by Olivia Gates
With every step closer he came into clearer focus, inducing more tremors into her limbs and heart.
He was wearing the adult-size version of Leo’s costume, imperial clothes, though she failed to pinpoint its origin. His shoulders and chest looked even more imposing than usual in a midthigh coat in vivid blue, the same hue of the inlay in her dress but many shades darker. It was embroidered exquisitely with gold thread and cord in a horizontal repetitive pattern, each ending where golden buttons closed the coat down his massive chest. At his hard waist it opened down to reveal white gold-embroidered satin pants gathered into navy-and-tan leather boots.
And then she looked up at his face, and that was when she almost fell to her knees.
The mahogany hair that now rained down to his shoulders was scraped away from his leonine forehead and gathered back into a ponytail, the severe pull emphasizing his rugged bone structure, the lupine slant of his eye and the sensual hardness of his lips.
He looked way more than heart-stopping. And he looked...hungry. She felt him devouring her from afar, felt her body readying itself for his possession, didn’t know how she’d survive the time until she could have him again.
Then they reached him where he stood on the draped-in-satin, five-step platform, and Aristedes unhooked his arm from what she realized had been her spastic grip.
He held out his hand to Maksim, who gripped it in a firm handshake, then drew him into one of those sparse male hugs. Cali heard their brief exchange.
“Make her happy, Volkov,” Aristedes said. Or else was conveyed clearly.
It was lucky she hadn’t applied makeup or she would have ended up a streaked mess when she heard Maksim’s answer.
“I live to make her happy, Sarantos.”
The two most important men in her life parted with a final look of understanding. Then Aristedes placed her hand in Maksim’s and stepped down.
Everything from the moment her groom took her hand onward went by in a dreamlike blur.
Maksim tucked her to his side as if he were afraid she’d disappear as an ornately dressed minister started reciting the marriage vows first in Russian, then in English. After she’d recited them after him in a fugue, another man stepped forward, took the minister’s place and recited vows in Greek.
No longer able to manifest surprise or to deal with these spikes in emotion, she only looked up at Maksim, love and gratitude flowing from her eyes. He hugged her tighter, his eyes smoldering with passion so fierce it singed her soul.
After they’d exchanged their own vows, and he’d kissed her senseless, he held her swooning mass to his side as he gestured to someone in the distance. In moments, Rosa came rushing up the platform with Leo popping with excitement in her arms. He threw himself at both of them, but it was Maksim who had the coordination to catch him.
Holding both of them to his heart, he addressed the guests.
“Every man lives searching for a purpose in life. If he is blessed, he finds it and can dedicate his life to it. I have been blessed beyond measure. I give you my purpose, my blessings, the owners of my heart and soul and everything that I am and have. My bride, the love of my life, Caliope Sarantos Volkova, and my son and heir, Leonidas Sarantos Volkov.”
Everyone stood as one, cheering and raising their glasses in a toast to the family, and Cali broke down at last, burying her face into Maksim’s chest, sobbing, while Leo jumped up and down in his father’s embrace and screeched in elation, as if realizing that this was a momentous moment in all their lives.
The out-of-body feeling she’d been experiencing only deepened as the celebrations continued, merging the wedding with the birthday. Maksim took her to salute their guests before heading outside the hall, where she found the rest of the mansion was spread with tables for the attendees, with the children converging on Leo’s wonderland.
She thought she laughed with her family, chattered in Russian with Tatjana’s acquaintances, joked with Maksim’s business associates who wanted to know how she’d melted that iceberg. She believed she joined in dancing the khorovod, the Russian circle folk dance, which her family eventually turned into the pidikhtos, Crete’s version of the dance.
Then she was hugging and kissing endless bodies and faces, the only ones she’d remember later being her family, especially Andreas, who promised he’d come visit her...sometime.
Then she was held high in Maksim’s arms, swept through the mansion to a wing she hadn’t been in before. As she peeked over his shoulder, she found Kassandra and Selene running to keep up with his urgent strides. A beaming Kassandra explained with gestures that they were coming to get her out of the dress. Seemed she’d taken Maksim aside and convinced him to recruit her for the chore.
Inside a suite that Maksim had lavishly prepared for their wedding night, he reluctantly set her down on her feet, thanked Kassandra and Selene then whispered in her ear that he’d be waiting for her inside and strode away.
After a giggling Kassandra and Selene helped her out of the dress, Kassandra worshipped it back onto its hanger and Selene gave her a package that had been waiting on a coffee table. Then with one more hug, both ladies disappeared, leaving her standing in her lacy underwear and high-heeled sandals.
Cali’s hands shook as she opened the package, which Maksim must have commissioned Kassandra to get for her. Inside was the most luxuriously erotic getup she’d ever seen.
Trembling all over with anticipation, she substituted it for her underwear, a dream of brilliant pearl-white stretch lace and satin that cupped her breasts into a deep cleavage and showcased the rest of her to the best advantage.
Unable to wait to see its effect on Maksim, she teetered inside, wishing he hadn’t changed into anything himself, since she’d spent the whole evening dreaming of stripping him out of that costume. Yet part of her was also wishing that he had already disrobed, since she couldn’t wait until she had his flesh beneath her hands and lips.
She entered a bedroom that was spread in gold and azure and lit with what must be a thousand candles. Maksim was at the far end with only those white pants on. His whole body bunched at the sight of her, like a starving predator who’d just spotted the one thing that would slake his hunger.
She almost fell to her knees when he rumbled, “Moya zhena...nakonets.”
My wife. At last.
* * *
Maksim watched the incandescent vision that was his bride. He’d spent the previous night drowning in her. Instead of sating him, it had only roused the beast he’d been keeping on a spiked leash, fueling his addiction to searing levels.
He’d felt her equal craving all through the wedding, her impatience to continue making up for fifteen months of separation and starvation. He’d intended to drag her into the depths of passion the moment she walked in, give her what she needed, invade her, finish her, perish inside her.
Then she had glided in, and he’d called her his wife...and only when he’d said it had it fully registered.
She was his wife.
And what he felt now was...frightening. So much so it brought his old fears crashing down on him, paralyzing him.
But after her own moments of paralysis, when he didn’t go to her, she started walking toward him, looking...celestial. It almost made him regret asking her friend to get her something made to worship her beauty. Her friend had chosen too well.
Then she was against him, running feverish hands and lips over his burning flesh, her eyes eating him up, her body grinding against his, pulling him down to the bed, taking him on top of her. Opening her legs for his bulk, undulating beneath him in a frenzy, she demanded him inside hers, riding her, pleasuring her, fulfilling her.
Her hands tangled in the string tying his hair back, almost tore at it as she tugged at his scalp, the exquisite pain lashing at his barely contained fervor.
Then her fingers
bunched into his hair and she brought his head down to hers, his lips fusing with the fragrant, warm petals of her flesh to breathe a white-hot tremolo into his depths. “Moy muzh.”
His every nerve fired. My husband.
And to have her say it in Russian. That she’d learned the language, and that well, for him...the gratitude he felt was at times...excruciating.
Spiraling, he tried to rise off her, to ration his response. But her pleading litanies to hurry, to take her, now, now, were like hammers smashing his control. Her beloved body quivered beneath his, her cherished face shuddered.
It was too much. He wanted too much. All of her. At once.
His growl sounded frightening in his ears as he sank his teeth where her neck flowed into her shoulder. She jerked and threw her head back, giving him a better bite. He took it. He was a hairbreadth from going berserk.
Then as she gazed up at him through hooded eyes, she made any attempts at curbing his passion impossible. “Show me how much you want me, Maksim.” Her voice reverberated in his brain, dark and deep. Wild. “Brand me as yours, seal our lifelong pact, give me everything...take everything.”
With a grunt of surrender, he freed her silky locks from the high chignon he’d longed to demolish all evening, pulled her head to the bed for his devouring. She bombarded him with a cry of capitulation and command.
He rose to free himself from the confines of his pants, to tear that tormenting figment off her, then hissed in relief when he found her wearing nothing beneath it. His fingers slid between the lips of her core before dipping inside her, finding her flowing with readiness.
Blind with the need to ride her, he locked her thighs over his back, drove her into the mattress with a bellow of conquering lust and embedded himself inside her to her womb.
They arched back. Mouths opened on soundless screams at the potency of the moment. On pleasure too much to bear. Invasion and captivation. Completion. New, searing, overpowering. Every single time.
His roar broke through his muteness as he withdrew. She clutched at him with the tightness of her hot, fluid femininity, her delirious whimpers and her nails in his buttocks demanding his return. He met her eyes, saw everything he needed to live for. He rammed back against her clinging resistance, his home inside her. The pleasure detonated again. Her cry pierced his being. He thrust hard, then harder, until her cries stifled on tortured squeals.
Then she bucked. Ground herself against him. Convulsed around him in furious, helpless rhythms, choking out his name, her eyes streaming with the force of her pleasure.
He rode her to quivering enervation. Then showed her the extent of his need, her absolute hold over him. He bellowed her name and his surrender to her as he again found the only profound release he’d only ever had with her, convulsing in waves of pure culmination, jetting his seed into her depths until he felt he’d dissolved inside her.
Even as he sank into her quivering arms, he was harder than before. Which didn’t matter. He had to let her sleep.
He tried to withdraw. She only wound herself tighter around him, clung to him.
“There will be more and more, soon and always.” He breathed the fire of his erotic promise into her mouth. “Rest now. You’ve been awake for forty-eight hours, and I’ve taxed you in every possible way beyond human endurance.”
She breathed her pleasure inside him, thrust her hips to take him deeper inside her. “I can only sleep if you stay inside me. I can’t get enough of you, moy dorogoy muzh.”
“Neither will I of you...ever.” She was driving him deeper into bondage. And he wouldn’t have it any other way.
He drove back into her and she pulsed her sheath around him until he groaned. “Tormentress. Just wait until you’re rested. I’ll drive you to insanity and beyond.”
In response to his erotic menace, she tossed her arms over her head, arched her vision of a body, thrust her breasts against his chest and purred low with aggressive surrender. Still jerking with the electrocuting release, he turned her, brought her over him, her shudders resonating with his.
“Give me your lips, moya zhena.”
As she gave him what he needed, her lips stilled while fused to his, exhaustion claiming her.
As she finally surrendered to slumber, totally secure and trusting in his arms, he knew.
His resurrected fears were totally unfounded. Even through the inferno of lust, tenderness and giving had permeated him. His feelings weren’t forged in selfishness and dependence but fueled by the need to enrich her life, be the source of her fulfillment. His pleasure lay here, in being hers.
He took her more securely into his containment and surrendered to their union on every level. And to peace.
For the first true time in his life.
Ten
Cali stretched in the depths of utter bliss.
She wanted to never surface, to lie here on top of her Great Russian Wolf forever.
For the past four months since their wedding, she’d gone to sleep like that, after nights of escalating abandon.
But she had to wake up. She’d promised Tatjana to spend the day with her. At least she thought she had. After a night of mind-scrambling pleasure at Maksim’s hands, she wasn’t even sure where she was.
She actually had to open her eyes to make certain they were back in Russia. They’d just come back last night after a taking-care-of-business, apartment-buying stint in New York.
She’d thought this mansion had become her home, but then she’d also felt at home on their first night in their new NYC apartment. If she hadn’t been certain by then, she was now. Anywhere Maksim was would always be home to her.
She propped herself up with palms flat over his chiseled chest to wallow in his splendor.
Unbelievable. That did just sum him up. And every moment of every day with him. She sometimes still did find herself disbelieving this was all really happening, wondered if it was possible she’d ever get used to his...their perfection.
But then why should she? How could she get used to this? Nope. It was impossible. There was nothing to do, and nothing she wanted to do, but live in a state of perpetual wonder.
Just looking at him had her heart trying to burst free of its attachments and her breath refusing to come until she drew it mingled with his beloved scent. So she did.
At the touch of her lips on his, he smiled in his sleep and rumbled, “Lyublyu tebya.”
She caught the precious pledge in an openmouthed kiss.
He instantly stirred, dauntingly aroused, returned the kiss then took it over.
She gasped with pleasure as he swept her around, bore down on her. “Love you more, Maksim.”
“There’s no way you love me more, moye serdtse. I’ve waited all my life for you, knew it the moment I saw you.”
She arched up, opening herself for him. “Same here.”
He rose on his knees and positioned himself at her molten entrance, held her immobile by her hair for his passionate onslaught, the way she loved him to. “Nyet, I’m older, so I don’t only love you more, I’ve loved you longer.”
She cried out with the searing pleasure of his words and his plunge into her body. Their hunger was always too urgent at first. It took only a few gulps of each other’s taste, a few unbridled thrusts to have them convulsing in each other’s arms, the pleasure complete.
After the ecstasy he drove her to demolished her completely, he twisted to lie on his back and draped her over him again, a trembling blanket of sated flesh.
A sigh of contentment shuddered out of him after the burst of exertion and satisfaction.
She raised an unsteady head to savor his beauty. “You’re feeling quite smug
, aren’t you? You think you’ve claimed the More and Longer Loving title for life, don’t you?”
“If this ruffles your feathers too much, I can be persuaded to grant you equal billing in the ‘More’ category. The ‘Longer’ one, alas, is an unchangeable fact of time. Being the spring chick that you are, you just don’t have the creds.”
She drove her hands into the thick, mahogany hair that now fell past his shoulders at her demand, tugged sharply, knowing he loved it when she played rough. “Do you know what happens to condescending wolves, even the one-of-a-kind specimens?”
He stretched beneath her languidly, provocation itself. “Da...they get punished, with even more love and pleasure.”
“Damn straight.” She swooped to devour those maddeningly seductive lips, took him over this time, tormented and inflamed and owned every inch of him until she had him begging her to ride him. And she did. Hard and long, until they both almost shattered with pleasure.
Afterward, tingling with aftershocks, she let him haul her to the shower, where they spent an indeterminable time leisurely soothing and pampering each other.
They’d just exited the bathroom guffawing as he chased her to tickle her when a knock came on the door.
She bolted away from Maksim’s groping hands and started jumping into her clothes. “Leo! Hurry, put something on.”
He picked up his jeans, his smile unfettered. “Our son has an impeccable sense of timing. He lets us feast on each other in peace, then comes to join in for playtime.”
She prodded him along and he shoved himself with difficulty into his jeans, wincing and muttering that only undressing was safe with her around.
Her wide grin of triumph elicited a growled promise of retribution as she rushed to the door.
As soon as she opened it, Leo bolted inside without even looking at her. She laughed. The wily boy was preempting her, wasn’t risking her telling Rosa to take him away for now. And he was after his daddy anyway, his biggest playmate and fan.
