by Nicole Fox
Bella sucks my earlobe in her mouth and tangles her fingers in the hair at the base of my neck. Her body writhes against mine, letting me know she wants this just as badly as I do. And that reality awakens something new inside of me. With no warning, I grip her waist and spin her around, throwing her back on the bed. She bounces on the squeaky mattress and barely has time to sit up on her elbows before I’m crawling over her.
“I want to be on top this time,” she whispers, her voice rough and low.
I close my eyes against the rush of pleasure her words bring, and then bend low, brushing a kiss to her nose and her forehead. She places a hand on my chest and presses, but rather than obey, I wrap my hand around her wrist and pull her roughly to the side. She flips onto her side, protesting only for a second until I tuck my hand around her lower back and roll her onto her stomach.
“Bad girls don’t get to make demands,” I say, stroking a finger down the length of her spine. She shivers when I reach her lower back.
Then, I spank her.
The slap resounds through the room, mixing with the sound of her grunt. I spank her again. And again.
Bella arches her back and spreads her arms out straight in front of her, giving herself over to the punishment, and the sight of it is enough to drive any man wild.
“Have you had enough?” I ask, the words strained with desire and need.
She looks back over her shoulder, lips red from biting them against the pain, and shakes her head.
I grab a handful of her hair like a rein and pull her head back slowly. Her breathing is wild, her entire body trembling in front of me, and I can’t wait anymore. I use my free hand to spread her legs apart, and when I press myself at her opening, Bella whimpers.
“Please.”
I sink into her in one stroke, and she releases a delicious moan. Her hips press back to meet me, and she fists the comforter, unable to do anything else because of the position. I have her body held in an arch in front of me, completely submissive to my will, and she’s loving every second of it.
Bella arches her back and slams her body against me. “Spank me,” she breathes.
She doesn’t need to ask twice. Her body ripples under my touch, and her moans reach a new pitch with each slap.
“Harder,” she begs, and the single word threatens to send me right over the edge. I’ve never had a woman in the submissive position wield so much power. Bella could tell me to come right here and now, and I would simply because she asked. Simply because the command came from her lips.
I release my hold on her hair and dig my fingers into her hips, crushing my body against hers until it’s a wonder we both don’t break apart. She screams out with every stroke, and I let my hand slip around her waist to her front. When my finger draws a circle at her center, Bella’s arms collapse out from under her. She falls on her chest on the bed, only her hips raised up, and shudders through her orgasm.
I’m not far behind. A few more thrusts, and I can’t hold back anymore. I growl and drill into her again and again until there’s nothing left. Until I flop on the bed next to her, hand over my heart, breathing heavily.
“That was fucking incredible,” I sigh.
Bella giggles and looks over at me. “You sound like you think you’re done.”
“I know I’m done. I’m spent.”
Then Bella hooks her leg around my waist and settles herself over me, the friction of her backside doing something strange to me. “I recall telling you I wanted to be on top this time.”
She slowly rocks front to back, stroking my length with her body, and I groan. My body is sensitive from my recent orgasm, but there’s something else stirring in my abdomen. Bella plants her hands on my chest and grinds herself against me. “And I intend to get what I want.”
I can’t remember ever being ready for a round two so fast in all my life, but before Bella can even finish the sentence, I grab her hips, lift her up, and bring her down on me. Her mouth opens in surprise, but then she bites her lower lip and begins to roll her body. My hands on her hips are there as a guide, but she doesn’t need them. She’s taking us both there entirely on her own.
Bella arches back and places her hands on my thighs to hold herself up, and the new angle makes everything feel new. It must be working for Bella, too, because she lets her eyes flutter closed and circles her body over mine, her movements increasing in speed with her moans.
It seems impossible that I could be at the brink again so quickly, but watching Bella move above me, I’m doing my best to hold it together. However, when her body shudders, her shoulders tucking in as a wave of pleasure moves through her, her brows pinching together, I can’t hold back. We come together in a sweaty, breathy mess.
When she’s finished, she collapses next to me.
“Done already?” I tease, walking my fingers down the curve of her hip. “I was thinking about a round three.”
“Ha ha.” She jabs her elbow into my ribs before crawling out of bed and padding into the bathroom, and I’m too exhausted to fight back.
When she comes back, she curls into my side, her naked body pressed against mine. I wrap my arm around her back and fall into a deep sleep.
Chapter Sixteen
Bella
When I open my eyes, it’s full dark, and I don’t know where I am for a second. My vision is bleary and my back is stiff from not moving. Then, I feel Yuri’s arm shift around me. He thinks he’s bothering me and is trying to pull away, but I grab his hand and hold it in place, burying my face in the side of him.
“Sorry if I woke you,” he says.
“Why aren’t you asleep?”
He shrugs. “I never get the recommended eight hours. More like five or six.”
I’m about to chastise him, citing the statistics about how important sleep is to overall health that I’ve gathered over the years to use as an excuse why I occasionally sleep in until noon on weekends, but when I look up at him, there’s a crease between his brow and his lips are pinched tight. I sit up, not bothering to draw the sheets over myself. He has seen all of me already. Besides, even though my eyes are beginning to adjust, the darkness is still oppressive.
“What’s wrong?”
Yuri reaches out and drags his thumb across my lips slowly. “Nothing.”
I nip at his finger, sucking it into my mouth. “Liar.”
He laughs and tugs me back down next to him so we’re both staring up at the ceiling. “I’ve just been thinking about family.”
“Your family?” I ask.
“Yes,” he says. “And yours. And everyone’s. I’ve been thinking about what family is and isn’t.”
“Care to enlighten me?” I’ve rarely heard Yuri sound so distant. Clearly, something is bothering him, and while I’m desperate to know, I don’t want to press him.
“I was thinking about my family.” He tightens his arm around my shoulders and curls one of his arms beneath his head. “I told you my father runs a tight ship and has a lot of rules, but at the end of the day, we’ve always been there for one another. Always. My uncles, my brothers—each of them stands up for our family and our safety above all else, even when it means we might get hurt.”
“Like you were planning to do earlier today?” I ask, remembering when Yuri came back to the hotel room set on the two of us parting ways.
“Yeah, like that,” he says. “Loyalty is everything to my family. We would die for each other. So ... ”
I wait for him to finish, but after thirty seconds of silence, I press. “So ...”
He sighs. “So how could your father allow you to be tangled up in his mess? How could he not come for you or find some way to save you?”
I bite my lip. I’ve always been close with my dad. I have always trusted that our relationship is unbreakable. But in the last couple days, everything I know has been shaken. Now, I’m not sure where we stand. I’m not sure if he hasn’t come for me because he can’t or because he won’t. Maybe money is more important to him than
his only daughter. Maybe he is in hiding to protect his own skin, leaving me out in the cold. I truly don’t know. So, I say as much.
“I’m not sure.”
Yuri turns his head and presses a kiss to my temple. “I don’t mean to upset you, but I was lying here thinking about how, if you were my daughter, I’d do anything to get you back.”
I bark out a laugh, and he looks at me, surprised. “If I’m your daughter, we have defied every single law of nature.”
“Yeah, not what I meant.” Yuri screws up his face in disgust and then takes a deep breath. “Basically, if I had a daughter, I’d protect her no matter how much pressure I was under. No matter how many crime organizations were threatening me. I’d do whatever I had to do to take care of my family. I’d rather die.”
I lay my hand on his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart in my palm. “You know, there are other solutions to saving your family than sacrificing yourself. You don’t have to die to prove your loyalty.”
“But I would,” he says.
I sit up, resting on my elbows, and look down at his face, shadowy in the darkness. “But you don’t have to. I don’t want you to.”
He grips my chin and brings my face down to his, pressing his lips to mine. I close my eyes and sink into the kiss, enjoying every single second. “I’ll keep that in mind, but my family will always come first.”
I sigh, knowing there’s no way, in one conversation, to convince him he’s worth saving, and instead lie down next to him. “Do you want a family someday? I mean, a family of your own?”
“Yes.” He answers faster than I expect him to. “Do you?”
I nod. “Someday. When the time is right.”
“Do you mean to say that being chased by a secret Russian society is not the right time to start a family?”
I laugh. “That is exactly what I mean to say. I might wait until there aren’t assassins out looking for me before I decide to fall pregnant.”
We both laugh, mostly at the absurdity of the last few days—if we don’t laugh, we’ll cry—and then Yuri groans and sits up. “I’m not going to fall back asleep. Are you?”
“Unlikely,” I say, dragging my finger down his back, feeling the ripples of muscle underneath his skin.
Yuri shivers and then pulls away from me. “I was going to suggest we head to your family’s house, but if you keep that up, I’ll have other ideas.”
As tempting as it is to tease Yuri back into bed, I need to get to the house and find out if my dad is there. And if he isn’t, what happened to him. “I’m ready now.”
Yuri flips on the lamp beside the bed, the yellow bulb shining from beneath the dusty, cracked lampshade, and we both get dressed. With little in the way of belongings, we’re both ready in a few minutes.
Yuri hands me my phone. “Check and make sure he hasn’t moved.”
I open the app, click on my dad’s profile picture, and wait for the app to home in on him. The green circle appears on the same part of the map it was on last night. I hold it up for Yuri to see. “X marks the spot.”
He nods, grabs the car key from the laminate desk, and pushes me towards the door. “Let’s go treasure hunting.”
I smile, but silently wonder what that treasure could look like. Will it mean finding my dad safe at the house, meaning he could have come for me, but didn’t? Or will it mean finding out he is dead and was unable to rescue me? Either way, it seems like the only option is the loss of the dad I have always known, and I don’t think I’ll ever be ready for that. I follow Yuri to the car anyway.
Chapter Seventeen
Yuri
Bella strains against her seat belt when we reach the street of her family’s house, and instantly she begins to curse under her breath.
“What is it?” I scan the block, looking for any sign of trouble, but don’t see anything. All the windows are dark, which makes sense considering it isn’t even three AM yet.
“The lights are off.” Bella flops back in the seat and shakes her head. “Since we have multiple houses and apartments around the state, the entire house is rigged up to a smart-home program that turns different lights on in the main floor rooms throughout the night to deter burglars. The house is never completely dark.”
I parallel park across the street and kill the engine. “Never? Not once?”
“Once during a blackout,” she says. “But that’s it.”
“Shit,” I say, repeating her curse from before. If the lights are off, it means the power has likely been cut, and if the power has been cut, it means the senator did not go gently. If he went at all. I stare up at the modern two-story house as if I can see through the walls and detect a decaying body. If he is dead, will I smell him as soon as I get inside? “Maybe I should—”
“No.” Bella cuts me off before I can continue. “I’m going with you. I can handle it.”
“But he’s your dad, Bella.” I can still clearly see Bella’s comatose face after she found out her dad was taking money from crime rings. How will she react if she sees her father’s dead, rotting body in their family home?
“Which is exactly why I have to go inside.” She grabs her phone from the console and shoves it in her back pocket before grabbing the door handle. “Are you coming?”
I pause to try and think of something, anything I can say to change her mind, but I know it will all be futile. So, I slip my gun into my waistband and follow her across the street and up the polished cement stairs.
She tries to enter the code to the front gate, but the keypad isn’t responding. I walk over to the gate and give it a shove. It opens with a metallic squeal.
Bella closes her eyes for a moment, steadying herself, and then walks to the front door. Like the gate, it opens immediately. Not only was it not locked, it wasn’t even latched. The door was standing open. I’m sure Bella knows how bad things are looking, so I don’t point it out. We just silently walk into the black marble entrance hall.
Immediately, it’s obvious the house has been ransacked. A vase of flowers—now browned and wilting—is lying on its side in the middle of the floor, books have been thrown from the shelves, and the furniture is sitting at odd angles with the throw pillows tossed on the floor.
“Let’s just find his phone,” Bella says, walking past the doors to the sitting and dining rooms and heading straight for the stairs. Let’s just find him is what she means, but I know she’s just as scared as I am that we will find him. Focusing on his phone seems less ominous.
We walk up the floating wooden stairs and all the doors on the second floor are closed. “Which way?”
Bella grabs the glass railing for support and then stands tall, pointing to the door to the right of the stairs. “That’s his office.”
I lay my hand on her shoulder. “Do you want me to go first?”
She hesitates and then shakes her head. “No, I’m fine.”
Taking slow, measured steps, Bella crosses the stair landing and lays her hand on the knob. As she turns it, I’m holding my breath, and when the door finally swings open, she sags with relief. “Clear.”
This room doesn’t have a body in it, but there are five other rooms left to search. “Do you want to look for his phone in here while I check the other rooms?”
Bella’s mouth twists to the side, and I can tell she’s warring with herself. She came inside even though I advised against it, but now, faced with the reality of actually discovering her dead dad, I know her resolve is beginning to waver. After a long deliberation, she nods. “Sure, that sounds good.”
I grab her hand, bring her knuckles to my lips, and then leave to search the other rooms. If anyone was in the house, they would have come for us by now, but I still keep my gun at the ready just in case.
The first door is a closet full of bright yellow rain gear and a box labelled “Christmas decorations.” The next is a bathroom that looks virtually untouched. When I push the third door open, the door stops mid-swing, catching on something, and I jump back and
draw my gun. The door bounces a few times, but otherwise the room is silent. I peek my head around, hoping I won’t find the senator’s dead body, and instead find a butterfly-patterned body pillow on the floor.
One glance around the room, and I realize I’m in Bella’s childhood bedroom. The walls are pink and covered in band posters and concert tickets. Mixed amongst old bottles of nail polish and perfume are a few stuffed animals and an open jewelry box with a ballerina inside. The room is a mess, but not torn to shreds like downstairs. The foldable closet doors are open with a few sweaters dangling from hangers and the bedding has been thrown around, but otherwise it’s in fine shape. And mercifully free of any dead bodies.
The next two rooms—what I deduce are the master bedroom and a guest room—are both more of a mess, but still clear. I find a laptop on top of the dresser that I grab, and I’m just finishing my sweep of the master bedroom, checking the bedside table drawers for any sign of the senator’s phone, when Bella calls out.
“Found it!”
I jog down the hallway towards the office, and Bella is standing behind the desk with her dad’s phone in her hand, forehead wrinkled. “He changed the passcode, though. I can’t unlock it.”
When she looks up at me, she seems to remember all at once what I was doing, and her eyes go wide. “Did you find anything?”
I hold up the laptop. “Just this.”
She sighs with relief and then snaps her finger, gesturing for me to hand over the computer. “His phone backs up to his laptop, and I think I know the password.”
She plugs the laptop into the charger coming from a cord hole in the corner of the desk and flips it up, drumming her fingers nervously on the keyboard while she waits for it to boot up. Finally, she taps out a password that has to be sixteen digits long and hits enter.
“Yes,” she hisses, dropping down into the computer chair. I move around the desk to see the screen. As soon as it turns on, there’s one file in the center of the screen. Everything else has been removed.
