It wouldn't have been the first time.
"No, of course not. I'd just like to go back to my life without being unable to function without you."
"Well, then I think we simply want very different things from this relationship, Princesa. I very much want you to need me, as much as I've quickly come to need you."
His face remained casual despite the odd words, and when the server brought more food, he delved into the plates to feed me bits from each of them and explained what it was he'd gotten for me to try. Even though they were delicious, exhaustion settled over me.
It had been a long couple of days, and Rafe's odd words rang in my head.
I couldn't decide why they felt like a promise.
The ocean breeze was heaven on my burned skin, blowing through the daybed by the pool like a cool gift sent from the spirits. I drifted in and out of consciousness while I read with Rafael at my side doing some work on his phone.
He'd determined a quiet day was in order while I recovered from the exertion of the day before, making me feel pathetic. I'd given in when I fell back asleep in bed after he made love to me after breakfast, and hadn't woken up until noon. My jobs back home didn't require so much walking and weren't nearly as exciting.
I had a feeling the new and regular orgasms weren't doing much to dissuade me from sleeping either.
I opened my eyes, looking up to find Rafe staring down at me. His face was relaxed as he studied mine. "How long have you been watching me?" I asked with a hoarse giggle. He grabbed the water bottle off the edge of the bed, tipping it so that water poured into my mouth slowly.
"A while," he said vaguely. "I like watching you."
"That is either very sweet or slightly creepy. I can't decide which." He ducked down and nipped my bottom lip. Kissing me, he groaned into my lips as he shifted his weight to hover over me as his lips moved against mine with a smile.
"It's probably a bit of both," he admitted, his chuckle a deep rumble as his chest shook against mine. The ring of his cell phone on the day bed broke the moment, shattering the intimacy between us as I held my breath. He glanced at the phone, sighing in frustration before he picked it up and looked at me while he answered. "Espera un minuto," he barked into the phone, turning his eyes to me as he stood. "I have to take this, Princesa," he said, leaning down to kiss me firmly one last time before he walked to the edge of the pool where the steps led to the beach below. He leaned on the railing, watching me until his face hardened at whatever the person on the other end of the call said and he turned his cold gaze toward the ocean.
Grabbing my own phone off the bed, I pulled up Chloe's number and called her, needing advice on how to handle a man who kept secrets so efficiently that I couldn't even guess what they were. "Yo ho," she sang on the other end, the sounds of the city echoing in the background as I heard Hugo's voice yelling at someone playfully.
"Do you think he's married?" I asked, not even bothering to say hello. Without a clue for how long his phone call would take, I watched him pace back and forth on the walkway, barking orders at the person he spoke with.
There was a pause, and I wondered briefly if Chloe knew something I didn't. "What would make you think that?" she asked finally. "I didn't see a ring or a tan line the other night."
"No, there's no tan line," I agreed. I'd checked multiple times during our time together, wondering why I couldn't get rid of the nagging sense that something was just wrong. "He always takes his phone calls in private. Isn't that strange? It's not like I speak much Spanish so I couldn't understand what he said if he sat right next to me. The walking away just seems...excessive," I said.
"Let it go," she said. "Even if he were married, that's not on you. If you knew he was married and slept with him anyway? Sure, then you'd be partially at fault, but if he's going around and seducing women without disclosing that, then the blame falls on him entirely," she said. I started to interject when she cut me off to finish. "But, I don't think he's married. Married men who want to cheat don't pick one woman to spend their week with, they sleep with as many as they can in the limited time frame they have. At least, that's what I would think they do."
"So why the distance for phone calls?" I asked, picking at the fraying edges of the nail polish on my fingers. I shouldn't have done it since I hadn't brought any, and to be with Rafael I'd need to not have chipped nails.
"Maybe he just takes his business seriously. Men don't get to be as rich as he is without being professional. It's probably just a habit. You said he's in sales and investments, right? That sounds like it could be confidential."
"I hope you're right," I agreed. I'd never forgive him for deceiving me if he had someone waiting for him, but I'd also never forgive myself. I hadn't outright asked, and now I was terrified to.
How did I ask a question when I didn't want the answer?
13
Rafael
The call took much longer than I wanted it to, but I never stopped watching Isa. She might not communicate verbally as well as I suspected most women would have in her situation, but her body never bothered to try to hide anything from me.
Her body was an open book, and I'd use that to my advantage until she let me inside her head.
The moment my phone rang, she'd gone from joking about me being creepy to tense and insecure. While I loved that she was jealous over potential threats to her claim on me, she needed to understand that no woman would ever tempt me away from her.
I just didn't know how to tell her that without scaring her off. She wasn't ready for words like forever.
When I returned to our daybed, she was busily texting the photos she'd taken of the citadel the day before to her mother. She made no move to hide her phone from me or keep secrets, and the thought pleased me more than it should have when I couldn't be as open with her.
Probably ever, if blood and death threats made her squeamish.
The only part of the photos that didn't sit well with me was the way she specifically avoided sending any pictures of the two of us together. We'd taken a couple in the citadel, her beaming face next to mine as she curled into me comfortably.
"Why didn't you send her any of us?" I asked, settling in next to her and nodding toward her phone.
She laughed in response, the sound sarcastic in a way I didn't like coming from her. "She very specifically told me not to get into trouble," she said, touching a finger to my bare chest and looking up at me with a secret smile.
"To be fair, you didn't get into trouble. Trouble got into you." She gasped, slapping my chest playfully at the dirty innuendo. Taking the phone out of her hand, I dropped it onto the daybed and hauled her up into my arms with a broad smile on my face.
As much as I wanted Isa to tell her family about me, I had more pressing matters to tend to. Since it was probably better they didn't know about me until I was certain Isa would make the right choice, her family would wait.
She wrapped her legs around me with a laugh, my hands touching the naked flesh of her thighs where her bikini bottoms grazed the edges of her perfect ass. She went still in my arms when she realized where I was walking, neither her fight or flight instincts taking over as her breathing went rapid.
My first foot touched the water, submerging while I pretended not to notice Isa's rising panic. She couldn't live on an island and not be comfortable swimming. I'd push her as much as I needed to, until we unraveled the bulk of the fear that had kept her away from the water since she'd nearly drowned as a child.
The moment the water touched her feet, she clung to me tighter and tried to inch herself up my body. I forced my face into a mask of confusion, tilting my head at her thoughtfully as I stepped further toward the deep end. "Are you afraid of the water?" I asked her.
She sighed, nodding her head and burying her face in my neck as the water covered her from the waist down. “Mhm,” she hummed into me.
"I'm sorry, Princesa," I said, rubbing my thumbs over her skin to soothe her. "You never said." I turned toward
the stairs, hoping that the stubborn side I knew was inside her would come to the surface.
"It's okay. Just don't let me go. Please," she said with a little whimper. I felt an unreasonable amount of pride, that she was brave enough to confront her fears at all, but also that she trusted me enough to let me help her through it.
"I won't let you drown," I reassured her anyway, moving through the water slowly until it kissed the back of her shoulders. She sucked back a ragged breath, working to control her breathing. I didn't go any deeper, sensing she'd reached the limit of her tolerance for the day. In all my reading about severe phobias stemming from childhood trauma, I knew logically it would take time. She wouldn't suddenly not have a fear of water after one swim in a pool.
But I'd gladly take the baby steps she took with me, when she'd never even tried with anyone else. I moved to the loungers on a ledge at the edge of the pool. Lifting her up onto one of them, I deposited her in a lounger and admired her body as she forced herself to lie back, and the water moved over her skin. That emerald green bikini would be the death of me as she put her arms at her sides and forced herself to hold perfectly still. Pulling myself up onto the lounger next to her, I enjoyed the way the sun felt on my skin, even as I knew we'd only have a few moments to enjoy it before Isa should get into the shade.
It would take time for her skin to adjust to the strength of the Mediterranean sun, even with all the sunblock in the world.
"Have you always been afraid of the water?" I asked, watching as she forced herself to turn her head toward me, while she considered her words carefully.
"No. I—" she paused, sighing as my hand took hers in mine and she breathed a little easier. "I fell into the Chicago River when I was little. We were on the Riverwalk one day, and it just happened so fast," she said. "Odina and I both ended up in the river."
"Odina?" I asked, watching as she realized I didn't know who that was. I was sure it was hard to imagine having someone who was so a part of your identity, a mirror of yourself, and having someone not know she existed.
"My twin sister," she said. "We aren't close. We're totally opposite, even if we look the same."
"There are two of you?" I asked, chuckling because I knew it was impossible. Even if I hadn't seen for myself, there could never have been someone as flawless as Isa.
She shrugged. "Physically yes. Although she's the fun sister. She's so adventurous and unafraid. Sometimes I wish I could take just a little of that from her and give her some of my caution. Balance us out, you know? It's like she got all the extremes on one end of the spectrum and I got the other."
"Polar opposites," I said, nodding my head because I understood and very much agreed with the assessment.
"Anyway, I've never been comfortable with the water since then. I wasn't breathing by the time they pulled us out." I only just managed to keep myself from asking how her mother could have allowed such a thing to happen. To let both your daughters fall into the river was unthinkable.
Insulting her family would do me no good in trying to earn her trust and her love. If she thought I would be an issue with her family, Isa would turn her back on me before I could blink. For now, they were her world. My judgements would have to wait until her perspective on life changed.
Until all that mattered to her was me.
Isa swung her sandals in her free hand as we walked back from the tapas bar on the beach, staring up at the starry sky above us. Her face was more relaxed than I'd ever seen it. Thoughtful in a peaceful way, rather than the concentration I'd grown used to seeing take over her expression.
When she turned those shining eyes my way, I reached over to capture her face with my free hand and lean down to kiss her. The way she smiled into my mouth filled me with hope that my plans for her hadn't been a waste of time and energy. I'd do it all over again, if it meant she could look at me with stars in her eyes and love on her face.
And I knew without a doubt that it was the blooming of love that danced behind her expression when she dropped her guard in these moments. It could be nothing else, even if it was rooted in lies.
Better to do what was necessary and then ask for forgiveness, than to ask permission and never have this time with her.
She glanced back at the tapas bar behind us wistfully, her face twisting into a secret smile as her cheeks flushed. "What is it, mi princesa?"
She turned back to me with a shy glance, focusing her attention back on the beach and putting one foot in front of the other. "I just wanted to remember how it looked. That's all." I grinned down at her, promising internally to make the effort to take her back as frequently as possible.
El Infierno wasn't far from Ibiza.
The city lights illuminated Ibiza Town to our right as we walked back toward the hotel. Out in the distance over the water, the figure of Es Vedra loomed. "I'll take you to watch the sunset tomorrow night. Nothing compares to watching it with Es Vedra in the background."
She hummed softly, making me want a reminder of what the vibrations felt like with her pretty mouth wrapped around my cock. I resolved to find out, given that she'd proven to be a very willing student the first time. Approaching the steps that would take us to the hotel, I turned to tell her about the island being magnetic when I noticed a figure looming at the top of the steps.
Feeling the sudden tension in my body as the smile slipped off my face, Isa turned to face me and looked up to the man in question with confusion on her face. "Do you know him?" she whispered. Pavel's dark eyes shifted to her at my side, his face impassive as he studied her and giving nothing away. His gaze dropped from her face, gliding over her body and tilting his head to the side to scrutinize her scar.
The Kuznetsovs always did like their toys scarred and broken.
Just the knowledge that he'd laid eyes on my woman threatened my patience. Knowing the things he did to women drove me over the edge. I pulled the key card from my pocket, pressing it into Isa's hand while she looked between us and tried to fit the pieces together. Nothing in Isa's life had prepared her for the world I had thrust her into. She could never even begin to guess at the origins of the man watching her, as his face tilted in sudden interest when I tended to her rather than dealing with him first.
He would need to be handled. Quickly.
"Go up to the room. Now," I ordered, keeping my voice quiet. "I mean it, Isa."
"But—"
"Now," I stressed quietly. She swallowed, nodding her head and curling her fingers around the key card. I couldn't afford to kiss her or show her any affection to soothe the discomfort tearing her apart. Not when Pavel had already seen too much.
Having Isa out in public would always come with inherent risks. People knowing she existed was dangerous for her at best.
Deadly at its worst.
She turned on her heel, taking that first step slowly and then hurrying her pace as she gave Pavel a wide distance and made her way toward the entry to the main hotel. I moved up the steps carefully, watching until Isa faded from view within the main lobby. One of my men disguised as staff turned toward me from the pool area, raising a hand to show he'd seen her and would make sure she made her way upstairs as he followed her inside.
I gave it a few seconds to ensure she was tucked away safely, and then I turned my attention to Pavel. Whatever he saw in my regard must have finally resonated the danger of his situation as he backed away a step. "Rafael," he said with a chuckle. "You're a tricky man to get in touch with."
The attempt at humor fell flat, as my body slowly followed the angle of my head and I spun to give him the full effect of my presence. Although I stood without the formality of my suit to encase me in black, Pavel would never be able to stand on his own against me. Even if I did look less intimidating than him; he in his full suit and me in a t-shirt and shorts.
I reached across the space between us. Taking his throat in my hand until his Adam's apple bobbed against my grip and he gagged, I bent him backward until he had no choice but to lean on the railin
g by the stairs for support. "Rafael," he gasped, the sound ragged and forced as I restricted his breathing.
"You've got some fucking nerve coming here," I said quietly, glancing at the suddenly empty pool area as my remaining men cleared it of hotel patrons.
"You didn't give me a choice."
Another gag came at the increased grip of my fingers on the side of his neck. "When I tell you to fucking wait, you goddamn wait until I'm ready for a meeting. I do not give the first fuck what it is you need, because I don't operate on your schedule. Take your fucking ass back to Siberia where it belongs."
He shrugged off my hand finally as I relaxed my grip, standing to his full height as he glared at me with contempt. "You didn't give me a choice but to come myself. Sending my man back with a missing finger was harsh, even for the infamous El Diablo."
"Nothing you have to say to me cannot wait a week, Pavel," I growled.
He paused, and I watched his decision to be very stupid cross over his face as he considered his options. "She's pretty," he rumbled, reaching up a hand to touch his sore throat. "I would hate to see her sad when I slit her friend's throat and hang her from your balcony. To waste such beauty on sadness would be a crime, no?"
I gave precisely zero shits about Chloe. A few days prior, I wouldn't have cared. In fact, if things with Isa went sour, her friend’s death would be convenient for me. Since Isa had chosen not to tell her family about me, there would be no one to give my name in connection to her disappearance. There'd be no authorities for me to deal with.
They wouldn't have been much in the way of an obstacle, considering they were all in my pocket anyway. But I went through my life trying to be inconvenienced as little as possible.
It irritated me that I cared for Isa enough to not want to see her face when she realized her friend was dead. Particularly because she would learn the truth of Hugo's deception soon enough. That alone would crush her, with how close they’d grown.
Until Tomorrow Comes: A Dark Mafia Romance (Beauty in Lies Book 1) Page 14
