by Nikki Sloane
Alek’s expression turned serious and he spoke quietly. “You really think tonight was a setup?”
I shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal, although it was. “We’d hit them enough times before. My uncle will see what shakes out tomorrow.” I glanced over at Alek’s car parked beside the Porsche in my garage. “Mira might tell you her girls are clean, but make sure you wrap your shit up tonight, or your dick’s gonna fall off.”
He gave a nervous laugh, and his eyes flicked once again to the girl waiting inside the SUV. “Same to you.”
As Alek dug out his keys and moved to his car, I yanked open the back door and looked at her. “Out.”
She hesitantly climbed out, and studied Alek as she did it. Her expression was emotionless, but I could see the panic in her eyes she was trying to mask. She wasn’t that great of an actress, and watched him go like her last life raft was sailing away.
I told John to drive whichever car he wanted home for the week, and I’d text if I needed him. He took the Lexus.
I gestured to the door leading into the house, and my tone was clipped. “After you.”
She pushed the door open, moving like it led toward her doom. I flipped the hallway light on, disabled the security system, and put my hand on her shoulder, halting her from going any further. She jolted under my touch and turned to face me.
“Hang this up.” I shoved my damp jacket into her arms, took her bag from her, and dumped it onto the floor in the mud room to our right. She wouldn’t be needing clothes, and the ones in her bag were hideous anyway. As she snatched down a hanger and followed my order, her silence bothered me. “Why the fuck are you so quiet? Don’t you want to know what’s going on?”
She slowed her movements, thinking about her answer carefully. “I have an idea of what you want, and it’s probably better if I don’t think about it.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because,” she turned to face me, and her icy blue eyes cut me to shreds, “I’m sure nothing I say will stop it from happening.”
Her judgement was bullshit. I hadn’t even done anything to her yet, other than put my hand on her throat in the car, and her accusing glare made fire burn inside my head. First off, it was just sex. If she was willing, I’d do my best to make sure she enjoyed it. Second, I wasn’t interested in trying to fuck a weeping girl while she begged me to stop. My dick threatened to crawl inside my body at the thought.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” I snarled. “I could text a girl right now and have her here sucking my cock in under twenty minutes.”
She didn’t flinch at the vulgarity. Oksana lifted her chin. “Then, why don’t you?”
Instead of rising to her challenge, I grinned and filled my voice with mock excitement. “Oh, you wanna watch, huh? Maybe you want to take turns sharing my dick?”
Her face somehow went paler.
Since she was basically my captive, I could do whatever, including being honest. “What I want to do to you isn’t about sex.” I stepped close so we were chest to chest, and I watched alarm flare in her eyes. My tone was absolute. “It’s about power.”
3
Oksana
I stared up into Vasilije’s black eyes and shuddered. Was he saying he wasn’t going to fuck me? I scrambled to find a new angle. No matter how much planning I’d done, so much of tonight had been unknown, and I hadn’t expected to end up here, even though Aleksandar had assured me I would. Vasilije was greedy. He’d go for me as soon as someone else showed interest.
He looked different in person. The angles of his face were sharper, his shoulders broader, and his eyes deeper. I’d studied pictures of him, but in real life he was so much . . . more. More attractive, more imposing, and way more dangerous. I’d barely been able to breathe during the car ride here, and it had little to do with his hand clenched on my throat.
Once he’d staked his claim on me, my panic became less fake.
“Power?” I repeated breathlessly.
His irises were made of the blackest ice possible, and although he smiled and flashed his dimples, the warmth didn’t reach his eyes. His hand gripped my waist, and when I instinctively tried to retreat, his fingers dug in.
“I don’t like to be touched,” I said and shut my eyes tightly. I hadn’t wanted to reveal it, at least not yet, but there was no avoiding it now. I’d wanted to hold onto my cards for as long as possible. If he hadn’t picked me tonight, I was to play the role of Aleksandar’s girlfriend, but my ridiculous plan had worked.
What the hell was I going to do now? My next step was to get close to Vasilije Markovic, and I hadn’t the faintest clue how. Despite what I’d told my father, seduction wasn’t something I believed I could do.
My anxiety was crippling, and his icy cold hand on my waist was debilitating. I drew in a stuttering breath and forced my eyes open. He studied me like I was both grotesque and fascinating in the same instant.
I’d told Vasilije I didn’t like to be touched, so his evil smile widened and his hand slid upward, his palm stopping on my ribcage. His thumb brushed the underside of my breast through my thin sweater and bra, and my skin felt too tight. It was stretched and pulled in a million directions.
“You don’t like to be touched?” His deep voice was throaty. “Why?”
I couldn’t tell him I’d murdered the last man to put his hands on me. “I like my own space,” I said, rushing the words out.
If the devil took human form, he’d look exactly like Vasilije did now. Violently sexual and dangerously persuasive.
“Yeah? Get over it.” He glanced around before settling back on me. “All of this space is mine.”
The cold hand drew away, and my body felt hot in the aftermath.
He toed off his boots and carried my composition notebook under his arm as he went down the hall. He expected me to follow, so I did. It was getting hard to think about anything other than his plans for me, but I forced myself to focus. All of my work was laid down on those pages. They might as well have been written in my blood.
I’d been told Vasilije was nothing more than a good-looking thug. Dimitrije Markovic had two sons, and Luka was the smart one. But my information had been wrong, or at least incomplete. Vasilije might have flunked out of college, but I shouldn’t underestimate him. He’d figured out the drop-off tonight was a setup, he didn’t trust me, and worst of all, he knew the notebook was of value to me. He was far from the dumb mobster-wannabe I’d hoped for.
God, I should have sucked it up and left my notebook behind, rather than just a copy. I didn’t know how long it was going to take to do what I needed to do, and how could I be without my music for that long? I needed it to give me strength.
He led me into a darkened chef’s kitchen, not bothering with the lights. When he opened the fridge, it cast a harsh glow across his body. I begrudgingly admitted the “good looking” label assigned to him was correct. He wore a dark, long-sleeved shirt over jeans and the fabric hugged the lines of his muscular frame. He pushed the sleeves up to bunch at his elbows then pulled a bottle of beer from the fridge, setting it on the counter.
His eyes and hair were both dark, and a day’s worth of scruff shadowed across his jaw. He had ‘resting-asshole face,’ which made a promise he had no problem fulfilling. Hot and smug son-of-a-bitch. It was a look my half-sister Tatiana would chase after, if it wasn’t attached to Goran Markovic’s nephew and second in line to the Serbian crime family.
A bottle opener was dug out of a drawer and the cap popped, dropping noisily to the granite countertop, and I tried not to watch his hands or the way the tendons in his strong forearms moved beneath his skin. Think about what those hands are going to do to you, Oksana.
They might kill me. They certainly would if he found out the truth.
He leveled a gaze in my direction, and my anxiety increased tenfold. His stare was carnal and indecent. I should have been happy, but it was terrifying. It drifted slowly down my body, lingering first at my breasts, and then down to my hips.
I already felt naked and exposed, which was sure to come soon.
The beer was Osterhägen, which was ironic. It was my father’s favorite brand.
Vasilije drank a long sip, and then motioned to the hallway, carrying his beer and my notebook with him as he went. The Markovic house was elegant and classically decorated. It wasn’t gaudy. The luxury was refined and understated. Another unexpected thing from him. I’d heard the Serbians loved to show off. They flaunted their mafia money, most of it made off the backs of my people.
We reached the entryway that led to several parts of the house. There was a home office to my left, a large dining room to my right, and a living room before us, with a staircase leading upward. My body seized as I noticed the black beauty sitting beneath a picture window. In the moonlight, the Steinway grand piano was utterly breathtaking.
Sheet music rested on the rack, and my heart thudded faster. “Do you play?”
Could I find common ground with him?
Vasilije turned to stone. “Fuck, no. That thing hasn’t been touched in years.” My hope deflated, but his reaction was . . . strange. He acted like the piano wasn’t anything of importance, but it was just that.
An act.
When he guided me to the bottom of a staircase, my heart plummeted all the way to my toes.
Fear grew in me with every carpeted step I climbed beside him. My stomach churned with bile. If I threw up, he’d cast me out, and months of planning would be gone. I couldn’t fail at this. I pressed my lips together and fought against my nerves. It was just sex. There were worse men I could fuck than Vasilije Markovic, I told myself.
We reached the landing at the top of the stairs, and he took my elbow, turning me to my right. His cold, dominating grip forced me down the hall and to the doorway at the end of it, where he pushed a door open and flipped on the lights.
The back wall was gray stone. An unmade platform bed was centered beneath it. The room was stylish, matching the rest of the house, and not what I’d expected of a twenty-four-year-old boy. He closed the door behind us, pulled out his phone, and set it on a charging dock on a nearby dresser. Then he yanked open a drawer and dropped my notebook inside.
Off came the holster. He made a show of removing the magazine from his gun and emptying the round from the chamber. Was I supposed to be impressed? Konstantine had shown me how to do that, and faster, too. The Glock was put on top of my notebook and the drawer was shut, but I didn’t feel safer. He was stronger and faster, and I assumed he could kill me without a weapon if he wanted.
“The bathroom is through there.” He flung a hand to the doorway to my left. “Go take a shower.”
Like I was unclean.
I scurried through the doorway and shut the bathroom door behind me, gripping the doorknob and leaning against the frame for support. I was so fucking stupid. I’d volunteered for this. I’d asked for it. But now that the moment was here, and I wasn’t ready.
The bathroom looked like it had been lifted from the pages of a magazine. It was all soothing colors and sophisticated fixtures. The large glass shower had a seat in it, and I started the water, stalling for time so I could regroup.
I kept an elastic band on my wrist since I knew the day was going to be long, and drew my hair back, twisting it into a bun. I wasn’t about to get my hair wet. It’d take hours to dry without a hairdryer, but I needed to get under the water to keep up my lie.
My traveling hadn’t started in Kazan, Russia; it’d started in an affluent south side suburb this morning. I’d hung out in baggage claim at O’Hare for hours, inserting myself with the other girls who’d come in.
Shit, Oksana. Pull yourself together.
One spoiled little rich boy I could handle. That was what I’d told my father, and I would make myself believe it. Our families had been battling for control of Chicago for years, and getting inside a Markovic house was a huge advantage to Sergey Petrov.
Too bad for him my real goal didn’t align with his.
I stripped and got under the shower, letting the scorching water beat down on me and steam the glass. My body was a tool. I’d use it to bring the Serbian mafia prince in the next room to his knees.
The pep talk I was giving myself died when the bathroom door swung open and a dark figure appeared beyond the fogged glass. What the hell was he doing? It was unlikely he could see me, but I covered my nakedness with my hands and moved to the corner of the shower.
The figure stooped for a moment, then disappeared, pulling the door closed behind him. Dread lined my stomach, making me feel heavy. When I shut off the shower and pushed the door open, it confirmed my suspicions.
Vasilije had taken my clothes.
4
Vasilije
I tossed Oksana’s damp clothes in a laundry basket at the back of my walk-in closet, when I should have trashed them, but I was feeling lazy. No, not lazy. Too impatient to go downstairs and throw her shit in the garbage. If she took too long, I’d go in there and get her.
Had she noticed me when I ducked in the bathroom? I hadn’t seen her, but I also hadn’t been looking. I was saving that moment for later, and I was curious how she was going to react. Would she try to stay in the shower all night, or wrap one of the short towels around her body? Or would she come out stark fucking naked?
I lit up a joint and drew the smoke into my lungs. If Luka saw me smoking weed in the house, he’d lose his goddamn mind, but he wasn’t here anymore, was he? I could drop ash everywhere and stink up the master bedroom. I didn’t, though. I grabbed the bowl I used as an ashtray and went to the window, cracking it open a few inches.
Cold seeped in as I stared at the bed.
My father had fucked his whore on this very bed, which led to my mother’s death. The mattress was new, but otherwise it was the same. Was I sick for moving in here? It hadn’t bothered Luka when he’d done it. It was the biggest, nicest room in the house.
I only toked a few puffs and stubbed the joint out. I could get high as fuck some other time. Tonight, I just wanted to feel different. Better. I blew the air clean from my lungs out the window, and then slid it shut, quieting the sound of the rain.
The shower stopped, and I heard the glass door swing open.
A smile burned across my lips. What was the Russian girl thinking about right now? Was she panicking? Was she going to look for a weapon to defend herself with? She could go ahead. She wouldn’t need it. My attack on her wouldn’t be physical.
There were a few quiet sounds, but nothing to give me a clue what she was doing.
The bathroom door opened.
Fuck. Me. Sideways.
I’d hoped she’d come out with a towel tucked under her arms, barely covering her pussy and ass, but instead she was wrapped up in a plush black robe. My robe. I never wore it and forgot it was hanging on the back of the door.
It was way too big on her. She had one hand clenched on the front, holding the robe closed in addition to the belt knotted around her hips. Her other arm hung at her side, and the sleeve of the robe went past her fingertips. She stood in the semi-hallway between the bathroom and the closet and peered at me, trying to hide any trace of fear from her expression.
She failed.
I wasn’t ready for the sight of her wearing my robe, but strangled back the knee-jerk reaction of demanding she take it off. Drawing this out would be fun, and I couldn’t deny there was something interesting about seeing her like this.
“That’s mine,” I said casually. “I didn’t say you could wear it.”
Her hand clenched tighter and she took a step back. Her voice was whisper-quiet. “You took my clothes.”
“Yeah. So, you’re naked under there?”
For a micro-second, she looked at me like I was a fucking idiot, and then it disappeared. Her expression went blank.
No answer was all the answer I needed. “How does it feel?” I asked. “You like my robe wrapped around your body? Hanging on your tits? Clinging to your ass?” Every step of my approach
made her eyes twice as wide. “You like having my smell all over you?”
Her breath hitched.
I seized the knot of the belt, wrapping my fist around it and jerking her up against me. She stumbled into my chest and flung a hand out, but I didn’t release my grip. Instead, I ran a hand over the part of the robe that covered her thighs, moving up until I was massaging her pussy through the fabric.
“It’s so soft,” I said. “Feels so good against your skin, doesn’t it?”
“B’layd!” She spat the foreign word at me with horror. “Don’t touch me.”
I stroked her, pressing my hand deep between her legs, and got her to moan. I couldn’t tell if it was all shock, or if there was pleasure mixed in, too. “I’m just touching what’s mine,” I said. “If you don’t like it, take off the robe.”
Oksana wasn’t looking at me. Her gaze was focused on my brow, only giving the illusion of attention. She blinked furiously as I continued to slide my fingers over the robe. If she let me keep going, I’d have my hand inside soon. I’d already worked it beneath one side, bringing my touch closer.
She shuddered and her breath went ragged. Her chest heaved, struggling to process the air.
Her warm hand closed on top of mine on the knot, and I paused. “I’ll give you what you want.” She swallowed a breath, gathering strength. “Will you do the same? Please, Vasilije?”
Her tone was soft, but the words had meaning. Why did she hate being touched so much? She eased my hand away, and I allowed it. Relief visibly poured through her. The space was good for me, too. Blood was already pumping straight to my dick, and I didn’t fucking like that at all. She was Russian.
Pussy is pussy, my dick fired back at me.
I turned and went into the bedroom, taking a seat on the edge of the bed, and leaned back, propped up on my arms. I wanted to take the robe off her. Slide my hands inside and peel it down slowly one side at a time, torturing her as I revealed every naked inch of her body. But making her do it under my command was better. I wanted her overwhelmed and buckling beneath my control.