by Lucy Ellis
His savage laugh ripped through the tension holding Maisy in place.
‘I know you think you love me, Maisy,’ he said, with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. ‘I’m basically the first man you’ve been intimate with. It’s understandable you imagine you feel this way.’
Think. Imagine. She wanted to claw his eyes out.
‘Basically?’ she said, stony cold.
Something flashed through Alexei’s expression, leaving his eyes almost feral. ‘He didn’t give you an orgasm.’
Maisy rotated her fists. ‘How do you know?’
He moved so fast she didn’t even have a chance to resist. His hands were around her arms, pinning her, his mouth hot and hard, demanding a submission she wasn’t going to give him. But the shock of it, the longing to be in his arms and provoke a response from him, undid her. She gave a soft little moan and kissed him back.
He drew back, satisfied, releasing her. ‘That’s how I know, dushka. Only me.’
‘And when did you realise that, Alexei?’ she flashed back at him, wiping her mouth and gaining satisfaction from the narrowing of his eyes. Yes, Alexei, look—I’m wiping your low-down kiss off me. ‘Today? Yesterday? Last week?’
‘Seven weeks ago,’ he growled. ‘You’ve been in my bed six weeks, five days.’
He surprised her with the knowledge he had kept count. A tiny flicker of hope formed in its wake.
‘It took me a full seven days to make my move,’ he continued. ‘Slow, considering I could have had you that first night in London.’
The light went out. Maisy struggled to keep her nerve, but he had never been like this with her before. He could be cold, but he had never been crass.
‘What do you mean?’ She hated the note of desperation that had crept into her voice.
He heard it. She saw the bleak satisfaction enter his hard eyes. ‘You heard me. I seem to remember you kissing me back, Maisy, your legs around my waist. You were there all the way.’
‘No, that’s not true. You’re twisting it. I was so ashamed. I couldn’t believe I’d let you do that—’ She broke off, seeing triumph flash painfully across his face.
Idiot. She had blundered and said what he had been pushing her to admit. She’d allowed her own vulnerability to him to distract her from what was at issue. Maisy suddenly realised what this was all about and she shut her mouth.
‘Da, you were so ashamed you couldn’t wait to dive into bed with me the day I turned up here. It must have been hard, dushka, all that waiting. Explains why you were so easy to warm up the minute your back hit that mattress.’
Maisy made herself stay expressionless and stone-still, all the while silently repeating, He doesn’t mean it. He doesn’t mean it.
He was waiting for her to respond. Waiting for her to do something. But Maisy held her ground. And the longer she stood there, staring stonily back at him, the more pronounced the ticking of the nerve below his jaw became. He was so stubborn, she thought, and hard. Harder than me, thought Maisy desperately, and he could so very well win because of it.
Cursing in Russian, he cut the air with a frustrated gesture of his hand, reeling around and walking away from her. Then he spun and said harshly, ‘This is who I am, Maisy. I’m the one who turned your life upside down, who railroaded you into a sexual relationship—who drags you all over the continent and dresses you up like a doll, parades you on a boat as if you’re a goddamned trophy.’
Maisy could only stare at him and listen and ignore what he was saying.
He was shouting at her now. ‘I’m a class-A bastard, Maisy. That’s my reputation. You seem to be the only person on the planet who isn’t aware of that.’
She had never seen him like this. He had been angry before, but always in control, always measuring his response. That control had splintered, but the anger wasn’t directed at her. She knew him now. It was directed at himself.
But she had some of her own to serve up.
‘Listen to me, you stupid man. For your information, I would never have let things go that far that night in London.’ Her voice rose strong above the hum of the wind and the ocean. ‘The only reason I ever slept with you here was because I wanted to, and it was everything I dreamed of—because you were sweet and kind and considerate, everything you claim you’re not. But I’m tired of being on the outside of your life, and I will never, never forgive you for throwing my feelings back in my face unless you get down on your sorry knees and beg my forgiveness, and then work your behind off making it up to me.’
Face flushed, body trembling Maisy took a backward step. ‘Starting right now.’
Then she swung away and headed inside. She’d had her say. At last. Whatever happened next was up to him.
It occurred to her that his friends had probably heard a great deal of what had been said—especially the last part where she’d been shouting—but suddenly she didn’t care. She felt almost light-headed with emotion. If strangers thought she was a fool, what did it matter? She was fighting for the life and the man she wanted, and she refused to be ashamed of that.
She accepted a glass of iced tea from Valery as she sat down, who murmured, close to her ear, ‘We’re rooting for you, Maisy, and by the way I love the dress.’
Maisy went red to the roots of her hair, but the adrenaline enabled her to smile and shrug.
‘Valery, stop flirting with Maisy,’ said Ivanka mildly.
Alexei had come into the room looking like thunder, hands hooked into his pockets. He stood at the end of the sofa, staring at her.
Maisy shrugged off his jacket and threw it at him.
Stiva clapped his hands and dropped into the chair opposite Maisy. ‘Now, this I’ve gotta see.’
‘You’re toast,’ said Valery, handing Alexei a glass of brandy.
Alexei ignored it. ‘Maisy, upstairs—now.’
‘No.’ She crossed her legs and concentrated on her drink. She could literally feel Alexei breathing. ‘But if you’re the—what was it?—class-A bastard you claim to be why don’t you just drag me out of here by my hair?’ She blinked innocently up at him, her fingernails scoring her palms.
She heard Stefania’s sharp intake of breath, and then the solid warmth of Ivanka’s leg and hip as she slid onto the sofa close up beside her. She remembered her assurance—’I’ve got your back’—on Firebird, and wanted to tell her it was fine. Alexei wasn’t about to do anything so primitive. Except she really didn’t know.
And the not knowing sped up her heart.
Alexei towered over her, laser-blue eyes fixed on her alone.
‘You really want to have this out here and now?’
There was a warning in his eyes even as his voice remained cool, direct. Public voice, private eyes.
She flashed back to that morning when he had towered over her as she’d sat on the terrace, Kostya in her arms. Literally crushing her heart with his careless assertion about other women.
Except it hadn’t been careless. He had used it as a weapon to keep her at a distance and more importantly, it hadn’t been true.
Was he lying to her now? Was he doing it to push her away?
‘Alexei thinks I’m too good for him,’ she said out loud.
‘Yeah, because you are,’ said Stiva jovially.
‘Stiva!’ Ivanka glowered at him.
‘He tried to make me his mistress, but I’m not. I’m his girlfriend. Not that he’s ever even brought me a bunch of flowers.’
‘Or bling,’ put in Stefania.
‘I don’t mind about the jewellery. I told him I didn’t want any. I didn’t say anything about flowers, though.’
Maisy was talking to her glass. She knew in revealing what was between them before others she was taking a chance with this most private and closely guarded of men. These people were his family, but that probably made it worse. Yet what choice was he giving her? And what had she to lose? She needed to push him. For him to see he was surrounded by people who loved him. She loved him. She wanted him to l
ove her.
‘A single rose from the garden would have done, or maybe some wildflowers from the roadside—’ She broke off as her glass was snatched from her and then big familiar hands closed around her waist.
He plucked her from the sofa and she wound her arms around his neck and let him carry her, as docile as she had been that morning when he had come to seduce her.
‘Like I said,’ Valery commented dryly, ‘toast.’
Maisy threw an anxious look at Alexei’s face so close to her own. He wasn’t angry. He was determined, but it wasn’t anger he was radiating—it was something else. Something that made her instinctively cling to him.
‘Where are we going?’ she demanded, although it was clear he was taking her upstairs.
‘Why can’t we have fights like that?’ Stefania’s high voice floated after them.
Maisy suspected she was about to be ravished on that big bed upstairs and little else. A miracle would have to take place to get Alexei to talk, and she was just about out of pulling miracles from her sleeve.
Maria appeared at the top of the stairs and Maisy struggled to be put down, but Alexei held fast.
‘I have bad news for you, Alexei,’ she said simply. ‘The bambino wants his mamma.’
Alexei paused on the threshold of the nursery, expecting a difficult struggle to calm Kostya down. It was going to take many months to convince a child of this age his parents weren’t coming back. He’d been through it all with the psychologist.
The boy was with the night nanny, his little face red and screwed up with crying. It had been a long, awful day, but it was the first time Alexei had felt truly hopeless. He couldn’t communicate with Maisy, and he couldn’t protect Kostya from this.
‘Mama!’ He sniffled, big eyes latching onto Maisy and not letting go.
She moved swiftly to him, took the child into her arms and settled into a chair. His cries subsided almost instantly as he buried his hot face in her neck and clung.
Alexei swore softly under his breath. He’d been blind. It wasn’t Anais the boy wanted. It was Maisy. She had taken the role of Kostya’s mother from the beginning.
It had always been Maisy.
It was peaceful in the nursery, but Maisy knew what awaited her outside. She’d forced this confrontation and now she was going to get it. Ready or not.
Alexei was watching them, arms folded over his chest, leaning against the bureau. He hadn’t turned tail and run in the face of the infant’s tears. For a man with no experience of children he’d adapted quickly and irrevocably to the fact he had one in his life. It was clearly just women he had a commitment problem with.
Kostya’s body was sleep-heavy, and Maisy knew the moment had arrived. She moved reluctantly to stand.
‘Here, let me take him.’
Alexei’s deep voice had the volume turned down, but its impact shuddered through Maisy as she gave up the baby to him. He lifted Kostya from her arms with a practised move that caught at Maisy’s raw emotions. His eyes flickered to hers. They had done this so many times, she realized. Like a tag team—like parents. She saw acknowledgement of this in his expression for the first time.
Shaken, Maisy fetched Kostya’s favourite blanket, draping it over his sleeping body, and then without saying a word or sparing a glance for Alexei she slipped outside.
She was halfway down the hall when she heard the nursery door click shut, and then Alexei’s hushed voice whipped her around. ‘Not so fast.’
In that instant Maisy realised she was actually running away from him. She was behaving like a scared little mouse—the timid girl who had started at St Bernice’s all those years ago and looked to Anais to fight her battles. She was a grown woman now, and if anything the past few weeks had taught her she could handle one large, moody Russian male—except this time she needed to do it without sex muddying the waters and confusing the issues.
He stalked towards her, the down lights on the walls throwing his shadow so that he seemed to increase in height as he stood over her.
Maisy’s trembling hands automatically found her hips. ‘If you think I’m going to jump into bed with you and have mad, passionate, angry sex so you can put this behind us and just go on as before—’
‘We’ve done that, Maisy, and moved on from it,’ he interrupted.
The fact that he was on the same page with her brought Maisy up short.
‘What I want to know is what was that about downstairs?’
Testosterone was pounding out of him, and Maisy was so distracted by the urge to press herself up against him she had trouble concentrating.
‘The stuff about the jewellery,’ he clarified, his accent clotting up the words.
Maisy shook herself. She was doing the very thing she had warned him against.
‘I’m sorry for embarrassing you,’ she answered. ‘But I was very angry—’
‘You didn’t embarrass me, Maisy,’ he broke in impatiently. ‘I want to know what it was about.’ He seemed to close in around her. ‘What do you want from me? I’ll bring in a jeweller tomorrow—you can have whatever you want.’
‘I don’t want jewellery!’ she exploded. ‘Oh, how can you be so ridiculously obtuse?’
‘I’m obtuse? You made it very clear in Paris that anything—anything—I bought for you was payment. Can you blame me for being wary about putting anything around your neck?’
‘So it’s all my fault? I don’t know what I’m doing, Alexei. Have you ever thought about that? It’s not like I’ve ever been a rich man’s mistress before. Forgive me if I make mistakes. You never gave me a rule book.’
‘You’re not my mistress,’ he said firmly. ‘I have never, never treated you as a mistress.’
‘You dress me; you chauffeur me around in limos; you keep me separate from your working life. Until now I’ve never met any of your friends. What else am I?’
‘I’m looking after you. You and Kostya. The three of us.’
‘No, Alexei,’ she said softly, sadly. ‘It’s just you.’
Her words fell like stones into the silence. Maisy’s emotions trembled with the weight of the impact of what she had said. He looked so lost, her big, steely take-no-prisoners Alexei. He needs me so badly, Maisy realized, and it gave her the courage to go on.
‘That’s what you do, Alexei, to protect yourself. You shut yourself off. You choose women who pick you because of what you can give them—stuff, luxury and publicity—and that way it’s never about emotions. And God forbid anyone asks for more than that—falls in love with you because you’re so scared to be vulnerable to someone, to trust and lay yourself open to being abandoned and hurt again.’
Alexei said something harsh in Russian. The sound of it was enough to dry up the words in Maisy’s mouth. He was very pale and very menacing in the down lights, his shadow pressing down on her.
‘I know I would never abandon a child who needed me,’ she pressed. ‘Anais never bonded with Kostya. It was all I could do to get her to be there in the morning when I got him up. I do know what it is to be abandoned because I watched it happen to a child I love. It made it impossible for me not to do everything I could to care for Kostya. And you clearly felt the same way—because you came and rescued him, because that’s how you show love. You offer protection. But I don’t need your protection. I’m not two years old. I need you to open yourself up to me and trust me not to take advantage of you, not to hurt you.’
‘What is it you want from me?’ he said in a low voice. ‘Name it and I’ll do it.’
He still wasn’t prepared to risk himself. Maisy felt the weight of the only choice left to her bearing down. She had to leave him and go back to London. She had done all she could to make Alexei see what was standing in front of him. She loved him, but she didn’t know if he was ever going to change. Nothing she had said seemed to have made a whit of difference.
She needed to protect herself emotionally or he would destroy her. It was the only way forward for both of them. It meant she could ver
y possibly lose him, but what choice had he left her?
She had to risk herself, because he wouldn’t. ‘Anything?’ she whispered.
He turned, his features entirely Tartar, menacing, miserable. It broke her heart.
‘Let me take Kostya back to Lantern Square.’ Her voice dropped an octave as she felt the world shift and tumble away from her feet. ‘Let me go.’
He flinched as if she had struck him. ‘Kostya is my responsibility, not yours,’ he said, in a strained voice she barely recognised.
‘I can’t leave him,’ she whispered.
He turned away from her. She could see all the muscles in his shoulders converge on that one point at the nape of his neck where she used to link her hands. Those shoulders rose and fell.
‘You’re the only mother he’s ever known,’ Alexei said in a low voice, as if speaking to himself. ‘It took me until tonight to recognise that.’
Maisy felt time stop as he turned slowly, his blue eyes so dark in the down light they seemed black. His eyes held hers, as if in challenge. ‘All things considered, I think going back to Lantern Square might be exactly what you need, dushka. But I am in Kostya’s life. You’re never going to be free of me whilst you’re with him.’
‘I’m packing now,’ she answered, swallowing hard. ‘And I’m going first thing in the morning. Can you organise that for Kostya and me?’
‘Da. But this isn’t over, Maisy.’
She shrugged, her throat clenching with the effort to keep her emotions in check. There was nothing more to say. She’d said it all. It was up to him now.
CHAPTER TWELVE
MAISY heard the bells chime over the door. No clients had been scheduled today, so she expected it was Alice, back early from the school run.
She put down her pen and got up to put the kettle on, pouring Earl Grey tea leaves into the pot. Her eyes were a little sore from peering at the laptop screen, but Alice would be pleased when she heard her good news. She’d managed to source French valenciennes lace and get it under price.
Alice’s little shop was a dream come true for Maisy. After landing back in Lantern Square, her first week had been absorbed by resettling Kostya back into a routine and organising a crèche for him before she got stuck into looking for a job.