15. Andrey

15

ANDREY

She's sitting on the window seat, regarding me with eyes made lighter by the sun pouring through the glass. She breathes evenly. Says nothing. Waits for my reaction.

Until, finally, she concedes that she'll have to speak first if she wants to talk about what the fuck just happened in here.

"Why so quiet? Not a fan of what I've done with the place?"

The careful planning—not to mention the tens of thousands of dollars I spent—seems to have faded into nothing.

Quite literally.

I'm standing in an empty fucking room.

"Where is everything?"

"Gone." She shrugs like she's all easy, breezy sunshine, but I see the fire behind her eyes. The fury. "I donated it all to charity."

"You were the one who dreamed of this place. You designed it. Why would you give it all away?"

"Because I'm not going to be bribed, Andrey." She leans forward, and I notice the cherry pendant that usually hangs around her neck is gone.

For some reason, that pisses me off more than anything else.

I run a hand through my hair, avoiding her eyes so I don't explode. "I can't keep having the same goddamn fight with you over and over again, Natalia."

"And yet, when I tell you I want more freedom, more autonomy—when I tell you I want to freaking leave—you increase my security, shadow my every move, and force me to live under your roof." She rises and glides forward until her feet touch the bare floor. "If you want to stop fighting, you have a weird way of showing it."

"Maybe I wouldn't have enacted all those precautions if they weren't necessary."

"So I'm supposed to just trust you? Here's some news for you, Andrey: I haven't trusted you since the day we fucking met."

She spits the words at me, her breathing coming in harsh bursts, her eyes narrowed. But her anger falters for just a second when I step closer. She pulls back like she thinks I might hurt her, and fuck, maybe she's serious. Maybe she really doesn't trust me.

"I know exactly what's at stake here, lastochka . Considering you were so recently Nikolai's prisoner, you should, too."

I wait for my point to seep into her pretty little head and make some difference—for her to realize how much I don't want her to end up like Maria—but it's like there's an invisible wall between us. No matter what I say, nothing makes any difference.

She lifts her chin. "You're just trying to trap me here."

"Jesus Christ, woman, I was prepared to let you go!"

The furious words explode out of me, but when Natalia responds, she's not meeting fire with fire. It's disdain she gives me instead. Venomous, desert-dry disdain.

"You really expect me to believe that?"

"Do you really think I didn't know about your ‘plan' to escape?" I hiss, moving closer still.

Her breath catches in her throat. Her eyes go wide.

I hold her gaze for a second before I continue. "Mila and Katya didn't have to say a word because Shura was standing just outside the door. I knew from the start that you wanted to leave. And if you don't believe anything else I've said to you, believe this: I was prepared to let you go."

Her breath squeaks out in a single word. "Why?"

A cruel bite of laughter escapes my lips. "Because I failed to protect you. I let you down and you felt that leaving me was the only way to give our children any kind of future. I understood that."

"You would have just let me go?" she breathes, her brows knitting together. "Just like that?"

"No. Not ‘just like that.'" I trail my fingers through a loose strand of hair that hands carelessly down her shoulder. "How could I live with myself without making goddamn certain you would be alright?"

"You were going to watch me." It's not a question, but a revelation. Hoarse and trembling, it sounds like it's an effort for her to talk at all. "That's not letting me go, Andrey."

I shake my head. "You would never have known we were watching. You could have lived the quiet suburban life you wanted… but from the shadows, I'd make sure you were always, always safe."

She searches my face, hunting for the lie, but I stare back at her, waiting for the truth to sink in.

"I was fully prepared to let you go, little bird. But Yelena—" She flinches at the name. If I were a weaker, less trained man, I'd probably do the same. "Yelena forced me to realize something: just because I was prepared to let you go doesn't mean everyone else would. Nikolai, Viktor, Slavik—they're all out for blood. And the best way to draw my blood is to go after yours."

My fingers curl around her infuriatingly bare throat, and I pull her into me until we're flush. Until her soft curves meld with my hard lines. She's trembling, but she doesn't fight. If anything, she arches into me ever so slightly.

"You're stubborn and desperate for independence, but your life is tied to mine now, lastochka . For better or for worse."

She shakes her head. "There has to be another way."

"There is no other way," I warn. "Don't you see?"

"No. As a matter of fact, I don't."

"Like I said: stubborn." Scowling, I draw my thumb over her full lower lip. I'm so hard it aches. "It seems you don't want to believe that I have your best interests at heart."

She swallows. The air between us goes taut.

"So I'll just have to show you."

Her eyes widen with alarm, but before she can get out her rebuttal, I silence her with my lips.

She lifts her arms—though whether to grab a hold of me or push me away, I have no fucking clue—but I pin them back to her sides. Parting her legs with my knee, I grind her against my thigh until she's trembling. I feel her warmth through my pants, and it's been so fucking long that I'm in danger of coming just from the mere thought of being inside of her.

She moans, and I part her lips with my tongue, sweeping in to taste her desperate breathing. Whatever she may say, she's been waiting for this moment as long as I have.

Her teeth bite down on my tongue, but I pin her to the wall and let her take out her anger on me. I don't so much as wince when she leaves her marks all over my body with bites and clawed nails.

I've got two fistfuls of her blouse, ready to rip it to shreds, when Natalia suddenly plants her hands on my chest and gnaws a chunk out of my shoulder.

"What the fuck?" I look down at my shoulder where the bloody imprints of her teeth glisten in the sunlight.

Part of me is stunned.

Another part—one below the belt—fucking loved it.

"I'm no pushover, Andrey." She eyes me like cornered prey. "You can't just kiss me and force me to forget."

"That's not what I'm trying to?—"

"You're trying to fuck me into submission. If it's not money, it's sex. That's how you operate, isn't it?"

I'm on her again with a snarl. I shove her pants down around her thighs, and there's not a whisper of space between us now. We're sealed head to toe, my breath mingling with hers as I work a finger between her legs. "As usual, you don't understand the bigger picture. I'm trying to save you—from my enemies. From my sins. From yourself ."

"Then who is—" She whimpers as I push one finger into her and then a second. She falls against my chest, helpless. "Then who is going to save me from you?"

I withdraw my hand, loving the disappointment that flashes across her face when she looks up at me. "No one, lastochka ."

Then I free my dick from my pants and drive into her heat.

Whatever protest she had planned, it's gone now. I drive it out of her with slow, deep strokes that feel like coming home. I fuck her into the wall, clawing at her hips and her waist, trying to claim as much of her as I can.

I want to make her feel good.

I want to make sure she has what she needs.

With every thrust, the need to be everything to this woman consumes me.

While she's caught in a moan, I bring my lips to her ear. "I'm not going to let you hurt yourself anymore, Natalia . If you won't take care of yourself, I'll do it for you."

I suck on her earlobe and taste the soft skin of her neck as we come together again and again. Her head falls back against the wall, her mouth opens in a sigh, and I can see my blood on the inside of her lip.

I fuck her harder until her face is burning with desire and her eyes are hazy. Then, I curl my fingers around her throat.

"You're going to talk to someone," I tell her. "You will take your meds. You're going to start taking your mental health seriously."

"Andrey…"

"I'm going to teach you how to fight and shoot," I continue, thrusting harder, more urgently, my hands grazing over her breasts. "I'm going to teach you how to defend yourself."

I grab her ass and hoist her up, lacing her legs around my waist as I delve even deeper inside her. "You are not a victim, Natalia. You are a fucking fighter. It's time the world knew."

She gasps. "Andrey…!"

The sound of my name on her lips is what does it. My grip on control slips, and I plow into her until the rest of the world falls away. Nothing matters except the way we fit together—the way she quivers around me.

With a scream, she comes, strangling the orgasm from my cock.

Just when I thought I'd experienced it all.

The high lasts an eternity. When it finally lets us go, her knees are weak. I have to set her down on the window seat. Her clothes are scraps, but she tries to pull them around her chest and her bump.

With every passing second, she's growing more and more distant. I see it happening.

This solved nothing.

"This nursery wasn't meant as a manipulation, Natalia."

She forces her gaze to mine. "No, it was a gift. A gesture. But that's not what I want. It's never what I wanted." A sob bursts from between her swollen lips. "I wanted your time. I wanted you. "

Should it bother me that she's speaking in the past tense?

Before I can decide, she leaves me with one parting blow. "Maybe I'm not the only one who needs someone to talk to."