by Rose, Bella
A thousand things slipped through her mind. She felt slighted that she’d spent all that time in grad school, and now she wouldn’t even graduate. She felt sorrow that she wouldn’t ever see Veronika again. She thought about her stupid little insignificant life in Russia and all the things that she would never be able to do.
She thought about Dmitri. She thought of all the things she wanted to say to him. Rage. Irritation.
Love.
It didn’t even seem possible for all the thoughts to fly through her mind. As soon as she lost her footing, an arm was circling her waist. “Easy. Don’t panic,” Dmitri whispered in her ear as he righted her.
Charley gasped and circled her arms around him. “Are you shot? Did she shoot you? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Her aim was off. I knew that.” His eyes darkened with intensity as he stared at her. “Did she hurt you?”
“No. She said she wanted me to watch you die,” she muttered as she ran her hands along his chest. Part of her couldn’t even believe that he was here. She had to touch him and prove to herself that it wasn’t a hallucination.
“I don’t plan on dying today,” Dmitri said huskily. He straightened and lifted his head to study to bridge above them. “Getting down was the easy part. With the wind whipping around, the currents in the river are deadly. We’ll have to go back up.”
Charley followed his gaze. “There is no way I’m ever going to get back up there,” she whispered.
Dmitri flashed her a sexy grin and winked. “Trust me, babe. I do this for a living.”
Charley stared at him. “You chose me,” she muttered. In her head, she thought of all the romantic things he might say. He might confess his love or at least confess that he might have feelings for her.
He didn’t say any of those things. Instead he just gave her a small smile. “What makes you think I had to choose?”
***
The guards pulled out their keys and opened the door. Dmitri cast a quick look around before sitting at the table. Ivan, dressed in the prison attire, sat across from him with his arms handcuffed to the table.
It was almost satisfactory to see the man who killed his father utterly defeated. “They told me that Anton was visiting me,” Ivan whispered. “How could you have adopted your original identity?”
Dmitri smiled. “It was quite easy. After Kazimir went after you and got you arrested, I went to the authorities and explained the situation. I told them that I faked my death at the age of eighteen to get away from my psycho guardian. If they thought it was odd that I bare a striking resemblance to the dead assassin Dmitri, they didn’t say.”
After Dmitri called Ivan, he immediately called Kazimir. Kaz went after Ivan while Dmitri went for Charley. Soon he’d have to actually start calling Kazimir a friend.
“I still win,” Ivan hissed. “I can do great things behind bars.”
Dmitri leaned back against the chair and gave him a chilling smile. “I could have had Kazimir kill you. He offered. For the death of my father, you deserve it. But for what you did to Charley, you deserve so much worse. You’re powerless in here, Ivan. I’ve personally spoken to the warden. I know half the men who share a cell with you. If you so much as attempt to contact the outside world, you’ll be beaten within an inch of your life. But they won’t kill you. I want you to live in this filth for as long as I can.”
His former guardian stared at him in horror. “We were family, Anton.”
“My father was my family. You were the man who turned a child into a killing machine. Into a monster.”
Ivan chuckled. “I gave you the tools. You were the one who was so damn good at it. You don’t actually think you’ll go legit now, do you? You’ve done this your whole life. You know of nothing else. You’ll shed blood until someone finally ends you.”
Dmitri rolled his head as if he was bored. “I’m done with this life, Ivan. I have enough money to retire, and I don’t have a thirst for blood. I’ve found something else now. Something real.”
“The woman?” Ivan asked as his eyes widened. “You almost got her killed. She’ll never take you back.”
That was the first thing Ivan had said that even remotely rang true. Dmitri had no idea if Charley would even consider taking him back. It would probably just be best if he walked away. “It doesn’t matter if we’re together or not,” Dmitri said softly. “What matters is that I know I’m capable of love. She showed me that. She’s my redemption even if I never see her again.”
“You’re a fool. Love makes you weak.”
“Maybe. But I wouldn’t give it up for the world.” He got up and shook his head. “I won’t come back, Ivan. This is the last time you’ll see me. I’ll keep tabs on you, though. I want to make sure you rot in here.”
“I loved you.”
Dmitri froze as he stared at Ivan. The man’s eyes were filled with sadness as he looked at him. “I mourned your death, Anton. It affected me more than you could even imagine. I took you as revenge against your father, but I grew to love you as my own. I sometimes wonder about the man you would have been had you known how much I loved you.”
There was nothing for Dmitri to say, so he simply turned and walked out. Things would have been radically different if he’d been raised with love rather than hatred. Maybe if he had, he would have been able to hold onto love when he had the chance. Maybe Charley would be his.
Chapter Ten
“So you’ve only been in Russia for a week?” Charley asked, trying to force a smile. The petite woman in front of her pushed her thick Coke-bottle lens glasses up her face and nodded. “And before that you were in England?”
Again, the woman nodded meekly. Charley flipped through the pages and sighed. As yet another search began for a new roommate, she was starting to find red flags everywhere. On paper, the woman in front of her seemed perfect. She was in Moscow to study Russian culture, and Charley has Kazimir check every moment of her life. She was clean.
But as the supposedly perfect woman sat in front of her, Charley began to pick her apart. No one wore glasses that thick anymore. Obviously she was trying to hide her identity. Whoever was sitting across from her wasn’t the woman Kazimir had investigated.
“I’m sorry. I just don’t think it’s going to be a great fit,” she said as she stood. It wasn’t the first time she’d mourned the loss of her baseball bat. After her kidnapping and Ivan’s arrest, the authorities descended on the hotel room like a swarm. Everything was taken as evidence, including her baseball bat.
Dmitri, of course, disappeared. He’d been gone for three weeks now, and there was no word on his whereabouts. He’d simply dropped her off at the police station and melted into the shadows.
She’d been interviewed relentlessly, but she had no information to give. Over and over again, she just said that one of Ivan’s enemies had her kidnapped. She had no idea who he was or where he was.
And it was true.
Charley tensed as the woman rose. Here it was. The seemingly harmless English woman was going to attack, and Charley was defenseless.
Instead, the woman whispered a thank you and hurried from the house. A voice inside Charley’s head wondered if maybe she was seeing threats at every turn.
“But it’s not like I don’t have good reason,” Charley snapped at herself.
“Ms. Barns?” Charley whirled around to see the English woman standing in the doorframe. “You have a package out here,” she said quietly before ducking her head and leaving.
A package? There was no mail today. She followed the woman out and glanced down at the box. It wasn’t addressed.
“What the hell is this?” she muttered. With a sigh, she grabbed it and brought it inside.
Cautiously, she opened it. A brand new baseball bat nestled inside the box along with a manila folder. Trembling, she pulled out the folder and opened it.
It was an application for a position as a roommate.
Name: Anton Mankovich
Date of Birth: July
27, 1974
Occupation: Freelance Consultant
Criminal Background: Suspected for multiple crimes, investigated, and cleared.
Marital Status: Depends
Slowly, Charley flipped through the pages. There were pages and pages of background history and references. Without even looking up, she knew that he was watching her.
“You have a nasty habit of following me,” she said softly without looking up.
“I apologize,” Dmitri said formally as he materialized from the corner of her living room. “I was concerned when I discovered you were looking for a new roommate.”
She sat the application on the table and straightened her shoulders. Every nerve in her body was aching to touch him, but she couldn’t. She’d gone three weeks of not hearing a peep. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of jumping into his arms.
“My last roommate failed to pay rent, and her deposit check bounced. Something about her assets being frozen,” Charley said as she crossed her arms.
“I checked out that last woman myself. There was no reason for you to send her away. She has impeccable credit, great references, and she had plenty of money,” Dmitri said quietly.
Charley met his worried gaze with defiance. “I didn’t like her glasses.”
“Her glasses?” he asked with a lift of his eyebrows.
“Yes. They were too thick. It was impossible to see her eyes.”
He stepped closer to her, and she immediately took a step back. His saw the move and stopped. “Charley, you can’t live your life afraid.”
Trying to seem nonchalant, she shrugged. “It looks like I still have an opening. I’ll review your application and get back to you. You can see yourself out, Mr. Mankovich.”
“Charley.”
All it took was one word for her stop. Rage filled her, and she turned on him. “Mankovich. I didn’t even know you had a last name. I though you just went by Dmitri. And since that’s not your legal name, you shouldn’t be putting it on your application.”
“If you look through that file, you’ll find everything you need to know.”
“Like what?” She crossed her arm and stared at him. “What did you put in the file? What do you think I need to know?”
Hesitation flashed in his eyes, and she felt a streak of satisfaction. He was on unstable footing. Good. She wanted him to know how she felt.
“After Ivan’s arrest, I turned myself in. I explained that I was Anton Mankovich, and that I faked my suicide as a teenager to free myself from my criminal guardian. I’m a freelance consultant, and I’m legally cleared.” He cleared his throat. “I would also like to point out that all of Dmitri’s victims had blood of their own on their hands.”
Charley snorted. He thought the fact that his victims weren’t innocent was the headlining factor here. “A freelance consultant?”
“Up and coming businesses. I’m quite successful at it.”
“So you’re wealthy. Why would a wealthy freelance consultant be interested in living with me?”
“A change of pace would be nice,” he said quietly. “Settling down would be nice, too.”
“Settling down?” Charley scoffed. “As my roommate?”
Just like that, the mask slipped away. Charley saw naked vulnerability in his face. When he spoke, she heard the honesty in his voice. “Help me out here, Charley. Tell me what you want me to say.”
“Are you kidding me?” She stared him. “You disappeared. You dropped me off without so much as a word and left me. You really want to know what I want, Dmitri? I want to know what the hell is going on inside your fucking head!”
She’d barely blinked before he’d crossed the floor. Framing her face with his hands, he pulled her in for a bruising kiss. “You want to know what’s in my head? You are. Every time I close my eyes, I see you. Every step I take, it’s toward you,” he hissed.
“That’s not good enough,” she said as she pushed at him.
He captured her wrists and pulled her in for another kiss. If he was trying to convey anything in that kiss, she didn’t know what it was. Charley couldn’t focus on anything except the sizzle of his lips on hers. He leaned her against the side table and pressed his hard body against hers. Lust and desire took control of her body, and she wrapped her arms around his neck to pull him even impossibly closer.
“It doesn’t mean anything,” she murmured even as she grappled at the buttons on his shirt.
“It means everything,” he said huskily as he pressed hot kisses to her throat. She moaned when his hands skimmed under her shirt. She didn’t even need the foreplay. She’d been wet and ready from the moment she’d set eyes on him again.
He lifted her and slid her on the surface of the small table. The lamp on it fell to the floor with a crash, but she barely registered the sound. She wrapped her legs around him and dug her nails into his skin. “Please,” she murmured. “Dmitri.”
“Anything you want. Whenever you want,” he growled. She heard the distinct sound of his zipper and whimpered. In the haze of her lust, she almost forgotten the point she was trying to make. She almost lost herself in the moment.
“Dmitri,” she gasped. She wanted it to stop. She wanted to be strong and tell him to go to hell, but instead, she let him lift her. She shimmied out of her pants and pulled him closer.
“Charley,” he urged as he slid a hand under her bra. Freeing her breasts, he flicked at her nipple as he nibbled on her ear. It was too much. He was too much. Closing her eyes, she wrapped her hands around his hardness and guided him.
She needed to feel him inside her just as much as she wanted to tell him off. Her body would always betray her, and as he filled and stretched her, she came to terms with her need. He was her drug.
It was more than the intense feelings as he thrust deeply inside her. She opened her mouth and bit into his shoulder. He groaned as she suckled on his skin, marking him. She may never have more than this, but by God, she would make sure he remembered her. Every time he saw that mark, he would think of her.
“Look at me,” he murmured. His breath was hot against her skin. “Charley, please look at me.”
Please. She lifted her eyes and cried out as he moved deep inside her. Her toes curled as he moved over that sweet spot inside her. “Don’t stop,” she cried out softly. If this was going to be the last time she had him inside her, she didn’t want it to end.
“Let go, baby. Please. Just trust me,” he urged her in a strangled voice. He was close. She could tell. And he always waited for her. If she could just hold on a little bit longer….
But she couldn’t. Her body betrayed her, and she threw back her head and screamed his name as her body completely shut down. Wave after wave of pleasure crashed through her, and she barely heard his hoarse cry as he found his own release.
At some point, he’d carried her to the couch. Her muscles were completely limp as she pooled on top of him and waited for her mind to realize what she had just done.
“Tell me that didn’t mean something,” he whispered finally.
Pain gripped her heart when logic finally returned. She wanted to tell him that it meant everything to her, but she was far too proud. Drenched in sweat, she pushed herself to her elbows and stared down at him. “Chemistry, Dmitri. You don’t have to prove chemistry. Good sex, while a great way to relieve tension, isn’t what I’m looking for.”
“I didn’t mean for this to happen,” he said softly as he reached up to frame her face with his hands. “By this, I mean all of this. I never meant to involve you. I never meant to get involved with you. And I didn’t mean to leave you for so long. I’m sorry Charley. I wanted to call you every day, but when I stood in front of you again, I wanted it to be a man you could be with.”
She felt her heart speed up, and it didn’t have anything to do with the fact that he was naked under her. “Your profession was never the problem.”
“But we’d be hiding from everyone, and your life is here. I didn’t want you to h
ave to give that up,” he said softly. “I’m legit. I’ll stay legit.”
“Again,” she said with a hint of irritability. “Your profession was not the problem.”
“Then what? What do you want from me, Charley?”
She rolled her eyes. “If you don’t know, then I can’t help you.”
As she tried to push herself off him, he gripped her arms and flipped them over. He settled on top of her, and intensity flashed in his eyes. “You want me to tell you how I feel about you.”
“That’s not a tall order. If you want this to work, you need to be transparent with me.”
“And you?” Dmitri searched her eyes. “Will you be transparent with your feelings about me?”
Astonished, she stared at him. “Are you serious? My feelings aren’t transparent?”
He smiled. “You talk to yourself, Charley. For the most part, every emotion that you feel is written all over your face. Anger. Irritation. Disbelief. But if it’s an emotion that scares you, you lock it down. If it’s words that could hurt you, you never utter them. Charley Barns, I love you. I’m not afraid of what I feel for you. It came out of the blue, and the only thing I feared was that I couldn’t protect you.”
Hope swelled within her. “You love me?”
He nodded and reached down to kiss her softly. “I know that recent events make it hard for you to trust, but if you trust me, Charley, I promise that I will spend the rest of my life trying to make you happy. Marry me.”
Charley couldn’t help but laugh. “You don’t know how I feel about you, and you’re willing to marry me?”
“Oh, I know how you feel about me.” He smiled wickedly as he reached down and kissed her nipple lightly. “And when you’re ready, you’ll tell me.”
Her body shuddered under his touch. “But you want me to commit the rest of my life to you?”
Dmitri shifted his body so that he could run his hands lightly up her naked hip. “Marry me, Charley. Make an honest man of me. Force me to spend the rest of my life listening to you talk to yourself.”