15. Viviana

"Where do you think you're going?"

The overwhelming smell of mint and cedar hits me before my eyes adjust. Mikhail is only a few inches away from my face, so I have to tip my head back to see all of him.

He's wearing a black shirt that hugs his large biceps and gray sweatpants that somehow fit him better than the suit he's been wearing all day. And his face is… sparkly? I might be hallucinating.

Before my mind can spin off in some Twilight-esque vampire fantasy, I realize Mikhail is sweating.

"Were you working out?" I blurt.

"I was… until I saw a hobo lurking in the hallway outside Dante's room." He kicks at my makeshift stick-and-bedsheet suitcase. "What in the hell is this?"

"Someone hid my actual suitcase."

"Because you don't need it," he growls. "You aren't going anywhere."

Before I can argue, Mikhail throws me over his shoulder and carries me back into my room. I pound his annoyingly muscular back with my fists.

"Put me down!"

No sooner than the words are out of my mouth, he drops me on the bed.

I flop and flail like a fish for a few seconds before I get my land legs and scramble to the edge of the mattress—only to find a wall of hard, sweaty flesh there blocking my path.

"You can't keep us here," I snap, knowing full well he absolutely can and will. "This is kidnapping."

"I think it's actually abduction."

"Same thing."

"Not in the eyes of the law," he says, his own eyes chilling me to the bone.

I cross my arms. "What kind of person knows those legal definitions?"

"The kind who can get away with them," he retorts. "You aren't going anywhere."

I shove against his chest. "You smug, cocky?—"

In one move, Mikhail grabs my arms, spins me onto my stomach, and?—

The sound of his hand cracking against my ass steals the breath from my lungs, the thoughts from my head, and the "what the hell" from my "are you doing"?

I snap my head around, eyes so wide I'm sure my face will be stuck like this forever. Permanent shock and horror for the rest of my days, like a gargoyle with a messy bun.

"Did you just spank me?!" I scream.

Instead of answering my rhetorical question, he does it again. Pushes me down with the flat of one hand between my shoulder blades. Rears back. CRACK.

Hand, meet ass. Ass, meet hand.

Pain, meet pleasure. Pleasure, meet pain.

"Get off of me!" I wiggle to get free, but Mikhail silently bends me over the edge of the mattress and spanks me a third time.

The force drives me into the bed, grinding me against the edge of the mattress. Heat that has nothing at all to do with how much it stings blooms low in my belly. My back arches all on its own, that traitorous little bitch.

When his palm slaps against me the next time, a soft moan forces its way out of my lips.

Suddenly, Mikhail backs away, panting. In an effort to look like I'm not the world's horniest masochist, I flip over and slide to a human puddle on the floor. Only to find myself eye level with Mikhail's gray sweatpants, which are doing absolutely nothing to hide the significant erection he's sporting.

I gasp and look up at him. "You liked that!"

Even from down here, his dark eyes shine with a light all their own. "Am I supposed to deny it?"

"You're supposed to pretend you're not a fucking psychopath," I hiss. "You kidnapped—No, I'm sorry, abducted me—and now you're getting your rocks off by spanking me. Red fucking flag, Mikhail. I guess I should have known. It runs in the family."

In the blink of an eye, Mikhail rips me off the floor and back on the bed. He stands between my spread legs, his hands on my thighs. His thumbs trace up my inner leg slowly, inching towards the pulsing ache at my center.

God, it's been a long, long time.

"I could check and see if you liked it, Viviana." He spends time saying my name. He savors it like a decadent dessert. "I'm sure I'll find you dripping for me. Don't think I didn't hear the way you moaned."

I want to deny it. I want to stick my tongue out at him like a tantruming child and tell him I'm as dry as the fucking Dust Bowl.

But there's no point. If I push him, he'll check. I know he will. Then he'll find the evidence of how much I liked him touching me.

None of that is the problem. The problem is that he'll assume wanting him is the same as wanting to be with him. He'll assume I want this house and this world and this life.

I don't.

Not for me or sure as hell not for my son.

"Sue me; I moaned," I admit. "But touching isn't something we ever had trouble with. It's how we got into this mess in the first place, actually. It's everything else we struggle with."

"There is nothing else."

I snort. "Of course you'd say that. The man who kidnapped a woman and her child with less than five words spoken is bad at communicating? Who would have guessed?!"

"I didn't kidnap your child. I kidnapped mine."

I sit up, my legs tightening around Mikhail's hips, and jab him in the chest. "He's mine. And nothing you can say is ever going to convince me to lie down and let you destroy his life. I'm not going to let you use him like some bartering chip. I'll never stop running and I'll never stop fighting and I'll?—"

"Get yourself killed," he snarls, interrupting. "You want me to communicate? Fine. You are the mother of the one and only heir to the Novikov Bratva. It can be a position of power if you accept it. If not, it's a liability."

I know how this world works, so I know just how right he is. Women have been killed for getting in the way of their children inheriting their birthright. I've heard stories about it. Girls who ran off with their secret heirs only to turn up dead once the father found out. Those stories have been haunting me to sleep every night for the last five years.

"You'll kill me?" I challenge.

Mikhail's jaw clicks. "Dante loves you. You're his whole world. I would never do anything to harm him."

"Except rip him out of his school and his house and his routine," I fire back. "Sorry, but you've been in his life for an afternoon and your track record is already shit."

"I'm his father. I want to take care of him."

"That's what my father said before he literally sold me to a madman. But you already know how that ended up."

He knows parts of it. Not all of it.

Mikhail doesn't know exactly how deep my father's control ran. If he thinks selling me off to Trofim for a reputation boost is the worst of it, he needs to get a hell of a lot more creative.

No matter what, I won't let anyone treat my son the way I was treated. Not while I'm alive to stop them.

So I need to stay alive.

"Promise me…" I lick my lips, trying to think of the right words to say. What concessions could possibly make this situation livable? "Promise me that you won't hurt him."

"Done," Mikhail says without even pausing to think about it.

"Don't just say that. I need to know that you actually mean it."

Mikhail tips his chin down to meet my eyes. A strand of dark hair falls over his forehead and my stomach flips. But I ignore it and focus on the words coming out of his mouth… which is very close to mine. Too close, probably.

"Dante is my heir, Viviana. He will have the full protection of the Novikov Bratva and my full protection."

"Isn't that the same thing?" I breathe, staring at his lips while I wait for a response.

He shakes his head slowly. "The Bratva is an extension of me. But it isn't me." His voice softens and I swear it's almost musical. "So I give you my word as pakhan and as Dante's father that I'll keep him safe."

What would it be like to be with Dante's father? To be with the version of Mikhail who loves my son and gets off on spanking me without all of the fucking baggage attached?

I fist my hands in my lap before I do something stupid like run my fingers through his hair. It's just hard to think about anything else when he's standing between my legs.

"Fine," I croak, clearing my throat. "I won't run. We'll stay, but… But I'm his primary parent. I'm the only parent he's ever had and I should be the default. You get him for Bratva stuff, but I get him for everything else. And I don't want you to be alone with him."

"No."

The response is so fast and so final that I almost think I imagined it. But when I look up into his face, I know I didn't.

"What do you mean, ‘no'? You're going to refuse everything I said just like that? Do you take a second to consider literally anything or do you always shoot straight from the hip?"

"I don't need a second to consider a bullshit offer. You want me to interact with my son under your supervision and only when it concerns the Bratva. I say no. Fuck no, actually. Hell fucking no."

It's not lost on me that I'm disappointed that the father of my child wants to be involved. The world feels upside down right now.

"Well, I can't promise you any more than that. That"s all I'm willing to give."

"Whether you approve of it or not, Dante is my son. He's going to live here in this house with me as my son. He's going to inherit the Bratva I build for him as my son."

"And where does that leave me?" I try to push Mikhail away, but he doesn't give me an inch. I'm forced to face off with him while my legs are still wrapped around his hips. "I know what it's like for mistresses in this world. I saw the flowers in your office; I'm sure you have an army of ass on the side if you aren't already married. I'm not going to sit on the bench in your harem while you steal my son from me."

His nostrils flare. His eyes are black. There's desire written all over his face, but I'm positive it has more to do with the desire to spank me than anything else. Poor Mikhail probably isn't used to his stable of women pushing back.

"There is no harem. I don't want you to be my mistress."

"Then what do you want?" I snap.

"I want you to be my wife!" he roars.

I fall back, catching myself on my elbows, jaw flopping open in sheer shock.

Mikhail jerks away from me and runs a hand through his hair. His jaw flexes as he grinds his teeth together.

"I'm sorry, you… you want me to be your wife?"

He can't be serious. He isn't.

He turns to face me, his expression wiped clean. His eyes are cold and distant. "I want my son with me. Dante is staying here no matter what. Either you can marry me and stay, too, or you leave."

"Leave?" I reach for the escape hatch. "We can leave? You'll let us?—"

"You can leave," he clarifies. "Dante is staying."

I can leave—without my son. Either I live here with Mikhail as his wife or I leave my son behind.

That isn't an option. There is no future for me without Dante. There's no life without him. I can't leave him here alone. I won't.

"I'll give you the night to think it over," Mikhail says, as if he hasn't already sealed my fate.

Then he walks away, leaving my bedroom door wide open behind him.