“I’m with Luka Malakov,” I told them. One of them doubtfully showed me in. I’d told the cab driver to leave me there—however this worked out, it was going to be dangerous and he’d done enough for me.
Luka and Vasiliy were at the same table I’d sat at with Luka—his usual table, I guessed, although something looked different. There was food already on the table and wine, too. The tables around theirs had fallen into a sort of awed hush as people realized who they were sitting close to.
Yuri was standing just a few feet behind them, keeping watch. He spotted me first and said something in Luka’s ear.
Luka had been looking down at his food. Now his head snapped up and he looked right at me. My breath caught in my throat. Even with everything that had gone wrong between us, my heart gave the same lurch and then mad rush that it always did when I saw him. But God, the ice in his eyes, the raw, hot anger that shot across the space between us—it tore me apart.
I put my hand up in front of me. “I’m sorry—”
Luka stood, pushing his chair back so hard it clattered to the floor. He half-turned, reached his hand under Yuri’s jacket and returned holding a gun. A gun he pointed straight at me.
People around me started screaming. For all they knew who Luka was, for all they’d heard about the Brotherhood and their crimes, they didn’t expect to actually see things happening right in front of them. No one would be crazy enough to shoot someone in a crowded restaurant.
But if there was one person powerful enough to do it and get away with it, it was Luka.
“I’m not here to argue with you,” I managed to say. “You need my help.”
“I don’t need you at all.” His accent and anger combined to twist the words. It was almost a snarl.
“Listen to me! My old boss was working with Ralavich. He’s going to have both of you killed.”
“He can try,” said Vasiliy quietly. “You should go, Arianna. I’m running thin on reasons not to kill you myself.”
“Please! You don’t know him!” I stared at Luka. “I don’t want to see you get hurt!”
“You tried to kill my father! You lied to me!”
“I’m sorry!” It was useless. I’d thought that maybe I’d be able to reason with him and persuade him to lie low for a while, but he was far too angry to listen.
And then, as I glanced around the room in frustration, I saw what was different. Like many places around the city, they’d brought in portable heaters to keep the place warm despite the blizzard outside. But last time I’d been here....I shut my eyes to make sure, going back to that day we’d had lunch. Yes...there’d been two heaters, one in each corner of the room, pumping out hot air.
Now there were three.
Luka still had the gun on me but I forced myself to turn away and shout to a waiter. “When did the extra heater arrive?” I asked in English.
He looked blank.
Well, I guess it didn’t matter anymore. “When did that extra heater show up?” I demanded in Russian.
The waiter stared at me as if I was crazy and then shrugged. “A few minutes ago. Some guys in overalls.”
When I looked back at Luka, his face was thunderous. Yes, I could understand all your Russian. Sorry. Just another lie I’d told him.
I took a step towards the heater. Luka raised the gun a little.
I took a shuddering breath. “I think it might be a bomb,” I said, saying it in English so I didn’t panic a hundred jumpy Russians. “If you’re going to shoot me, then shoot me.”
And I walked over to the heater. Luka tracked me with the gun the whole time.
There was no hot air coming out of the heater and the surface was stone cold. I didn’t dare try to open it, but I looked through the vents.
There were wires and bricks of gray stuff even I recognized as plastic explosive.
I stood up. “Tell them all to get out!” I yelled.
Luka stood there, the gun still pointing at my head. And now I could see the hurt in his eyes, the anger that came from a deeper place.
“You can kill me later,” I told him. “Just get everyone out.”
He held my gaze a second longer and then lowered the gun. Then he shouted, full volume, for everyone to get out, shooting into the ceiling a few times for good measure. The diners and waiters stampeded for the door. Luka, Vasiliy, Yuri and I were left standing there until the end. Then Vasiliy and Yuri grabbed Luka and pulled him and he pulled me, and we all stumbled down the steps and onto the street.
When we came to a stop, I found myself right up against Luka, as close to him as I had been that time at the party, back in New York. He was breathing deep and hard and he suddenly grabbed me by the upper arms. I tensed, staring up into his furious face.
One of the diners tried to run past us, back inside. Yuri grabbed her arm.
“My son!” she screamed. “I think he’s in the bathroom!”
I took a step towards the restaurant, but Luka shoved me back against Yuri and ran up the steps. Yuri tried to follow his master, loyal to the end, but Vasiliy pulled him back.
We watched as Luka disappeared into the restaurant. Seconds passed. Vasiliy put his hand on my shoulder and it was comforting, even with the knowledge that he probably wanted to kill me.
The restaurant exploded. I had to close my eyes as a hot wind blew fragments of glass and china and wood right at us. I felt one slash my cheek. But I was focused on the image behind my eyelids, the snapshot my perfect fucking memory had burned into my brain forever: the windows of the restaurant caved outward by orange fire.
I’d killed him. My heart collapsed down like a black hole, sucking everything else that I was down with it. I didn’t dare open my eyes because, when I did, he would truly be gone.
I heard the mother’s hopeful sob. My eyes flew open. As the smoke cleared, I saw Luka lying flat on the ground just in front of the restaurant doorway, where he must have hurled himself as the bomb went off. His body was hunched protectively over something and the back of his suit was smoldering.
I ran over to him and slapped out the flames. He lifted himself from the young boy he’d shielded and the boy staggered off towards his mother.
“I thought you were dead!” I croaked.
Luka got slowly to his feet, wincing a little.
“We Malakovs are not so easy to kill,” said Vasiliy. “Come. Get in car.”
Yuri grabbed my shoulder and started walking me towards a car, where more of Vasiliy’s men were waiting.
“You want me to go with you?” I looked at Luka, but his face was unreadable. “For what? Luka?!” He didn’t answer.
I looked at Vasiliy. “What’s he going to do with me?” I asked.
Strong hands pushed me into the car.
“Whatever he wants,” Vasiliy said grimly.
By the time we arrived back at Vasiliy’s house, the blizzard had slowed traffic to a crawl and the guards outside were wrapped up in thick coats. There were more of them, standing at the gates and watching from balconies. They knew the threat to their masters was real, now. And they all knew it was somehow connected with me, that I’d betrayed Luka. I could feel their anger blasting down at me in hot waves as we walked the short distance from the car to the front door. Out of all of them, only Yuri didn’t seem to hate me.
Inside, Luka grabbed my forearm and pulled me upstairs to the room he was using. As soon as the heavy oak door was closed behind us, he shoved me away from him, making me stagger, as if he couldn’t bear to touch me anymore.
I looked at him. Swallowed. Opened my mouth to defend myself but couldn’t come up with the words.
“I should kill you,” said Luka, his voice shaking with anger. “Sooka.”
Which can mean traitor or bitch or whore. All of which were sort of accurate. Handy of the Russian language to combine all three in one word.
“You betrayed me,” he snapped. “You slept with me. You made me think—” He broke off and glared at me.
“What?” I ask
ed, my voice weak. “What did I make you think?”
He shook his head and muttered Wed’ma under his breath. It meant witch. Crazy, because I’m the last person who’d ever be able to cast a spell on anyone.
“I’m sorry,” I said. I knew it wasn’t enough, but it was all I had. “I was wrong. I thought I could…” I closed my eyes. “...be with you and not feel it and—I couldn’t.” I shook my head.
He let out a disbelieving snort. “I think you good person,” he said, his rage making his English slip. “You seem like an innocent.”
“I am! I am an innocent. I’ve never done anything like this before! This is my first mission!” I opened my eyes and shook my head, blinking back tears. “I’m not even a real agent! I’m just a languages geek!”
He took a step towards me. “Then why would you agree to do this?”
I let out a long groan of self-hatred. “I thought I was working for the good guys.”
He shook his head, but gently, as if he understood. “There are no good guys, Arianna. Only different bad men.”
I nodded. I got that, now.
He stepped right up against me. That big, strong hand came up and settled on my throat. I knew he could throttle me without even breaking a sweat. “So tell me. Why did you spill his drink? Why did you change your mind?”
“Because I’m in love with you,” I whispered.
He stared into my eyes. I’ve never felt so connected with anyone my entire life. There were no secrets, no doubts. Everything I was, was exposed to him.
And he knew I was telling the truth.
Has hand stayed on my throat but his mouth came down on mine, tasting my lips, then devouring me completely, taking control of me.
I melted into him, clinging to his back. The heat was raging inside him, throbbing through his skin, that dangerous energy that had scared me so much, at first. Now, I gave myself up to it. I let it soak into me, right to my very soul, and thaw the parts of me that had been encased in ice for so long.
We kissed for a long time, exploring each other, turning slowly, our hearts thumping gradually faster and faster, in rhythm with one another. We twisted so that he was the one with his back to the wall, and it was almost as if we were a couple of normal, regular lovers. His hands traced down my back to my ass, pulling me in close, and I let out a long, slow breath at the touch of those big palms there.
Then he suddenly twisted us again and slammed me up against the wall. The mood shifted to a more primitive need.
We stared at each other, neither of us daring to move. His eyes, burning into me. Telling me what he wanted to do to me. Every filthy way he wanted to corrupt my innocence.
And me, for the first time, daring to meet his gaze full-on and telling him that I wanted it.
He grabbed my waist and lifted me straight up, my feet kicking in the air. He pinned me against the wall like that, my ass pushing against the cool plaster, my chest heaving with fear and heady arousal. Then he mashed his body against mine, pressing his legs between mine, holding me there with the pressure of his flat, taut stomach against my groin. I felt myself go squishy inside, my sensitive flesh rubbing over those firm ridges of muscle as I struggled.
Why am I struggling?
I flushed. Because it’s more fun.
His hands bunched in the neck of my dress. It was funny because I almost had a vision of him ripping the thing in two, but it was quite strong fabric and—
His muscles bunched and the material screamed and gave, seams popping and stitching wrenching loose. It ripped straight down the front, baring my bra-clad breasts. He got it all the way down to my navel and then, with three savage tugs, he ripped it right down to the hem and it fell apart. Air made furnace-hot by his presence wafted against my exposed stomach and thighs. I could feel myself throbbing—God, moistening under my panties.
He kissed me again, gripping my hips to lift me a little more, his mouth hungry and fierce at my lips. His tongue plunged deep, meeting mine. I was being plundered, ravished. Fantasies I hadn’t even known I had, fulfilled.
I could feel him panting through the kiss. His hands ran up and down my body in long strokes, lifting and fondling my breasts through my bra, then sliding down to the softness of my inner thighs, then back up in a rhythm that had me writhing.
He broke the kiss. “You understood all the things I said in Russian?” he asked in Russian.
I nodded. “Da.” Yes.
The tiniest hint of a blush as he remembered some of the things he’d said. But a deeper gleam of lust in his eyes as he realized that I’d understood them...and I’d come back for more. “All of them?” he asked.
“Even when you said you were going to make me beg you to stop,” I whispered. “And then make me beg you for more.”
He growled low in his throat. And then picked me up by the waist and threw me onto the bed.
The shreds of my dress flopped around me, half-hiding my body, but he was on me in a second, rolling me onto my face and stripping it off me. A second later, I was back on my back, drawing in shuddering gulps of air.
He looked down at my chest. Then he folded his thick fingers around the front of my bra and pulled, hard. It stretched away from my body for a second, the straps pulling painfully tight, and then they snapped and my breasts were naked beneath his eyes. He stared down at them for a second, feasting his eyes, and the feel of him looking at me sent a hot wave soaking through me. Then he lowered his head and began to lick in long strokes, covering all of my breast but each lick crossing my nipple. I moaned and kicked and writhed beneath him and reached for his head, intending to pull him down against me harder.
He grabbed my wrists in one big hand and pinned them to the bed above my head. A moment later, his other hand bunched in the thin fabric of my panties and ripped them away. I groaned and tossed my head, feeling the heat rising up inside me, filling me. It was too much. My legs opened and wound around him but, at the same time, I shook my head and said, “I don’t understand this.”
He froze and stared down at me. “What is there to understand?”
I flushed. “Us two, together. This. This...thing, this game—”
“Is not game,”
“That’s worse! Or better, I don’t know. Like, is it BDSM and should we have a safeword and is it wrong that I like it? I mean, I’m not sure why I like it and MMFF!”
The last was because he’d put his hand over my mouth.
“Shut the fuck up, Arianna,” he told me.
I went stiff and quiet.
“You Americans analyze every fucking thing,” he said mildly. “You like it—yes?”
I nodded.
“You know I would never, ever hurt you?”
I did, but hearing it lit a warm glow of reassurance inside me. I nodded again.
“Then that is all that matters. Now shut up and kiss me while I fuck you like dirty slut.”
My mind exploded as his lips replaced his hand and his tongue slid into my mouth. I wasn’t Arianna Scott or Arianna Ross anymore; I was just his. I wasn’t going to be judged for wanting him to be rough, for wanting to play at resisting him. I could just enjoy it.
I pressed up against his hand with my wrists but it felt like his hand had turned to rock. I was held there, helpless, until he damn well chose to let me free, and the thought made my groin roll and grind against him.
His free hand tangled in my hair as he kissed me, then stroked down my cheek. He lifted his lips from mine and stared at me with those icy-blue eyes. “Beautiful,” he said in English, and my heart soared. He kissed me softly on my neck. “Sooka,” he whispered and the heat tightened and twisted inside me. He kissed me again, this time on my collarbone. “Innocent,” he said. Another kiss, on the top of my breast. “Shalava,” he whispered.
He kept going, alternating between telling me how beautiful I was and what a dirty, filthy slut I was, with kisses for punctuation. By the time his mouth reached my groin, I was a hot, panting mess.
He put his mou
th very close to me, until every hard-accented syllable was like a caress on my ready, throbbing sex. “You will tell me,” he said.
“What?” I was so turned on, I slurred it.
“You will tell me exactly what you want,” he said, his voice like cold steel.
My eyes widened. Every time we’d had sex, I’d basically let him do all the talking. His voice I got off on, but I couldn’t say that sort of stuff. “I can’t,” I said hopelessly.
He lifted his eyes to meet mine. “You will. Or I will stop.”
He licked me and my back arched like a bow, hot pleasure rippling up through my body to explode in my mind. What?! He wanted me to—My cheeks reddened. I couldn’t—
He stopped.
I instinctively humped my groin towards him, but I couldn’t quite reach that hot, expert tongue. “I can’t!” I insisted.
“Say it in Russian,” he told me.
Russian. Maybe that would make it easier.
And so I told him in awkward, halting phrases, how I wanted him to lick me. And as he did, the words came a little easier, the heat inside me melting away the barriers. My Russian came in little flurries of words and then in desperate, rushed sentences and then in a gasping litany that rose to the ceiling as I begged him not to stop, begged him to go deeper and faster and OH GOD harder. I wouldn’t have had a hope of knowing some of the words... if I hadn’t listened to his phone sex over and over again.
Wrestling against his hands was my safety valve, enabling the pleasure to go on and on without me exploding too soon. His shoulders held my thighs wide apart as his lips sucked on my aching clit and his tongue plunged deep. I could feel it building, building, the blood rushing in my ears, my breath coming in desperate pants. I was rolling my hips, bringing my body up to meet him. Just as I thought it couldn’t get any better, he slid two fingers into me. I felt myself shudder and go over the edge and then I was bucking and twisting, straining with my wrists against his hand. The pleasure rolled up my body in waves, stretching every muscle taut and then letting it dissolve into warm goo. I flopped onto the bed, spent.
Lying and Kissing Page 23
