For a man who’d spent his adult lifetime perfecting the art of eroticism and prolonging the sex act far beyond a simple fuck, for the second time in as many days, his only thought was to take her. He lowered his cock to her channel, pushing past her opening until she’d accepted all of him. Without a condom blocking her smooth, wet arousal, the added friction intensified their heat.
He pounded into her tightness, her arms wrapped around his neck and her legs attached to his waist. She came before he did, twisting and moaning as her pussy contracted around his cock, but he wasn’t releasing her until he’d finished, teasing her nub to garner her second arousal. It took a few minutes, but she was ripe, moving her hips in rhythm with his until his seed spilled into her.
Neither of them spoke when he pulled her on top of him, freeing her hair from the ponytail, and he studied her. Her face. Her eyes. Her smile was so full of satisfaction that it almost hurt. He wasn’t ready to leave her.
She rubbed her wet pussy along his thigh and grinned. “I wish you’d shaved me before you took me downstairs this morning. I would have liked for Slavic to see me all pink and swollen like this.”
He laughed. Not a chuckle or a smirk, but a true laugh. She ran her fingertips through his hair with a sad smile. “That’s the first time I’ve seen you really laugh since I met you.” She kissed him, and he returned the affection, savoring every second. “I’ll never forget you, Luka. Thank you. And don’t worry about me, I’ve got a clean bill of health from regular checkups, and I’ve been on birth control since I was in high school. My mother always said we had enough people in our house.”
“I can offer you the same security,” he said, “including an operation I had many years ago, so you really do not have to worry about a pregnancy, but your true danger rests in your home. My team will come to your house as soon as I can arrange it. This is where you need protection.”
“But we’re done,” she said, sitting up and smoothing out her hair. “We both agreed this was a one-night stand, and I’m okay with that. Besides,” she added with a smile. “I might get that handgun and take a few lessons. Who’d mess with me and a gun?”
“That’s not enough,” he said, the future becoming clearer. “I want to continue what we’ve started until I have to return to Russia. Join me back at the lake house under the same rules we’ve established. I do not like to share my time, so I need you to take a leave of absence from your work. I will pay your salary, of course, and I would need your passport.”
She didn’t speak, but she was struggling. “If you do what I tell you,” he added, “I can keep you safe. You do not need to worry about what happened with Anton or anything else about my business.” He’d frightened her, but his father could not hurt what he didn’t know about, and the man was thousands of miles away.
“It’s not that. Well, it’s not just that. I figured there was more to that story than the news was reporting, but this is nuts. I have my own house, and it’s close to the hospital. Besides, I’m not giving up my job for anybody. I’ve worked too hard, so that’s non-negotiable. And you really don’t understand poor people, do you? I don’t have a passport. I’ve never even been on an airplane.”
“Don’t ever, ever tell me something is non-negotiable, but if you are willing to make certain adjustments, we could make that work. We’ll stay at your house when you have a short time between shifts. I’ll have a driver take you back and forth when I’m not available, but there will be serious improvements to the security in your home. That is my version of non-negotiable.”
“We’ll talk about the driver,” she said with a sigh, adding with no small amount of sarcasm, “but you’re showing some great skills in the art of compromise. I’m very proud of you.”
“There is a limit to my patience, so don’t push your luck. Unless you’d like for me to show you what my belt can really do.”
“Just keep that thing on the floor.” She checked the damage to her bottom, rubbing her hand over the three red stripes. “I’m more than open to continuing with this relationship for a little longer, but how would I possibly explain any of this? I mean, my mother alone will grill me ruthlessly if I start throwing money around or disappear for weeks on end. And if I show up at work with a driver? People will be talking about me behind my back for years.”
“You have a rich boyfriend, that’s all people need to know. What I am proposing is not any different from what we’ve had these last few days, but I think we would both like to explore your interest in submission. Nothing else needs to change.”
“No shit,” she drawled. “So, let’s see if I get this straight. You’re basically offering me half of you, no emotions, just a physical relationship.”
“The physical relationship is all of me,” he said firmly. “There is nothing else.”
“You underestimate yourself. But if I’ve learned anything about you, it’s that this whole BDSM scene isn’t a game for you. I can accept that, but are you asking or telling me to join you, because those are two very different things.”
The general would never allow the submissive to act independently, and it was this exact complexity that had made her so attractive from the beginning. He wanted her, but he wanted her on her terms as well as his, and he understood the distinction would be just as important to her.
“I’m asking. This is your choice, and I will respect your decision if you demand I leave.”
“You had to think about that,” she teased gently. “Was it, like, painful to be so polite?” She ran her finger along the swirling tat that ran out of his collar. “And it’s all going to go away in a few months... just like Cinderella?”
“Get all that sass out of your system now, because when you are mine, you will regret those snarky comments, and yes, when I return to Russia, I will not ask you to continue in a long-distance relationship. Barring any unforeseen circumstances, I should be able to guarantee my presence through the summer.”
Even if his father demanded his return at their agreed upon time, he could make excuses that would keep him in New York for a few months. His assigned task wasn’t complete, and his success would dramatically increase their American business. They’d wait for him.
“Fine. I’ll take it,” she said, “but I have one condition.”
He prepared for a request that would be easy to grant, perhaps some pretty jewelry to fill that plastic box, or ideally, the funds to buy a bigger bed for the nights he spent at her house, but she said, “I want to be held. After we are done with whatever you have planned, I want you to hold me until I relax. I don’t want you wandering off or leaving me alone with my thoughts even if I’m chained to your bed. When you leave me, I feel used and unimportant.”
“That’s an easy demand,” he said, unable to hide his surprise, “and I agree to it, unless you are being punished. In that case, withholding my affection will be punitive.”
“Well, first,” she said, crossing her arms with a smile, “it’s not really a demand, sir. I know better than that. It’s more of a strong request. And second...” She let her thought trail off. “Oh, hell, there is no second. Fine. I can live with those rules.”
“I will stay here tonight and see you to work tomorrow,” he responded, his muscles relaxing for the first time all day. “I need to go to New York in the morning to catch up with Yuri and Slavic, but when your shift is done, someone will meet you at the hospital and bring you home. His name is Vadik Stepanov. When he tells you to make changes for your safety, you will obey as though the order came directly from me. I won’t be back in this part of the state until next week.”
“Da, ser,” she whispered, snuggling under his chin, her nude frame resting against his chest where she belonged.
He pulled a blanket off the back of the couch to cover her, and she grew quiet. Content to just hold her, he stayed until she started to drift off, and he roused her briefly to take the jewels off her nipples, rubbing her nubs when she reacted to the burst of pain. He lifted her in his arms to carr
y her to the small bed upstairs.
“Koshka,” he said as he grabbed his coat so his gun stayed close by his side. “What does the B stand for? In Susan B. Anthony?”
“I have no idea,” she murmured, settling into his arms and closing her eyes.
Chapter Ten
She didn’t expect to hear from him for days, but he’d texted her within minutes of dropping her off at the hospital and continued throughout her shift. She’d looked forward to checking her cell between patients, smiling to herself with each text and taking a long few minutes to think of a perfect reply before she’d moved on to her next task.
She’d fallen hard for Luka, but having spent years building walls to protect herself from the potential hurt and judgmental hypocrisies that came from a close relationship, she’d been prepared to return to her isolated life. His proposal to continue had shaken her firm self-reflection that isolation was her best option, but she assured herself that this was just sex, a short-term extension of their one-night stand. It may have been shallow and self-deprecating to accept a relationship with no future, but it was the right choice for her.
Even for a midweek daytime shift, the ER had been slow, but Mia wasn’t complaining. Her colleagues were enjoying the stress-free day too, talking quietly among themselves in the breakroom or chatting over a cup of coffee at the nurses’ station. She spent eighty hours a week with this talented team, more time than most people spent with their spouses, but she didn’t join the pleasantries. She knew very little about any of them beyond their names and, for a few of the doctors, where they’d attended school.
“You’re awfully chipper today, Dr. Anderson,” muttered Diondre McMurty, the dour, thin man who’d been running the main desk for years. “Maybe you can take some of that sunshine, you know, someplace else.”
She laughed, grabbing her last chart for the day. “At least I match the sunshine in your brilliant smile, Diondre.”
“Yeah,” he said, his deadpan expression never wavering. “Well, your shift is about over, so I’d suggest you wrap up and get out of here before something blows up, and we get swamped again.”
“I don’t want to get stuck either,” she said, looking at the clock on the wall. “I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night, and I’m beat.”
“Ahh...” said Diondre, leaning back in his chair. “That explains the three-hundred-pound linebacker standing down there by the elevators. That little bounce in your step. The extra smile that makes my teeth hurt. You’re too busy with the new man in your life to get your beauty sleep. He told security he’s waiting for you. Honestly, Dr. Anderson, I gotta say that you show some fine taste.”
“Huh?” she responded, craning her neck to see what he was talking about. In the six months since she’d started working there, that was probably the longest personal conversation she’d ever had with Diondre, and she had to take a second to adjust to his interest in another man. “That guy is waiting for me?”
Dressed in a heavy winter coat with black dress pants and expensive shoes, the huge stranger stood at the end of the hallway. Luka wasn’t kidding when he’d told her she’d have no trouble identifying his emissary at the end of her shift, but that guy was no more a driver than she was a neurosurgeon. He had to be about six five and three hundred pounds of solid muscle, probably spending more hours in a gym than half the Buffalo Bills football team. Late forties with more than a touch of gray in his blond hair, he acknowledged nobody, staring straight ahead like one of those guards at Buckingham Palace. Staff and patients alike walked around him, giving him sideways glances and a few of them even pointed as they whispered to their companion.
She took a deep breath before approaching, and he immediately stood taller, waiting expectantly until she reached his side. “Good evening, Dr. Anderson,” he said, his strong Russian accent cementing his position. “I am Vadik Stepanov. I have a car waiting for us in the front of the building to take you home.”
“Great,” she said without enthusiasm. “I can hardly wait. Just let me finish with one more patient, and I’ll be right with you. Can you give me about fifteen minutes?”
“Of course, ma’am. Take all the time you need. I’m here to support your schedule.”
The kid in exam room three was an easy slam dunk to end her day, a double ear infection with a low grade fever, clear chest, and no sign of the flu. “You know, you’d save a lot of time and money if you’d visited a walk-in clinic,” she said to the mother as she wrote the script for amoxicillin. “We have several in the outlying communities that are part of the hospital system.”
“I’m always worried you’ll have to admit him,” said his mother, wringing her hands, “and I don’t want to postpone that by having him someplace else.”
“Has he ever been admitted to the hospital?” asked Mia, running back through the chart for fear she’d missed something, but there was nothing in his medical history beyond typical childhood drama.
“Well, no,” she conceded, “but he’s very vulnerable.”
His mother continued to gush about nothing while her ten-year-old cringed, igniting a memory when Mia had been about the same age. In all fairness, her mother had been about eight months pregnant when Mia had shown up in her room at two a.m. with a fever and nasty cough. With a groan, Joy had rolled over and told her to go back to sleep. After a long, painful night on her own, Mia’s temperature was 104 degrees and she’d ended up in the ER with pneumonia where her mother had cussed out the nurses, and her little brother had run wild through the waiting room. There had to be some happy middle ground in parenting styles in there someplace.
Dismissing the overanxious mother with a reminder for her to follow up with her primary care physician, Mia gathered her things, including the old backpack she’d grabbed before leaving the house that morning. With a raised eyebrow, Luka hadn’t said a word when she’d kicked the pink gym bag under the kitchen table, but she hadn’t been prepared to deal with ten thousand dollars at five-thirty in the morning and sure as hell wasn’t bringing that kind of cash to work.
Like a solid, granite, immoveable mountain, Vadik stood where she’d left him, nodding politely as she approached. “Are you ready, Dr. Anderson?”
“Yep,” she said, looking around to see if anybody was paying attention.
He suppressed a small smirk as he pointed toward the exit, following behind her like an oversized shadow. A blast of cold air delivered a flurry of snow through the portico, sending huddled, well-bundled people scrambling to their cars, but almost immediately, a large, nondescript black SUV pulled next to her. Vadik opened the door to the back seat, and she got into the warm car before he sat next to the driver.
“Is there any place you need to stop before you go home, Dr. Anderson?” asked Vadik without turning around. “We have the driver as long as you need him. Perhaps the grocery store?”
“Uh, no, I mean, no, thank you. I’m good. I only live a few minutes from here. You need to take the next left at the corner.”
Before he could respond, the GPS gave the same instructions. “I was given your address ahead of time,” he said as his cell phone started to ring. “Your photo, too. My car is already in your driveway, but it seemed simpler to arrange for alternative transportation the first time we met. In the future, I’ll pick you up in my car and wait for you outside.”
He answered his phone, speaking a few Russian sentences before handing it to her. “It’s Luka. I’ve assured him you have been picked up safely and are on your way home.”
“Hi, Luka,” she said, trying to whisper. “I’m glad to hear from you.”
“Me too, koshka.” He barked out a few angry phrases in Russian as though he were talking to a roomful of people. “I haven’t much time, but I wanted to make sure you were settled. I probably won’t be back to you until Sunday or Monday. I’m sorry it’s taking so long.”
“That’s fine. I have to work until about six on Sunday, so don’t drive too fast. Maybe we can do something fun on Monday?”
“Who do you keep yelling at over there? It’s a little unsettling. And I don’t have that... that card.”
“I’m shouting at Slavic because he’s being an idiot.” Raising his voice, he added, “I should shoot him in the fucking ankle.”
“You wouldn’t really do that,” she said, her stomach turning slightly. “Would you?”
“You need to work on your sense of humor. If I shot him, it would break his stepmother’s heart and make a mess on her carpet. I need to go. The store will help you with new sheets and bedding, too.”
“Maybe you just aren’t very funny. I don’t mind a bigger bed, but I’m not going to spend a fortune. What kind of store is this? I think I saw some coupons in my mailbox for that place in the mall.”
“I’m the one who is demanding the bed, so I am the one paying for it. Just work with Popovich’s store. They are from St. Petersburg. Goodbye, koshka. Call me from this phone anytime you want to talk to me, and I will answer it when I can. I’ll see you on Sunday.”
She tapped Vadik on the shoulder to hand him the phone. “That’s for you,” he said. “It’s a secure line, and Luka wants you to use it to keep in touch with him.” He reached into his coat pocket and handed her a legal-sized envelope. “I also have the credit card he expects you to use. He specifically asked for cookies the next time you go to the store.”
Luka’s latest model smartphone had to have cost well over a thousand dollars, starkly contrasting her ancient, discount store dumbphone that was at least five years old. “That thing is awfully expensive,” she said to Vadik. “I don’t need anything this nice.”
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