Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 92549 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92549 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
“No!” The word came too fast, too sharp.
Both of them froze.
Travis narrowed his eyes. “Why the hell not?”
I swallowed hard, my mind racing, forcing myself to focus. “Because you never know whose payroll they’re on,” I said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
Because to me, it was.
“The Russian mafia owns cops all over the world. If you call them expecting help, but they’re working for the big guy upstairs? You’re fucked. We’re fucked.”
Travis paled, but John still looked ready to argue.
I didn’t have time for this.
“Just go,” I ordered. “Spend the night somewhere else.”
I bent down, quickly gathering the electrical cords and shoelaces Kostya had used to tie them up.
John grabbed my arm. “What the hell are you going to do?” he demanded.
I ripped free from his grip so fast he barely had time to react. “That’s not your concern.”
“The fucking Russian mob? Who are you, really?” Travis’s voice was sharp, full of suspicion. “We have a right to know.”
I looked up, meeting his gaze dead-on.
“No, you don’t.”
And then I shoved them both toward the door.
Because I had bigger problems to deal with.
“Leave.” I said it again, sharper this time. “Before he wakes up.”
That did the trick.
John and Travis hesitated only a second longer before scrambling to grab their things, throwing on their jackets and stuffing their pockets with their keys and wallets.
The front door slammed behind them.
I barely heard it.
I was already running upstairs.
Kostya was still sprawled out on my bed, motionless.
Still breathing.
Still here.
I ignored the way my hands shook as I untangled the electrical cords and tied him up. The same way he had tied up my roommates.
His wrists and ankles bound tightly behind his back, his body forced into a position he wouldn’t easily get out of.
It wasn’t perfect, but it would buy me time.
I grabbed the mirror again, holding it under his nose, waiting until the glass fogged.
He was still alive.
I sucked in a breath.
And another.
And another.
I backed up against the same wall he had pinned me against, the phantom heat of his body still imprinted on the space. My legs gave out beneath me, and I slid to the floor, dropping my head between my knees.
I just needed to breathe.
Every part of me was screaming to move.
Get up. Get out. Go!
But I couldn’t.
Because my mind wouldn’t stop replaying that kiss.
Over and over, like a fever I couldn’t shake.
If his closeness had turned me on, that kiss had brought me back to life.
I shouldn’t feel this way. Not about him. Not about my sister’s husband.
It had been bad enough when it was just a stupid crush—something I could ignore, something I could outgrow.
But this?
How the fuck was I supposed to get over a kiss like that?
I could still feel him.
The way his hands had moved over my body, possessive, as if he owned me.
And my God—I wanted that to be true.
He hadn’t kissed me as a show of affection.
It had been a claim. A demand.
His lips had tasted like expensive vodka, tobacco, and home, like something sinful wrapped in something inevitable. And I had melted into it. Worse. I had wanted to give him more.
When he asked if I was going to be his good girl, my body had fractured with need.
Fuck.
Those words—just his words—should not have done to me what they did.
I had wanted to drop to my knees and show him just how good I could be.
To feel his hands in my hair, his voice raw with pleasure as he let go, as he gave in to me.
I had never let a man touch me before.
Not like that.
Not like him.
What would he think when he discovered the truth?
It wasn’t because I was saving myself for marriage.
But because I was saving myself for a man like him.
A man who could make me feel safe even when his hands were wrapped around my throat.
A man who could set my body on fire with just a touch.
How could the American boys I lived with ever compare to the Russian businessmen my family worked with? I had spent my life around the real monsters, men who wore tailored suits, who smelled of wealth, power, and the kind of danger that caused my stomach to flip.
Men who took what they wanted.
How was some fuckboy who whined when he got shot in a video game supposed to stack up against that?
He wasn’t.
And I had never wanted any of them.
But I wanted Kostya.
I was ready for him.
Ready to lose myself in every filthy fantasy I had ever had.
I readjusted the ends of Veronika’s shawl under my jacket.
Veronika’s shawl.
The one I wrapped around myself for comfort. The one that reminded me of home and all that I had lost.
And suddenly, the walls crashed down.
What would she say if she knew?
That not only had her husband kissed me, but that I had kissed him back?