by Lana Sky
She was more than his wayward kitten—maybe they all were. The other women smart enough to leave him before he threw them aside like trash.
And that’s all you are to him, baby. Melanie’s voice slithers through my thoughts, tainting them. Trash. Just like me. You think any man might feel differently? Think again.
“You’re upset, aren’t you?” He phrases the statement as if doubting it the moment the words leave his mouth. “Look at me—”
“Goodbye, Mr. Koslov.”
We’re in front of the house now, parked in the driveway. A yellowish glow illuminates the windows; the kids are home. My lips twitch, fighting to remember how to smile as I reach for the door handle.
“No—” The car lurches backward and then veers onto the road so fast that I have to brace myself against the window.
Heart pounding, I look at him from the corner of my eye. He’s rigid, hunched over the dashboard, his eyes on the blurring streets.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“We’re not done.”
I can taste his anger, more potent than the perfume of those fucking roses.
“I asked you a question.”
“Let me out,” I rasp. But if he replies, I hear nothing. Just my pounding pulse and ragged breaths. One. Two. Ten. Fifty. The faster I inhale, the more lightheaded I feel.
He’s zooming through traffic, running red lights…
With no fucks given, he veers across oncoming traffic and a barrage of honking horns deafen me as my stomach lurches to the back of my throat.
“Stop!” I tug at the handle, only to realize he’s engaged the locks. “What are you doing?”
Seconds later, his high-rise seems to come from nowhere, looming above for a heartbeat before he turns into the garage. After he parks and switches the car off, I can breathe again.
“What are you doing?” I repeat, my voice shaking.
“Get out.” He doesn’t even face me before exiting the car. The door slams shut behind him, echoing like a gunshot. “We need to talk.”
“I’m done talking.”
So why aren’t I running?
I’m copying him instead, approaching the elevator. Maybe I really am in that damn thriller. There’s a monster on my trail, though he keeps his distance, calling out in a dangerously soft cadence.
“Did you hear me?” he wonders, his voice chasing me as I pull ahead of him.
Yes. I hear him. Just like I’ve heard a million others throughout my life. Teachers. Boys. Men. My mother. My sisters. My brothers.
You’re too stupid to do anything but scrape, Frankie.
You have to take care of us, Frankie.
You’re worthless, Frankie.
All you’re good for is lying on your back…
“Look at me.”
My spine curls at the lethality contained in just a few terse notes. Shit. There’s no ignoring him. The entire elevator car crackles with tension, feeling impossibly small. Crushing myself in the corner can only buy me a second’s reprieve. What the hell am I doing here?
I start for the closing doors and try to wedge my hand between them. “Take me back—”
“Look at me.”
A violent crack rips through the silence. The door slamming shut? No. His fist meeting the control panel so hard that a chunk of metal flies off and ricochets across the floor.
It misses me by mere inches, and I cringe, pressing myself against the wall out of instinct. But when I finally process my emotions, I only feel…pain.
Sharp and searing agony claws through my stomach, but my nails aren’t the cause this time.
Poor baby, Melanie taunts. You thought you were the special one? Ha!
The room blurs, reducing Maxim to a golden blur on black canvas. No matter how hard or fast I blink, nothing holds the tears back.
“Are you bored?” I ask him. In the narrow space, I sound dangerously loud. “Is that why you brought me here? To fuck? To terrorize? Whatever it is, let’s just get it over with.” I claw at the front of my dress, undoing the buttons beneath the collar. Ping! They fly off one by one, dancing across the floor. “Should I bend over? S-stand? Just tell me where you want me—”
“Stop.” He watches my pathetic performance without a shred of emotion.
“Here, then?” I’m already trying to shove my arms from the sleeves. “Just tell me—”
“Stop it.” He’s closer in an instant, grabbing me by my throat, clenching hard enough to cut off any sound I make.
I’m forced to stare up, but from this angle, his eyes burn. Like glimpses of hell smuggled in the gaze of an angel.
“Tell me what this is about,” he demands.
“About?” I croak—the loudest reply I can force through his grip. None of this should be surprising. His real feelings shouldn’t hurt. I should take his money like a good girl and perform whatever song he wants in return. “Just tell me how you want to use me. That’s all I’m good for. Isn’t it?”
He laughs, and never in my life has a sound ripped down my spine with such intensity, resonating in my bones. Like thunder, that first warning herald before one hell of a storm.
“I see it now. You’re jealous.” He lets me go and steps from the elevator, leading the way down the hall. “Of her,” he calls back.
I should deny it. Shake my head.
Lie.
“Tell me,” I choke out instead. “I just… I just need to hear you say it.”
God, why do I sound so weak? Breathy. Desperate.
“Oh?” His tone rings with warning, begging me to heed it. Stop this.
Hell, every nerve in my body screams at me to do the same. Get a hold of yourself, Frankie! I bite my lip. Gouge at my wrist. Nothing clears my head. Instead, the same damn thought keeps echoing over and over. Her potential. Her potential…
“Was I that much of a whore?” I ask in a rush. I can’t stop spitting each word out despite how his shoulders stiffen, his posture tenses. “Is that why you made your offer?”
Why you threw me away.
“Enough of this.” He whirls on his heel without warning. His hand latches onto my skull, dragging me deeper inside.
I try to back away, but he’s relentless, grasping me even tighter.
“Whore? Yes,” he snarls. “Just like the rest. And to you, I was just a job. Look at me—” He tugs even harder when I try to turn away. Goosebumps swell over my skin, feeding off the tension radiating through him. It’s like he’s a fucking inferno—even though his voice chills me right to the fucking bone. “You want to know about her?”
He shoves me onto a leather chaise face down before I can reply. I twist my hips, fighting his grip—but his knee lands on my lower back, easily pinning me beneath him.
“The trembling little girl who came to me in a goddamn prom dress?” he hisses. “Who vomited on my cock before she could even take the damn thing in her mouth? A girl who wouldn’t have lasted a day, let alone a night with me? And what about you?” He yanks my head upright, ripping tiny hairs from their follicle beds. My scream can’t drown him out; he’s that loud. “You came to me no better than she did. I showed you mercy. I told you to leave. You disobeyed—”
His voice rasps as if the concept confounds him, even now: I came back to him.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Suddenly, the pressure on my scalp loosens. Through streaming eyes, I watch him back toward the center of the room.
“I gave you what you wanted—more than all those fucking women combined.” He’s still shouting, straining the cords in his neck. I feel each bellowed word like he’s hammering them into my skull. “Gemma has a husband. A child. The first time I spoke to her in four years was to request her services. For you. Fuck, the things I’ve done for you.” He sounds awed. Disgusted. “The things I’m still doing. For you. Even when it costs me more than you can imagine. And you want to play this childish game? Like a mouse chasing the cat’s tail. You enjoy this, don’t you?” Amusement
flickers across his expression, but it’s mixed with something else, visible only in his stern frown. Something too heart-stopping to name. “Don’t you?”
“Enjoy it?” I choke out. His madness is contagious. I’m going mad. I tear at my hair, rocking back and forth as the pain barely registers. “I hate it! Stop toying with my head. You threw me away—”
“Did I?” He glances around the massive room as if taking stock of each possession. The luxurious leather chaise. The polished, pristine floors.
And finally me, trembling at his mercy.
“Bored. You used that word. And I should be bored of you.” He takes a step closer.
I jump back, but he advances again, another step. Another. His movements are jerky, devoid of the grace I’m used to. Almost as if he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it. Prowling. Hunting. Closing me in near the wall, eliminating my only escape route with a mere shift of his weight.
The second I flinch to the balls of my feet, it’s already too late.
“You want to know about kotyonok—” His hand sweeps out, capturing a fistful of my hair again.
One ruthless yank makes me stagger into him, my hands grasping for leverage. I can feel his heart beating like this. It’s fast. Unsteady. Manic. He doesn’t care when I stiffen. His fingers just readjust their hold, crushing me against him.
“You were the only one whose name I didn’t bother to learn at first. Just you,” he admits, murmuring the confession into my hair. In a sick way, he sounds softer than before. Gentle. “You were right to be jealous. If you and Gemma both came to me that first day, I would have picked her.”
Fire shoots through my chest. Is that pain? No, it’s too sharp. Too raw. It doesn’t numb me—it makes me reckless. “Get off of me!” I try to turn away, but his grip tightens.
“Don’t.” His teeth nip my earlobe as he snarls the warning. “I would have picked her,” he echoes, an octave softer. “I could smell the desperation on you then. To you, I was a wallet. A job. A necessary evil. But I didn’t judge you for that.”
He doesn’t sound angry. Merely crisp. Clinical. Like a scientist mulling his most puzzling experiment out loud, inviting anyone to offer insight.
“I knew you only wanted money. It’s why I let you stay. It’s why I didn’t take the same pity on you that I did on the others. You were too young. And when you came back the first time…I knew exactly why. For money. And the second. And the third. All you wanted was fucking money.”
He chuckles in that cold, chilling way, making goosebumps rise over my skin. We’re too close. There’s no escape from everything that makes him Maxim Koslov: the smell. The bulk. Those eyes glaring into my soul as if he knows everything I’ve ever tried to hide.
For what feels like an eternity, he stares into me. Through me. Whatever he finds just hardens his features further. He’s stone within an instant, impossible to decipher.
“Believe it or not, I could stomach your greed. I have more than you’ve seen in your fucking lifetime. Enough to make you choke on it—” His free hand flinches for my throat as if he’s intending to do just that. Choke me.
This time, for good.
Instead, he twists me around, shoving me face-first against the ice-cold wall. He’s brutal. Unbearable pressure pins me in place: a prison made of flesh, and bone, and skin.
“It’s not the money, is it?”
Warmth tickles the back of my neck: his mouth, nuzzling me. Biting me. Another gasp claws up my windpipe, but he’s already licking the pain away before I can voice it.
“No… Something else keeps you coming back now.”
There’s no answer. None that I can give, and none that he’d believe. There’s just silence, and a heartbeat—his and mine, hammering out a violent, unsteady rhythm in sync.
“I don’t even think you know,” he declares, sounding thoughtful again. “But it’s wearing thin, Francesca… Though damn, maybe this is what you want?”
His fingers creep up my hips, groping through my thin clothing. Up my rib cage. To my breasts. The tighter he grips me, the more disjointed this moment feels. I’m in a parallel universe, where oxygen is an afterthought.
My body subsists only on this. His touch. His hate. Without warning, his nails sink into my skin. Lightly at first. Then firmer. Viciously. The tighter he holds, the harder I squeeze my eyes shut.
Harder. Harder. Light flashes before my eyes by the time he finally relents. Judging from the fiery welts stinging on my chest, he drew blood.
“I’m losing my patience,” he admits, exhaling against my shoulder. “I’m losing my goddamn mind. Gemma, I could let her fuck someone else. She doesn’t matter. I don’t fucking care—but you?”
A shadow along the wall is my only warning before he wrenches my head to the side, baring my throat. A part of me lurches, anticipating teeth. Instead…I just feel the unstable gusts of his breath.
“I should bite you,” he says against my skin. “Taste you. Make you bleed. More. Take all of you until there’s nothing left.”
He turns me around, capturing my throat in both hands, and yanking me onto the tips of my toes. Though my fingers fly out for stability, my nails catch the material of his jacket, accidentally seeking the flesh underneath. Bone.
He doesn’t even flinch.
His hand cups my scalp, pulling me toward him, and I’m frozen. Blood. That’s what we taste like as he forces his mouth to mine. Blood mingled together over bitten lips. Salt from my tears. Heat from his rage. Lust. Our tongues clash, his clambering to steal it all without sharing an ounce. And a terrifying thought starts to take hold: Maybe this is the only way I’ll ever know how to let him in.
Through violence.
Because deep down, we’re the same.
Selfish, twisted creatures.
Chapter Twelve
Just as quickly as the kiss began, he ends it, shoving me back. “Get on your knees.” Each word crackles with barely concealed tension as he looms above, his hair obscuring part of his face.
I know the look in his eye, however, and I’m already staggering backward, rushing to obey the command. My knees strike the floor, bare beneath the hem of my dress.
I stare down at the bruised flesh, not looking up even as I hear him circle my position. My brain scrambles to take note of every nuanced emotion from him. He reeks of sweat and something else. Something sweet that drips from his fingers and taints the air like perfume.
“Your dress,” he grates out amid the telltale crunch of leather over fabric. His belt.
I picture it being wrenched from belt loop after belt loop. Impatiently. A shiver runs down my spine as I contort my arms behind my head and struggle to lift the fabric. The cool air kisses the bruises already there, but I barely feel the ache. By the time I rise onto my hands, the first crack of leather hits the air.
And the only thing I can do is feel.
He’s reckless. A grunt rips from him with every brutal lash, mingling with the groans I barely manage to smother. In a twisted semblance of harmony, we create a symphony of muted agony and sadistic satisfaction. What feels like seconds later, it’s over. His belt hits the floor with a thud, his breaths unsteady over the air.
“Get…up.” His hand sinks into my hair, guiding my head back just enough so I can find him staring down on me, his eyes feral and unfocused. One hard yank and he has me on my feet, staggering down the hall, into his room, toward the bed.
I land on my back, my legs spread apart just enough for him to fit in between. He palms my waist, wrenching the hem of my dress up farther while pinning me flat against the mattress. With one hand, he reaches between my legs, cupping me in his palm.
I can’t stifle a gasp. He feels hot. On fire. His fingers are slick as well, and I cringe as I wonder why—or maybe the moisture is from me? He hasn’t touched me in days. I shouldn’t crave that rough, bitter sting only he can deliver, but my hips are already arching into it, extending the torturous seconds.
“Still greedy,” he bites o
ut, stroking me with a callused finger. The anger is gone, and the teasing pinch on my clit is my reward. I think. He curls a thumb inside me before I can be sure, purposefully stroking my inner walls. “Roll over.”
When I do, he smooths my hair along my back, guiding me upright. The other hand is still inside me, slowly churning my insides to mush.
“Your knees.”
My thighs jerk apart, anticipating the moment he mounts the mattress behind me, his breath on my throat. Wet heat precedes the warning nip of his teeth. A tease. The next bite goes deeper, easily breaking the skin.
My lips fly apart, a moan caught between them. As if in punishment or encouragement, he bites down harder, tearing…grinding. My fingers sink into the sheets, straining the cotton. It isn’t enough to anchor me though. My head floats, my thoughts drifting.
Clear. Crisp. Real.
“You’re hungry for me. Aren’t you?” Maxim growls into my ear, banishing the dark suspicions.
My body agrees with that assessment. Both nipples feel like razors teasing the inside of my dress. Each brush heightens the heat building in my blood. I’m starving, but he just might be poison and my body is torn between the risk of dying and the promise of instant gratification.
“Aren’t you?” He nips me again, soothing the wound with a lick from his tongue.
The mattress sinks as he settles in behind me, throwing me off-balance. The hiss of a zipper being undone pierces the air, and then his fingers are between my legs again, nudging them further apart.
He breathes out after the first experimental thrust of his thumb. With the slightest bit of pressure on my clit, he has me lunging toward the headboard, bucking into his hand. He wields me like a tool this way, stroking and pinching to make me squirm. Make me scream.
Make me submit.
His broadness teases my entrance. Stretches me open. Wakes me up. My inner muscles clench, hungry for his length, but he doesn’t thrust. He lingers, giving me the briefest taste of the fullness I crave.
It’s maddening.
My legs shake, my fingers grasping for leverage. Just when I start to sway, he thrusts another half of an inch. Another. A burst of wetness coats him, easing his way—not that he takes advantage of it. It’s like he’s getting off from the anticipation of fucking me alone, thickening against my entrance. Driving me fucking insane.