend her time leafing through catalogues with the intention of helping Vlad furnish his spare apartment, it was only to liven things up by ordering new surfaces for him to fuck her up against. It all seemed terrifically simple to him. It was only Dmitry who was trying to complicate things.
"Here." His brother tossed him a book, which Vlad snatched deftly out of the air. Kama Sutra for Dummies, the title read.
"I thought you dealt in rare books," Vlad said as he let the trashy volume fall open in his broad hand.
"Recently it feels like I deal more in hopeless cases," Dmitry remarked.
Vlad closed the book with a snap, fighting to control an unexpected rise in his temper. He had come all the way here to have a serious discussion, but Dmitry still insisted on treating him like the youngest brat in the family and little more. "I didn't come here to discuss the family business, and I didn't come here to talk to you about the girl," he said finally. "I came to talk to you about Maxim."
"Maxim?" Dmitry blinked owlishly. "Why? He was just in here the other day. He didn't mention that he saw you."
Vlad shouldn't have felt surprised by this. He wasn't even certain that Maxim remembered their encounter well enough to relate it; then again, he couldn't discount the possibility that his brother was trying to cover his tracks.
"Do you trust Maxim, Dmitry?" Vlad asked.
Dmitry crossed his burly arms and stared at him for a long moment. Even beneath the navy wool sweater, Vlad could see that five years later, his brother was keeping up with his old workout regime. Good. Vlad was fast losing allies, and he would need the strongest to remain with him if he hoped to survive his investigation.
"How well do you trust him?" Vlad pressed his brother.
"I already know where you're going with this," Dmitry replied. "And if you know something about Maxim that I don't, then you better tell me now. Is it his drinking? How bad is it?"
"Bad enough to lead him to pick a fight with Sergey," Vlad said.
Dmitry's severe expression shifted strangely then and Vlad knew what was about to happen before the bell even chimed above the front door. He turned slowly, but even his attempts to casually take in the intruder fell miserably short when he saw Madison O’Connor.
In the context of Dmitry's dusty old bookstore, the woman was nothing short of stunning. Her brilliant red hair tumbled about her shoulders untamed; evoking immediate memories of what she looked like between his sheets. She had just come from work, and despite the wildness of her hair, was dressed as conservatively as a big city librarian in a crisp blouse and black skirt. She made Dmitry, the true keeper of the books, look shabby by comparison, at least in Vlad's private opinion. Her face lit up when she saw him, her freckles racing to amass on the bridge of her nose as she smiled.
"Hi, Vlad. I'm glad I got the address right. What's that?" she asked, staring pointedly at the book in Vlad's hand.
"Nothing." Vlad immediately shoved the book among the nearest series of volumes, concealing the title from Madison's curious gaze.
"Don't shelve that there," Dmitry moaned. "That's in the children's section."
Oddly, Vlad thought he saw Madison flinch at Dmitry's words. Was it the mention of children that caused her to look so uncomfortable? Then again, maybe she just hadn't noticed his brother sitting behind the counter until that moment.
"You must be Dmitry." She recovered herself and joined them in the front room, extending her hand in greeting. Dmitry shuffled out from behind his desk to take Madison's hand; then, surprising everyone in the room, he overturned it and kissed it.
"And you're the art gallery owner," he returned. "Fitting that a work of art should be surrounded by her contemporaries at all times."
"Enough." Vlad inserted himself between them, forcing Dmitry to break contact as he steered Madison away from his brother. "Let me give you the tour, Maddie." He hadn't expected to have such a visceral reaction to them meeting, but he decided not to question it. Instead, he led Madison further back into the stacks and out of earshot of his suspiciously grinning brother.
"Your brother is handsome," Madison observed. Vlad felt a flare of jealousy at her comment, but he suppressed it quickly. He knew he came from an attractive family; even someone with vision as bad as Dmitry could see that much. He had just never expected to feel in competition with his older brother again after Dmitry's defection from the family business.
"He's a nerd," Vlad said without any trace of generosity. "Anything remotely creative he just said to you probably came out of a book."
"You called me Maddie," Madison said.
Vlad glanced down at her, trying to assess whether he had inadvertently crossed a line. He kept his eyes hooded, his gaze impassive; but if his expression was unreadable, why was the woman staring back at him smiling?
"Nerd or not, you're clo
se to your brother," she noticed as she turned away to trail her fingers along the spines of the old books. Vlad noticed she was carrying a plastic grocery bag in her other hand. He had been so distracted by her appearance that he hadn't noticed it before. "This is the one who left the family business first?" Madison asked, pausing to throw a glance back at him over her shoulder.
"Let's just say he left with the least amount of drama."
"I think it's sweet that you wanted me to meet him," she returned brightly. "I really thought your family business was all that 'family' meant to you."
Vlad sighed in exasperation. "Now you're misreading my intentions as badly as Dmitry," he stated.
"Seems to me that a guy who makes his living reading probably doesn't misread often," Madison pointed out. She stopped short in her browsing abruptly, and Vlad took full advantage of her pause to move in. He rested his elbow on the shelf above her; Madison backed herself into the books, lacing her hands behind her back with a look of wry, expectant amusement.
"I invited you here because I wanted to show you how safe you are with me," Vlad explained. He felt stupid as soon as the words had left his mouth, but it didn't make his intentions any less true. "There is more to the Bratva than what you may have heard in those crime dramas you watch late at night. Yes, I can hear you through the wall."
Madison blushed. Either it was a guilty pleasure of hers, or she realized just how few nights they spent apart these days. "Like it or not, maybe 'safe' isn't what I want," she murmured. Vlad watched the sensuous movements of her lips as she spoke. He was well-acquainted with that mouth of hers by now, both on and off the battlefield, but he found he still couldn't get enough of it. He leaned in.
"No. Wait. Bad segue," Madison said. There was a rustling as she reached behind her, and she thrust a small box between them. "Here. You keep half of these stocked at your place, and I'll keep the rest."
Vlad's brows knit together. "Condoms? I thought you said you were on the pill."
"I am," she said. "I have been for years, and you can bet I've never missed a day. It's just… never can be too careful, right?"
"You think I'm seeing other women?" he asked her.
"No!" Madison exclaimed, bringing her hands up in protest and shifting the bag back up between them once more. "At least, you said it yourself. Our walls are paper-thin. I think I'd know it if you were. God, I hope you aren't." She gave a nervous laugh, one that Vlad ignored as he peered into the depths of the bag.
"What else is in there?"
"Nothing," she replied, bundling the bag up quickly. "Just… you know. Lady stuff."
"I'll keep the condoms," Vlad said, "if you promise to keep some in your office."
"What, like at work? At the gallery?" Madison groaned as they came back out together from behind the bookshelves. "You're serious, aren't you?"
"Deadly."
"That's the problem with you Karevs," she muttered as she rose up on her toes to bequeath him his kiss. "Well, most of you Karevs," she amended, pulling back to glance off toward Dmitry, who was rearranging the pencils in his desk cup. "You're deadly. And I'm… shit, I'm going to be late for a meeting. I wanted to stop by home first." She cursed as her brown eyes fell to the men's watch that dwarfed her wrist. "Why don't you come by the gallery later and see for yourself how well-stocked I am?"
Vlad's cock twitched aggressively at her words. He enjoyed watching her walk back out the front door of the bookstore, observing the hitch and slide of her tight rear end; Madison paused on the sidewalk outside to throw him a knowing look over her shoulder, grinning as she dialed a number on her cell phone. Back to work, and back to real life… for the both of them.
"You guys even have the same phone," Dmitry noticed from further back in the store. "Was that intentional?"
"Shut up."
"Vlad," his brother said more seriously this time. "You can't have 'just sex' with a woman like that. It isn't possible."
"Like you'd know."
Dmitry huffed in exasperation. Finally, he said: "All right. Tell me about Maxim."
Madison never thought she could hate a color as much as she hated the color pink.
She sat outside the O’Connor Fine Arts Gallery, hunched over like a gargoyle on the steps, thinking about all the ways she could eradicate pink from the displays and even from the outfits of the people passing by on the street. Savannah was perched on her shoulder as usual and speaking rapidly through the receiver.
"It was pink? Are you sure?"
"Positive." Madison groaned as she switched the phone to her other ear. "Oh God, don't make me say that word again."
"Have you told Vlad?" Savannah demanded. Madison would have shrugged had her friend been sitting across from her. It was how she would have preferred to deliver the news… not that she was especially good at delivering the news.
"It didn't come up," she said lamely, shifting a strand of hair back behind her ear.
"Well, clearly someone has been coming up."
"You know, I really thought I could depend on you not to do the whole 'I told you so' routine," Madison snapped. "I messed up, and now I'm in a bind. My parents aren't the only ones unwillingly tied to the Russian mafia these days." She put a hand over the receiver unnecessarily as an elderly couple passed her by; they stared openly, and hurried in their steps when they noticed her looking.
"Unwillingly tied?" Savannah scoffed. "You can't be serious. I may not be there in person, but I've got eyes on you, Maddie. If you're in love with the guy, just say so. I'm not going to judge… much." Her best friend sighed on the other end. "At least say it to him of all people. And while you're at it, you might consider saying a few other extremely important things."
“I didn’t expect to fall for him. Savannah, what am I going to do? The whole point of this was to free my parents from this whole mess; not tie them tighter with a grandchild. But he and I and it just happened. Many times. It happened many times and in many places. What have I done?” Madison couldn’t help sounding despondent even though she knew she should be happy. She was going to have a baby.
“Well…sounds to me like you’ve fallen in love with a mobster.” Madison could hear her friend’s amusement in her tone and she wanted to bristle at it but she knew she wasn’t making sense. How had things gotten so out of control?
“I…”
Madison watched as an unmarked black car drew up to the sidewalk. She heard the cascade of familiar shoe heels behind her, and turned to spot her father hurrying down the front steps of the gallery. "Savannah? I'll call you back," she said, hanging up with a quick key of her thumb.
It was Igor Ivankov, tall, bland and non-threatening, that her father had descended so rapidly to meet. Madison watched as the pair entered the gallery together; she waited until the car had pulled away and disappeared down the block before rising to follow.
"What are you up to, Dad?" Madison murmured to herself. Her father did not look happy, and she didn't blame him; prolonged contact with Igor Ivankov had a similar effect on her mood. Not only was he boring, he was often lewdly patronizing to her; to the point that she suspected he did not have a high opinion of professional women. The unassuming man with the tasteful pocket square collection was Sergey's brother, wasn't he? That meant he was Vlad's uncle… yet Madison couldn't think of two people more different from each other. She would have to remember to ask Vlad for more details on his uncle later; whether her lover would be forthcoming with them was something else.
Madison scowled to herself. Well, if no one was going to be forthcoming with her—and if she had no idea at the end of the day just who her allies were anymore—she was going to have to set her moral compass aside and inform herself.
She watched as her father disappeared with Igor into the east wing; then, she quietly slipped down the back hallway toward his office and unlocked the door.
His computer password was the same as ever: 'camillepasswordo.' Madison snorted as she was admitted immediately to his desktop, feeling a bi
t guilty now for spying on the innocent, almost endearingly naïve man who had raised her. But this is for his own good, she reassured herself as she clicked through to his e-mail client. If Sergey was out of the picture and her father was still in over his head, she needed to know exactly who the enemy was.
A quick search for 'Igor' and 'Ivankov' through her father's inbox revealed no more than the usual correspondences, all of them one-sentence confirmations to business scheduling on Igor's part.
When Madison sorted by most recent e-mails, something far more interesting came up. She sat back, considering the name that appeared repeatedly in her father's inbox; then she hit print.
She had not expected to see nearly fifty e-mails originating from Peter Franklin within the past month. Then again, Peter always seemed to appear these days when she least expected him.
"Peter?" Madison was in the process of stuffing the stolen e-mails into her briefcase when she came upon her family's lawyer standing before a new display in the west wing. Peter leapt back as if she had activated a laser field around the picture. Maybe she should think about getting one installed; he was standing awfully close.
"Careful! You'll knock one of the sculptures over!" Madison protested as he wheeled near the display.
"Oh yes, the sculptures! Sorry. Marvelous… marvelous work," Peter stammered. He raised his hand as if to pat the leg of the nearest sculpture, before drawing back and seeming to think better of it. "I was just on my way out. Financial meeting with Carson, you know, but I'm afraid we had to postpone it."
"Dad's double-booking himself these days," Madison noticed.
Peter nodded distractedly. He was still gazing at the picture, but then his eyes cut to her.
She sensed an opening and pounced. "Peter, would you mind meeting me here tomorrow morning before the gallery opens? Nothing official. I just have some… documents I want to go over with you."
The evening would give her time to read through everything and come fully prepared for battle tomorrow. She felt confirmed in one suspicion, at least, and that was that Peter wasn't only playing both sides against each other. He had a higher stake in what was going on at the gallery, and maybe, just maybe, it had something to do with Sergey's death.