He sighs again.
For the first time, I see a flicker of vulnerability in his eyes. Not that he appears outright vulnerable, exactly, but that he could, if he were not … well, him.
He leaves me there, wondering exactly what just happened.
For the next two days, I don’t catch any sight of Artem, but I feel his presence everywhere I go in this giant house. I feel him watching me as I walk down the hallways, as I spend more time in the kitchen, still waiting for the penny to drop.
I know I’m here for a reason, but every time my mind skirts close to what I think it might be, I hear all the self-doubting voices I’ve heard my whole life.
I remember being the nobody in high school, stalking through the hallways, unseen, mostly friendless. I remember when I first started developing curves, looking at myself in the mirror, turning this way and that to try and convince myself I wasn’t ugly, that I wasn’t that dreaded F-word.
And then I shiver as the feeling of standing under that spotlight in the bikini returns to me, all those staring eyes. Even if they were hidden in darkness, I could feel the sweat pricking my body, sliding over my skin.
No, stupid girl, Artem Elgort isn’t interested in you like that.
Then how is he interested in me, then?
I keep trying to claw an answer to that question, but I can never find one.
If he wanted me as a chef, fine, that might make some sort of sense.
A babysitter.
A maid.
Something.
But as it is, I’m left to wander the hallways like a ghost haunting this place, confused, dreading the day that Artem marches in here and finally tells me that he’s found his purpose for me.
I’m going to torture you. I’m going to resell you. I’m going to make you live in a personally-constructed hell.
One morning – the fifth day – I wake to a warm bundle curled up next to me. I reach out my hand and curl my fingers around it, wondering if I’m dreaming when I feel the roughness of its tongue against my palm, my fingertips.
A giggle escapes me when I open my eyes and see the dog, its eyes wide and a gorgeous shade of blue, its fur cloud-white except for a few black spots, one over its left eye. Its tail points straight up, wagging happily as it splits its mouth into a grin and gazes up at me.
“Um, hello,” I say, and the dog leans forward, giving me a lick of greeting on the chin.
I laugh and study the dog closer, seeing that he’s a boy. His collar is blood-red and a small note dangles from it, tied with a piece of string. Hello. My name is Rocky. I need a home. Will you take care of me?
Something inside of me melts as I read that he’s a Jack Russel crossed with a Dalmatian, he’s two years old, and his previous owner had to give him up when he moved overseas for work.
Without even thinking, I reach out and hug him close, cradling him to my chest.
“So you like him?”
The voice comes from the doorway.
I flinch and stare across my bedroom – my bedroom – to see Artem standing in the doorway. His hair seems darker than usual, coated with sweat, and his rippling body is clad in workout gear, his tight, muscled arms tense.
“I finally got some time to myself,” he says, striding into my room. “I thought you might like some company for when I’m away. So, do you like him?”
Rocky leaps onto my chest and starts lapping at my cheeks, as though imploring me to say yes, yes, of course I like him. I love him. I let out a giggle and tickle him behind the ears, savoring the way his mouth opens into a pink grin.
“Yes,” I say. “But …”
“But what?”
He wanders to the edge of the bed and sits down, his size so immense I feel the mattress sag toward him.
“But I don’t know why you’ve given him to me,” I say, my words coming out in a rush, all my pent-up confusion bursting out. “I still don’t know why I’m here. And I’m—”
“What?” he growls, when I trail off. “You’re what, Anna?”
“I’m scared,” I say, hugging Rocky close to me.
“Why?”
“Because I’m starting to like it here, okay? But I can’t let myself feel comfortable until I know what this is. Because it could be anything, couldn’t it? It could be something, I don’t know, something evil. I know that sounds melodramatic. But it’s the truth.”
Artem sighs.
“Evil,” he says quietly. “Is that what you think I am, Anna? Evil?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper. “That’s the point.”
“You’re here because … because I need you to be. For example, right now, I’m starving. Fucking ravenous. Will you make me something, Anna?”
“Do I have a choice?” I ask.
His lips twitch and he nods. “Yes, you always have a choice.”
Still confused, still unsure, I sit up and ruffle Rocky behind the ear, which he seems to love.
“Then okay, Artem, I’ll make you something. Let’s go.”
Will this ever stop being perplexing and strange?
I want to scream. Why am I here, Artem? What do you want with me?
Is this a trick?
CHAPTER FOUR
Artem
My body twists and my balls flame like twin suns as I watch her dancing around the kitchen, still in her PJs, hot pink material that hugs onto the globes of her ass as she bends over the obsidian block of the oven.
Rocky dances around her heels, already in love, wagging his tail and smiling happily.
I sit at the bar, my body still sore and sweaty from the gym. If I ever needed a punishing workout, it’s this week, with Emilio taking my snub at the auction to heart. Now, he’s been making plays in the city, getting aggressive, causing more than a few scuffles between the Bratva and the Mafiosi.
The man’s a fool, putting legitimate businesses at risk so that he can stroke his ego. He believes that stealing the power from his father makes him strong, a worthy contender in the power dynamic of the city.
But really it just puts everyone’s livelihood in danger, and he won’t stop, the little fucking rat.
All because I wouldn’t play nice with him at a slave auction.
I’ve felt my old instincts rising up in me more than once this week, the responses that were drilled into me in my formative years.
Fight.
Kill.
Survive.
I let out a sigh between my teeth and instead watch Anna as she chops vegetables, moving methodically, her dark hair bobbing around her shoulders.
Without any makeup on her face, she looks fresh, alive, in a way that sends urgent pounding through my body.
A war drum of desire captivates me, as though this is ten thousand years ago and I’m about to run into battle.
Claim her, it drums. Take her, fuck her.
I see myself stalking up behind her and sliding my hands up the pinkness of her pajama bottoms, savoring the way she’d shiver and wriggle against me. And then I’d peel down her bottoms slowly, revealing the round beauty of her wonderfully bouncy ass.
I’d spend a long time on her ass alone, massaging, fucking worshipping. I’d fall to my knees and bite and nibble and play with her flesh, until she’d wriggle against me, begging me to slide my manhood inside of her.
“I’m assuming you like chicken salad?” she asks. “Something simple, but, you know, you can add a few flourishes here and there.”
“Salad sounds fine,” I say, a rumble far back in my throat.
Now, finally, I have the time I need to properly appreciate this woman.
This past week has been a non stop barrage of business, of going from burnt-out warehouse to Bratva bar, looking over the shattered glass and the broken chairs and being told that it was the Mafiosi, those bastards, Emilio holding a grudge.
I push it all from my mind now.
I’ve given the necessary orders and paid off the correct people. If Emilio is foolish enough to make another move in the cit
y, we’ll be quicker to respond this time. He probably knows that, too, which is why he’s decided to lay low.
Good.
Let him lay low.
Otherwise he’ll end up far lower than he wants to be, in the fucking dirt.
My instincts are pulsing through me like primal invectives as I study this woman’s ass, her perfect round ass as she bends over the chopping board, biting her lip in concentration.
“Do you mind if I take Rocky to his crate?” I ask her.
She giggles strangely. “You ask me like I have a choice. I’m your property, remember.”
My property.
If that were the case, I could do anything I wanted with her.
I could fist that luscious dark hair and push her to her knees, bring my engorged manhood to her lips and drive it inside her wet mouth, slide it deep, and deeper, until she starts to gag and she can’t help but slide her hand down her body to toy with her sex.
As I drive myself into her mouth, her stark blue eyes wide with lust and fascination. Her fingers playing with her virgin womanhood, her eyes getting wider with each cock-thrust, with each tongue-stroke against my pulsating manhood.
I’d fuck her mouth, savoring its warmth, but that wouldn’t be enough, no fucking way. I’d only fuck it long enough for her to bring her virgin pussy to orgasm with her fingers.
And then I’d bend her over and bring my spit-slick cock to her pussy, never touched before, mine, all fucking mine.
And I’d drive inside of her for the first time, making her feel me like the queen she is, pushing all the way to those ass cheeks so they flatten against my abs.
“You have a choice,” I manage to breathe, mind clouded with thoughts of her.
“Is he okay in his crate?”
I can’t help but chuckle at her maternal instinct, just one of the qualities that drive so much excitement into me when I look at her. She’s going to make an incredible mother.
She’s going to give me everything I ever dreamed of.
It’s her.
She’s the one.
There’s no doubt about it.
“It’s the same crate he’s had since he was a puppy,” I tell her. “But it’s big. Don’t worry. I made sure of that. Apparently, it helps them to adjust to a new environment.”
“Then yeah,” she says, kneeling down to ruffle him behind the ears.
Fuck.
Her pink shirt rides up as she does, showing me a sliver of her pale belly, and now I’m gripping the bar so hard it’s a wonder I don’t snap it in half. To peel that shirt up and reveal her flushed skin, higher, and higher, until her breasts spill free for me.
I imagine gripping her nipples in my fingers and squeezing her milk out of them, letting it settle on my tongue and then kissing her, giving her back her own milk. And then she’d paint it onto my manhood and I’d use her precious fucking milk to screw her until she creamed milk-white, and we couldn’t tell which is her slick come and which is her milk.
But she wouldn’t care.
Because she’d be creaming too damn hard for me to care.
“What do you think, boy? Are you okay with that?”
Rocky smiles happily and I walk over to the door, clicking my tongue. The dog comes padding over obediently, a grinning rascal, and I take him to his room at the rear of the house and nod at his crate.
I had his room decked out last night, and it has everything he could want. A box of toys and a giant bed for sleeping on, his crate if he feels overwhelmed, a small agility corner with a self-throwing all device.
He sniffs around the room and then pads over to his crate, climbing inside and laying his head on his paws, smiling.
“Good boy,” I tell him.
He makes a yawning noise as I retreat, already content to lie and rest, getting ready for more play later, no doubt.
But now – now – it’s my turn to play.
I’ve waited long enough.
It’s been almost a week since I sighted my queen at the auction, a week of dealing with Emilio’s bullshit and business, all of it keeping me too busy to claim what’s rightfully mine.
Now, all of that is over.
I return to the kitchen and pause in the doorway as she stands, back to me, peering into the fridge.
She’s on her tiptoes and that just makes her ass seem even curvier.
I walk in and close the door quietly behind me.
She flinches at the sound of the door closing.
I wonder if she fears me.
I hope she doesn’t.
“Anna,” I growl. “You asked why you’re here.”
“Y-yes,” she whimpers, perhaps sensing the change in me.
It’s time.
“You’re here because you’re the sexiest fucking woman I’ve ever laid my eyes on. You’re my virgin queen, that’s why you’re here. And I’m going to fuck your wet virgin pussy until you cream all over my cock. Do you understand me? And then I’m going to fire my seed inside of you, and you’re going to give me a child. That’s why you’re here, my virgin princess.”
I wanted those words to come out more suavely, more controlled, but there’s something about this woman that just makes that impossible.
She turns me into the beast I secretly am inside.
She faces me slowly, her eyes wide just like they were in my fantasy.
“Are you serious?” she whispers. “You bought me so you could—so I could—so we could …”
I move across the kitchen slowly, my eyes fixated on her with every step.
I know that if I give in to my desire and move with more speed, that will be the end of any discipline I might be clinging onto.
I’ll just become a beast, a fucking animal.
I’ll leap across the kitchen and tear her to lustful pieces, and she’ll cream and moan every step of the way, sighing breathily over me.
But not here.
Not in the kitchen.
Not where anybody else might see her. A guard. A staff member.
“The first time I saw you,” I snarl. “I knew I had to have you. And when I heard that you were a virgin, that just made me want you more.”
She gazes up at me, seemingly at a loss for words, her mouth hanging open as she stares up into my eyes.
I close the distance between us.
“I’ve been watching you,” I whisper.
“What?” she says, voice just as quiet.
“Recordings from the exterior cameras,” I tell her. “I’ve seen you walking the grounds. It’s been killing me, returning at three in the morning and the only thing I have of you are those recordings. And yet they’re so fucking sexy, so perfect. Everything about you, it’s …”
But words fail me now.
I reach forward and wrap my arms around her, lifting her off her feet and holding her close to me.
My lips find hers and she gasps.
For a second I think she’s going to move away from me.
I don’t want this, she’ll say. No, please.
Can I have misread the situation that badly?
Can I truly have misread the shimmering desire I was sure was rioting through her just now?
But then she relaxes in my arms and makes a moaning noise, grinding against me.
I move my hands to her ass and squeeze, feeling her ass cheeks through the fabric of her PJs, feeling the heat of her.
And, past the heat, I can feel her womb, squealing, squirming, eager in its desire to flower for my seed and let our offspring grow.
Her lips are soft against my roughness, and I open my mouth and find her tongue with mine, swirling it around as I carry us across the room and lay her on the kitchen counter, surging forward.
I press my manhood between her legs, feeling my hardness grind against her through the thinness of my gym shorts.
I should stop.
I said not here.
But then she moans and moves her fingers through my hair.
And I’m lost. She has me. My vi
rgin fucking princess has me hypnotized.
CHAPTER FIVE
Anna
I feel his manhood pressing against me, grinding against my sex and for a second I think I can just sink into the lust.
I can forget about self-doubt and self-consciousness and just be.
I wrap my arms around his shoulders and squeeze close to him.
The confusion falls away under the steaming presence of his lust, the fierceness of the moment blossoming inside of me in a series of bullet-like strikes.
Bang, bang, bang, the heat thuds into me, spreading to every part of me.
I sink deeper into the kiss and let my desire guide me, my tongue tingling like there are freaking electrodes attached to it or something, my body buzzing and blisteringly alive for the first time I can remember.
But then the voices start whispering in my head, those familiar self-doubting voices, telling me I’m an idiot if I think I’m going to be able to please Artem Elgort.
And he knows.
That’s the thing that sends the most frustration catapulting through me.
He knows that I’m a virgin, that I’m inexperienced, and yet he’s still putting me in this position and expecting me to perform.
“Anna,” he growls, leaning back slightly when I pause in our animal kissing. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I lie.
Suddenly terror touches me.
What happens if I don’t perform?
But he talked about motherhood.
He talked about claiming me.
He said I was his and, even if it makes me a little bit crazy, I believed him.
I believe him.
He leans back and regards me with those steady brown eyes.
“Anna, the first time I saw you, I knew you were mine. I felt it. I’ve never been a sentimental man. I’ve never been allowed to be. But I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say I felt it in my soul. I can read you. And something’s wrong. I can see it. So tell me.”
I slide off the counter and let out a breath. My body still feels vivacious and buzzing with the closeness, with his hands making patterns on my back. My sex feels sticky and wet as I walk to the other side of the room, near my abandoned salad, and heave a sigh.
Sold To The Bratva Boss: An Instalove Older Man Younger Woman Possessive Romance (A Man Who Knows What He Wants Book 193) Page 3