“You probably enjoy having Sheppard to throw in my face, hmm?”
He got a brief but clear view of how much she didn’t enjoy it when her composure slipped to reveal her remorse before she hid it again. A small line formed between her brows as she rubbed at her nose with her palm in that way she’d always done just before they’d argued. God, he missed that little rub.
“How did you meet him?” The question slipped from him before he could catch it. He didn’t expect an answer, so he was surprised when he got one.
“His friend lives upstairs. I care for Steve and Angela’s son.” She pointed to the playpen, and then went over to gather a small pile of toys that had been thrown over to their side of the barrier. The smile she flashed at the little guy inappropriately hit Alek right behind the zipper.
“Cozy little fucking family you’ve found,” he muttered under his breath. “What is he to you, Sacha?”
“He is my charge.” She petted the boy’s dark head. “I have known him since he was born.”
Alek’s heart melted a little. “Not him, angel. I’m asking about the asshole I met last night.”
She glared at him. “Justin is not an asshole,” she said sharply. “He is a wonderful man. And what he is to me is not your concern. Is this what you needed privacy to speak with me about?”
Her heated defense had his muscles quivering, and as he eyed the door, he was very conscious of his gun under his arm. If he stuck around long enough, would Sheppard show up?
Eventually, yes, to take Sacha to the dinner tonight. Did he plan on arriving early so they could have some private time before going out?
Tipping his head to the side; first right, and then left, Alek stretched his neck out.
It was on the tip of his tongue to come clean at that moment. But the shit banging around in his skull wouldn’t let him drop this.
“I want you to tell me what he is to you.”
Her fragile shoulder went up in a careless shrug that said we didn’t always get what we wanted. That had his jaws coming together in a slow grind he was surprised didn’t cause his mouth to fill with dust.
“Tell me what he is to you.” How often did they have sex? The thought sent pain and fury screaming through him.
“It makes no diff—”
“Tell me what he is to you,” he repeated as he drifted closer to her without realizing it. What if that fucker had asked her to move in with him and that’s where all her shit was? She would spend every night next to a man that wasn’t Alek, wrapped around him, taking care of him. Loving him?
She again exhibited how she’d been developing without him by tilting her chin at an obstinate angle she wouldn’t have displayed before. She shook her head.
He snagged her wrist and placed her palm on his thrashing heart, holding it there when she would have jerked it away. It brought her close, but he needed her closer, so he took that half step. He wanted to shout at her, to demand she start talking, but Vasily’s warning was echoing in the back of his mind, forcing him to keep a tight grip on the reigns.
He let his head fall forward to get his mouth near her ear, and while the scent of her skin drove him mad, he spoke in a near whisper. “Please tell me what he is to you so I’ll know if it’s overkill to picture them needing more than one body bag to collect his remains.”
A shocked gasp escaped from her as her face turned ashen, her heightened color leeching from her cheeks so quickly it was visible. Fear immediately radiated from her in small, stinging waves that prickled over his skin.
“He has done nothing to you, Alekzander. You above all people cannot harm a man for being loyal and supportive.”
When he’s being loyal and supportive to you; yes, I can. He grunted as the hypocrisy of the thought connected with his gut. Closing his eyes, he released her and moved out of her personal space. “Fuck me. I’m sorry. Please forget I said that. I’m…on edge.”
“You cannot hurt him. Promise me that, Alekzander.”
He turned his head and gave her a sidelong look that should have sent her running. “Tell me what he is to you, and you have my word that I will not hurt him.” Maks could always do the honors. When she gave her lip an indecisive nibble, he added, “I just need to know what I’m up against.”
Something soft entered her eyes but was gone in a blink. “What do you think he is to me?”
“Your boyfriend.” Deny it.
“Then there is no need for me to say anything.” She didn’t meet his eyes as she drifted to the corner of the sofa where a laundry basket sat, filled with folded towels and linens. She began shaking them out and refolding them.
It was something she used to do when stressed. One time, he’d come home after driving from Atlantic City through a snow storm to find her sitting amid the contents of their linen closet, eyes red-rimmed, skin pale. Her parents had died in a car accident, and she’d been worried about him. She’d tried to distract herself by listening to classic fifties music while refolding bedsheets and tablecloths. They’d made a mess of everything because he’d joined her in her nest and spent the next hour reassuring her all was well. Fuck, he loved who they were back then.
As he imagined hanging the fucking attorney from a meat hook and tenderizing him until not one bone in his body was left intact, Alek found himself in front of her. He dropped his coat on the sofa and slowly reached out to lower the pillowcase she was holding up that prevented him from seeing her.
“I was never unfaithful to you, Sacha,” he said with a low apology in his voice because there was no denying he’d put them here. “Not in mind or body. Which means, by letting Sheppard into your bed, the only cheater in this relationship…is you.”
♦ ♦ ♦
Sacha stood very still, wondering if she’d heard that right. He did not just accuse her of being unfaithful to them.
But he did.
From the moment she opened the door to him, she’d gone from being afraid to feeling weak and needy, then angry. She’d felt sympathetic, amused, smug because he was clearly jealous, which had sent her back to being scared for Justin, then terrified again because Alekzander was so near Lekzi and Sacha wasn’t strong enough to send him away. Until she remembered what he did. Now she couldn’t get rid of him fast enough.
And through it all, she continued to struggle with her overwhelming physical attraction to him. This man had a way of filling her senses. She hated that, and loved it. Hated him. Yet loved him with everything in her.
To her eyes, he was magnificence.
To her ears, the deep cadence of his voice was an aphrodisiac.
His scent was driving her crazy as it continued to drift under her nose every few minutes; she felt like an addict, trembling and panting as she waited for more and more. Crisp apples and the Versace store on Mercer Street kept going through her mind.
Taste and touch were only memories, but they were vivid enough to weaken her knees.
And break her heart.
The only cheater in this relationship…is you.
The accusation once more roared in her ears as she saw him in her mind’s eye, behind his desk with that woman in his lap. Had they flirted during business meetings? Had their attraction to each other grown over time, or had it been immediate? How often had they come together in the privacy of Alekzander’s office? And why hadn’t he cared enough to even react when Sacha had walked in on them?
Because it had been fabricated?
The maelstrom of emotions battering her ebbed and eventually faded altogether until she felt as if she were an empty void with skin. No. Not empty. She was soaked with pain.
He was doing it to her again, taking from her when she had so little left to give. He’d stolen her happiness. And her innocence by tainting her view of the world. He’d stolen the optimism her parents had instilled in her; the very thing that had gotten her through her debilitating grief after they’d been killed in a car crash on their way home from her father’s first chemo treatment.
But the
most precious thing, the one that made her sick with loss; he’d taken from her the excitement and joy she should have experienced carrying her first child. Sacha had spent those months struggling to live her very life as she battled depression, grief, and loneliness brought on by feelings of betrayal, abandonment, and humiliation. All of which still lived inside her today.
When she felt able to speak, her tone was as hollow as her being. “I cannot express just how revolting you are to me. Or how utterly insane you sounded just now. Please, leave my home, and do not come back here.”
Panic bolted through his eyes as he reached out. She jerked back to escape contact and stumbled from the force of the move. She nearly fell over a rubber giraffe, and would have happily landed on her ass if it meant avoiding his touch. He tried to save her from falling, but she swatted him away.
“Do not touch me!” She righted herself on her own. As she’d always done.
“It was a lie, Sacha.”
Her world tilted as that pierced her like an arrowhead. “I am aware of that. It was something I realized quite soon after seeing you with her.”
His brows slammed down. “Not us. Her. The whole scene you walked in on was bullshit.”
“Ah. Yes. So you said.”
“I don’t blame you for not believing me. But if you’ll keep an open mind while I explain, I’m praying you’ll understand why I did it.”
She wavered, finding herself drawn to the sincerity in his voice and expression.
No. She couldn’t listen to him. With no more than a few gently spoken lines he was getting to her. She wrung the pillowcase in her hands, twisting it back and forth. Dammit. How was she letting him get to her? She couldn’t allow herself to believe the regret and misery in his eyes was real. It wasn’t. It was an illusion. Just like his love for her had been.
What was real was what she’d seen with her own two eyes.
Her glands watered, preparing to ease the way for her breakfast to come up. “You are hurting me again,” she said honestly. “I cannot be near you anymore. I do not want to listen to you. Every word you speak tops up the poison you inject, and I am full. Right to here.” She unraveled the cotton cutting into her palm and brought her flattened hand beneath her chin. “It chokes me, Alekzander. Please, just go.”
“I will ease you, my angel.”
The familiar reverential tone he used didn’t only lure her, it soothed her, taking the edge off her pain.
“If you’ll let me,” he whispered. “I will ease you with the truth.”
Something deep inside her begged her to nod. To give him permission to help her. It lay there, barely breathing, and pleaded with its final breaths.
But before she could accept his aid, a tight rap on the door preceded Angela sweeping into the apartment as was her habit.
Before Sacha knew what was happening, Alekzander spun and planted himself in front of her and Tanner, so they were sheltered behind the barrier his big body presented. The feel of his hand, hot and tight on her hip, stole the strength from her muscles to the extent that she had to latch onto the back of his jacket to save herself from ending up on the floor.
“Well, going by that display, I’d say my girl’s Russian is in the house.”
Scrambling to return to reality, Sacha let go of the expensive suit material and slapped at Alekzander’s hand with the pillowcase she still held. That wide palm and his long fingers were burning right through her jeans to mark her skin, causing a maddening but undeniable desire to curl through her belly. How insane that she wanted to press herself into him and wait for that hand to travel.
He didn’t release her, and that forced her to peer around his shoulder to see her smirking—curious—friend leaning against the door she’d just closed. Angela wouldn’t have found any humor in the situation had she been able to see Alekzander’s other hand resting on what Sacha knew was a weapon of some sort at his lower back. He would either have a knife or a small pistol in a carrier strapped around his waist, along with the gun he always wore harnessed across his chest. Which was it today? She found herself wanting to lift his clothes to see what was pressed against his tawny skin.
Irritated when his hand flexed on the weapon, she smacked it. Quick as lightning, he snagged her fingers and held them. She could have kneed him or something, but he had made the protective gesture to protect her and Tanner, and it had been self-sacrificing. And sexy. And kind of chivalrous.
So she went easy on him and gently tried to extract her fingers. At the same time, she poked into the hard muscle in the middle of the broad back in her face to get him out of the way. “You can move now. We are in no danger from Tanner’s mother. This is Angela, my landlord and friend.”
“It’s probably in bad taste to voice this, but that was really hot.” Angela came over, giving Sacha a wide-eyed look that read holy-shit-did-he-really-just-do-that? She held out her hand. “Hi. I’m the best girlfriend and resident nosy protective bitch. You must be Alekzander.”
He released Sacha’s fingers to shake. “It’s Alek. Nice to meet you, Angela. Is it your normal practice to enter your tenant’s homes without knocking?”
“Alekzander!” Sacha poked harder, her finger really digging into that sinewy pad that ran along the right side of his spine.
Angela’s curved eyebrow rose, and her head tipped in that way that meant something either entertaining or shocking was coming.
“Maybe you didn’t hear me over the testosterone I had to swim through to get across the room; I’m Sacha’s bestie. That means I come and go from my girl’s place the same way she does from mine. We share our homes, our problems, our dreams…our hurts,” she said pointedly. “And that conveniently brings us back to you.”
“Speaking of convenient.” He finally stepped aside to take up his coat and shrug it on as he turned a masked stare on Sacha. “It seems these interruptions are working in your favor because you just gained yourself another respite. Do you own this building, Angela?”
“My dad does. When you say respite, I take it that means you’ll be back?”
“Of course. What does your father do for a living?”
“He buys buildings like this one and has his nine kids take care of them. Has Sacha given you any indication she wants you to return?”
His attention came to her, and the way that pale gaze made its way from her head to her toes, she knew he’d taken in her every reaction to him today. “Yes. This expressive little angel has always been very easy for me to read. What’s your surname?” he tacked on.
“Trump. What’s yours?”
Sacha, who could barely breathe after that visual caress, was looking between the two in disbelief. “What are you doing?” she asked curiously, forcing her voice not to betray the deep pulse now giving her trouble between her thighs.
Two heads turned her way.
“Finding out who she is.”
“Finding out what his intentions are.”
They spoke at the same time, and that had their focus returning to each other.
“My name is Angela Morgan-Taylor. I’m a crisis counselor at North York Women’s Center. My husband, Steve Taylor, is a trial lawyer at Sheppard, Lupin, and Sheppard. We’ve been married for four years, have one son,” she pointed behind Sacha, “and we have a shitload of parking tickets that we keep stuffed in a drawer next to our stove in the hopes that one day they’ll catch fire and all our problems will be solved.”
Sacha’s lip twitched. Alekzander’s didn’t.
He jerked his sleeves down then began buttoned his coat as he hacked away at Sacha’s resistance.
“I am Alekzander Evgeny Tarasov. I am co-owner of TarMor Incorporated. My should-be wife, Sacha Urusski, is self-employed. I fucked up our relationship of almost a year, have every intention of rectifying my grievous mistake, and would have been halfway there by now if you hadn’t interrupted.”
He stepped forward, gently clasped Sacha’s slack jaw, and pressed a warm kiss to the corner of her shocked mouth. “
I’ll try again later, angel,” he murmured before walking out.
“Well fuck me to tears,” Angela said under her breath as they both stared wide-eyed at the closed door.
Yes, please, Sacha shamefully agreed when she knew very well she shouldn’t.
ELEVEN
Alek hit the button to lower the garage door before he and Anton entered the Old Westbury house through the entrance leading to a short corridor off the front foyer.
“Hey! Settle the fuck down,” Vincente’s voice boomed. “You deaf, boy? Sit! He jumps. Seriously, what the fuck, babe? I’m telling you, this dog has a fuckin’ hearing problem. Nika! You hearing me? Come and get your dog.”
Anton ducked back out into the garage with his finger going in a back and forth motion. “Let them know I am here. I do not need some Italian putting a hole in me because he is startled by my presence.” He shut the door as Nika’s voice rang out.
“One sec! I almost have him. Or her. Do you think it’s a girl? I think it’s a girl. Eva! Hurry with the milk!”
“Jesus Christ,” V grunted with an edge of humor in his voice that only those who knew him well would recognize. “Trisko, I swear to fuck, if the view wasn’t so good, I’d boot you in the ass for this.”
Alek came around the corner to see two Moretti soldiers stationed at the door. Vito had recently returned from some time off after having taken a blade to the eye during an altercation a while back. Bobby T had finally made it back from Seattle. He’d been with Gabriel during his self-imposed exile that had lasted five years.
Gabriel was lounging in the only chair in the foyer, legs extended, fingers locked together over his middle. He tipped his chin up in greeting then went back to watching the show. He looked thoroughly entertained.
One of his security team, Jakson Trisko, a former Navy SEAL, was a few feet away, his shoulder leaning into the wall, a beer in his hand. Jak gave him a lazy salute, his gaze going beyond Alek to prove he’d heard Anton’s unfamiliar voice. His wide grin that puckered the jagged scar running from his right ear to the corner of his mouth dimmed slightly. None of them liked new faces.
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