Chapter 14 - Alexei

Dammit, that girl has me completely obsessed with her.

Fuck.

I've had sex before.

I've been with women.

But Clara.

She blew my mind.

I can't get over how she made me feel. How incredible that was.

She is just—she is indescribably incredible.

And I want more of her.

I spend most of the time thinking about how amazing it was to be with her and wondering when I will have the chance to experience that again.

I have to be patient, though.

Clara has finally started to soften and open up to me.

I am cautiously optimistic, but I know I have a lot of making up to do after how badly the kidnapping went. I really didn't mean for her to get hurt or that scared, but now that she is slowly letting me get closer, I have a chance to fix all of that.

I am in town at the moment, stocking up on some food, but really, I came here to fetch something that I ordered online for her. It's a package I put together.

I want to see her smile and show her how special I think she is.

"Please sign here." The guy behind the counter slides the box across to me along with a slip of paper.

I pick up the pen and scribble my name across the line at the bottom of the page.

"Enjoy," he says, sounding like he hasn't enjoyed a single day of this entire week.

"Thanks."

I lift the box with one arm. It's big, filled with a rather wide assortment of things.

Opening the car door, I slide it into the back seat and grin.

She's been stuck inside for such a long time, trapped in that house. I really hope that a fun present will brighten her day.

Then, before heading home, I stop at the local food market and fetch the basics we need for the house as well as all of the ingredients to make a Thai red curry with pork chive dumplings. She mentioned the other day that she likes spicy foods, so I want to make her one of my favorite dishes.

I'll make her a miso seafood soup too, and a few spring rolls.

We can make a night of it.

I grin again.

Date night. With the most beautiful girl in the world.

My girl.

I think it will be a long time before Clara views these as date nights, but I'm hopeful. Outside the food market, I purchase a beautiful bunch of bright yellow sunflowers and carry everything back to the car. It's time to head back to Clara. Home.

I never thought of that place as home, but now that Clara is here it is starting to feel that way.

How do I make her want to stay?

Is that ever going to be possible?

I have a lot of making up to do to get her on my side—to get her to fully trust me.

When I arrive at home, just before I unlock the door to head inside, I have this knot in my stomach. It's fear—fear that she won't be here. That she might have found a way to get out and escape.

The same fear haunts my thoughts constantly, telling me that she is only pretending to enjoy my company—just biding her time, waiting for the exact right moment to get away.

I push the door open, my arms filled with the shopping I've done in town. The box containing her gifts is just outside the door where I placed it.

"Clara?" I call out into the house, then pause to listen.

"Coming," her voice drifts down from upstairs, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

I unload the groceries in the kitchen then fetch the box from outside.

When Clara comes skipping down the stairs in a pale blue dress, light-footed and looking happy, I am standing at the bottom of the stairs holding the flowers and her gift.

"You look gorgeous," I say, giving myself a moment to take in how beautiful she looks.

"What's this?" She tilts her head and narrows her eyes towards me as though skeptical, but the grin on her face is one of curiosity.

I hold the flowers towards her.

"This is for you."

"Why?" she asks, taking them from my hands with a nervous giggle.

Her cheeks flush a rosy shade of pink and a gorgeous smile plays across her lips.

"And this," I say, gesturing to the box under my other arm.

"That? What in the world—"

Her eyes are now glittering with curiosity and I know I have caught her attention.

"Come, you can open it in the living room." I carry the box through to the sofa and put it on the coffee table for her. She giggles again, excited as she follows me.

I take the sunflowers from her hands, but she quickly stops me before I walk away to put them in water. She grabs my wrist and pulls the flowers back towards her, dipping her nose into them she breathes in. "They're so beautiful," she smiles.

"Wait for me before you open it. I'll be back in a second."

She takes a seat on the sofa and I glance over my shoulder at her as I walk out of the living room. She is doing a little hip wiggle, an excited dance. Her face is beaming like a kid on Christmas morning. I had no idea that a gift would mean this much to her.

Hurrying back to the living room, I sit next to her.

"You can open it now."

"What is it?" she grins at me, shifting to the edge of her seat and pulling the box closer on the coffee table.

I crack up laughing. "Why would I tell you? Doesn't that defeat the whole purpose of a surprise gift?"

She rolls her eyes playfully.

Wiggling the lid of the big box, she lifts it off. As per my request, each item is wrapped in tissue paper.

She lifts the first item out, carefully unwrapping it.

It is a luxurious skin care set. Toner, day cream, night cream and serum. She squeezes a little of the serum onto her fingertip and rubs it in the back of her hand. "Oh my goodness, it feels amazing."

Next she opens the perfume.

She dabs the wand on her wrist, sniffs it, closes her eyes for a moment and then holds her hand out towards me. I gently take her wrist in my hand and lean forward to breathe in her scent.

White jasmine. It smells incredible on her.

Each gift she opens, she looks even more excited about.

A cozy, cotton knitted jacket, a summer dress, new shoes, makeup, books to read and books to write in, a gorgeous rose gold watch that suits the tone of her skin, jewelry and chocolates and hair care.

By the time she is done unwrapping everything, she is sitting on the floor, having pushed the coffee table all the way backwards, the gifts spread out around her on the Persian rug.

"Alexei, this is—this is so much—it's so amazing. I don't understand why you spoiled me like this."

I shrug, then shake my head. I wanted to play it cool, brush it off, but that would be me holding back something I shouldn't hold back.

"I want you to know I am sorry—about the kidnapping thing. And that you didn't deserve that. I also just want to see you smile. I want to spoil you, Clara."

She pushes herself up to her knees and wiggles over to me. Moving between my legs where I am sitting on the sofa, she crawls onto my lap, wraps her arms around my neck and pulls me into a very tight hug.

I slide my arms around her waist, lowering my face into her neck, letting the warm scent of her steal me away for a moment.

My body is alive with surges of electricity that rush through me, tingling along my skin. With her this close to me, it is hard to focus on anything else, anything other than her—her body, her smell, her breathing.

"No one has ever done something like this for me." Her voice sounds muffled as she is squished against my chest.

"Didn't your uncle buy you presents? For your birthday or holidays?"

"He did, but it wasn't personal. It was sort of…obligation, rather than anything he put thought into. Everything you put together in that box—they were all things that I would have chosen for myself. I don't know how you managed to get it so right, but it's like—it's like you really know me, better than anyone before…."

Her voice trails off as though her words are confusing her.

I smile as I squeeze her a little tighter. I don't want to admit it, but the reason I know those are all things she likes is because I had been following her for months before I finally kidnapped her on a whim.

She leans back and looks into my eyes.

"Honestly, Alexei, thank you. That was really thoughtful of you. It means a lot."

My heart begins to soften under her gaze, and I have to force myself to look away from her for fear that she will be able to see straight through me into my thoughts.

I clear my throat and stand up, lifting her with me as she laughs, clinging on to my neck.

"I have a really great dinner planned for us. Now, you have a choice; you can relax, have a glass of wine and enjoy a quiet afternoon while I cook, or you can come and make a big mess in the kitchen with me—and have a glass of wine, of course."

"I have to admit, the mess sounds like a lot more fun."

"I was hoping you'd say that." I carry her through to the kitchen, not letting her down even though she is blushing the whole way. I slide her onto the kitchen counter and hand her a bottle of wine and two glasses.

Every time her body is close to mine, I struggle to step away.

"You may do the honors while I start unpacking these groceries."

She reaches over to the drawer next to her and pulls out the bottle opener.

I watch her while she fiddles with the wine bottle, her tongue just poking out the corner of her mouth and her brows knotted with concentration.

"Ha," she declares when she gets the cork to pop up.

I chuckle.

She is so fucking cute.

She glances at me. "What's funny?" she asks, clueless as to how beautiful she is.

"Do you want the Thai red curry spicy or spicy?"

"Jee, those are two really different choices. I think—I think I'll go with spicy?"

"Excellent choice. I knew you were a girl after my own heart."

I start pulling apart the bok choi and rinsing off the bright, fresh green leaves.

"So, did you even celebrate birthdays? I mean—with your uncle?"

"Yes, but they were always dinners or parties with his clients or friends. He would arrange these elaborate parties and I think the entire purpose of them was to show off how awesome he was at being an uncle—when in actual fact he didn't even give a shit about whether I was having fun or not. I mean, I don't think it is fair of me to complain. He took care of me. There was no one else who stepped up to do that. He raised me after my parents died. I should be grateful, not talking badly about him."

She pulls her lips tight, I can see the guilt in her eyes.

Walking over to her, I place my finger beneath her chin, lifting her face up so that I can see those gorgeous brown eyes.

"Clara, just because he took you in doesn't mean he had a right to treat you the way he did. You deserve the world. One day—" I stop talking. One day, I want to show her that.

"One day what?" she asks softly, her eyes piercing into me.

"One day, you will see that you deserve more than the bare minimum that he gave you."

She smiles gently and nods against my hand. "One day," she replies.

I step away from her and pick up my wine. My body is misbehaving again, and if I don't get some distance between us, I am going to be fucking her on the kitchen counter. But I can't—I can't just assume that because we had sex once, she will allow that to happen again.

I want her to make the first move.

If she wants to.

I toss a little butter into a pan and throw the green onion and chives into it, flicking the pan to toss it all together.

"When did you learn to cook?" she asks, wiggling along the counter to get a better view of what I am up to.

"I don't know, I have just always enjoyed it. I don't like to follow recipes, though—too many rules. I like to make things up as I go along. Create my own versions of things."

She grins, watching me closely. "And birthdays?"

"What about birthdays?"

"You have a lot of brothers, and your sister—what were birthdays like in your family?"

I laugh as a memory comes to me.

"Birthdays are incredible in my family. We always go out of our way to try and make the day as special as possible for the birthday person. You know one year—I think I was turning eleven—I got it into my head that I wanted a pet duck. I swear. A duck. I was sort of obsessed with the idea."

She is already giggling.

"What happened?" she laughs.

"Leon, Yefim and Oleg went on this mission to try and find me a duck. Of course, I didn't know it was happening—this was all in secret. And while they were doing that, Anya used old boxes, cutting them up to make a really cool duck house with pink blankets inside and all."

"Did you get a duck?" she asks, watching me grin and shake my head.

"Oh, I got…something." I flick the pan again, then lift it off the heat and set it to the side. "My brothers and sister were so excited that they managed to pull this whole thing off, they woke me up at one minute past midnight on my birthday. They woke me up with the most excited bubble of chaos. They shoved this shoebox into my hands shouting happy birthday—Anya was standing next to this giant cardboard mess that I didn't know was a duck house—anyways, I opened the box and there it was. This tiny, fluffy, most gorgeously beautiful little duck. My heart just exploded, man. I was so happy. Honestly. I couldn't believe they had done this for me. I called him Spike the Duck."

Her head is tilted to the side as she looks at me through narrowed eyes. "But?"

"But, over time, we realized it wasn't a duck at all. It was an emu."

I crack up laughing, remembering the chaos.

"An emu?" she says, shocked. "Aren't they really big?"

"You know, they are. They grow to almost five foot nine. A bird. As tall as me. Well, I was eleven, so this bird was much taller than me."

She can't stop laughing. "What happened to Spike the Duck ?"

"What do you mean what happened to Spike?"

"Well, what did you do with him?"

"I kept him, of course. He was way better than any duck I could ever have dreamed of. My brothers and I would run around the neighborhood and Spike the Duck would come with us on his harness. Man, he was the best pet I ever had."

"An emu." She is laughing so hard she is spilling wine.

"Yeah. I miss him."

"It sounds like you and your brothers had a lot of adventures growing up."

"Oh, definitely. Anya too. We would all get into a lot of trouble. I still have a lot more adventures I want to go on, though."

"I wasn't really allowed to do anything weird. My uncle was super strict. I spent a lot of time focusing on schoolwork because it was something I could control—and I was good at it. I got really great grades. I just didn't have a whole lot of fun, basically."

"Do you feel like you missed out?"

"I feel like there is a lot I still want to experience. I want to have adventures. I want to get into trouble sometimes."

I walk over to her, running my hands over her thighs, pushing her legs open a little as I step between them. She looks up at me, her face soft, expectant, as she stares into my eyes.

"I'll take you on adventures, little one. You and me. We can go on all of the adventures together," I say to her.

She smiles, and it brightens her eyes.

I can't help it. I know I told myself I was going to wait for her to make the first move, but I simply cannot help myself. I wrap my hand around the back of her neck and pull her face towards mine, pressing my mouth over hers.

She lets out a soft moan and my cock goes rock-hard.

Her hands are already pulling my shirt buttons open, and that is enough for me—that is all the encouragement I need. My hands run up her thighs, pushing the dress up over her hips.

She moans against my mouth again as I grab her ass and pull her to the edge of the counter.