Chapter 18 - Fiona

"Okay, am I fucking crazy, or were midterms brutal this term?"

Anya's eyes are wide in the mirror, and she glances at me, waiting for me to confirm that this was one of the hardest mid-terms ever. The truth is that it was, and it makes me even more worried about finals in just a month and a half.

"You're taking twenty-one credits," I laugh, trying to get my shoe on as I glance up at Anya, who's carefully taking the curlers out of her hair. "Of course, that was brutal."

Anya is taking twenty-one, and I'm only taking eighteen, but I still barely managed to scrape by. When I expressed my stress about the whole thing, Boris made himself scarce, claiming I had a hard time studying with him in the room.

Which wasn't exactly not true.

"Okay, but my French teacher didn't have to be such a bitch about my essay topic," Anya says, tipping her head to put in a pair of dangling earrings. "I wanted to talk about the Corsica! How was I supposed to know she's scared of the mafia?"

I sputter, laughing loudly at the irony of that—being afraid of the mafia and having a member of the Bratva in your class. Even if Anya isn't threatening herself, she sure has a lot of muscle behind her.

"So, just stick Boris on her," I mutter, finally pulling my shoe on. Anya glances at me through the mirror, pausing in pursing her lips to touch up her lipstick.

"Right," she says, rolling her eyes. "As much as I wish I could, I don't think it's fair for her to lose her job over it. Some people are just bad professors."

"You can leave her a bad rating," I say, holding my hand up. Anya caps her lipstick and turns, grasping my hand and pulling me to my feet. I'm wearing a black leather skirt and a dark, sparkling top that's cut low in the back. I've always been proud of my back and arms—toned from a decade of working out—and this is the perfect top to show them off.

"I plan to," Anya says, "but if this mid-term grade drops me down to a B, I'm going to be pissed. My four-point-oh, right down the drain."

Anya grabs her bag, and we head out to her car—a brand-new black Volkswagen Beetle. I laughed the first time I saw it, which resulted in Anya not giving me a ride anywhere for two straight weeks.

"I wanted pink," she'd said, crossing her arms. "But it's like, some sort of Family policy that we all have to drive black cars for some reason."

"Because it's intimidating," I'd laughed, "the little black bug."

Now, we climb inside, and Anya weaves through the Las Vegas traffic, getting us to Noch in record time.

"Your brother should install some sort of safe driving device in here," I say, stumbling out and pretending like I need to go to the trashcan. Anya's driving does, admittedly, make me a little nauseous, but acting like I need to get sick is just dramatic flare.

"Fuck you," Anya says sweetly, using her phone to pay for parking before we head inside. We walk past the long line of people waiting to get into the club, and the bouncer takes one look at us before letting us in, lifting the matte black cord so we can enter.

Inside, the club is bouncing with energy. Boris said he's thinking about inviting the guest, D.J., to come on full-time since he seems to have just the right energy for Noch.

It's been a few weeks since the Family reunion, and things between Boris and I have been steady. He and his brothers still leave the room to talk about important Family matters, but he will sometimes give me little nuggets of information when we're in bed together.

I think of last week and how he'd told me of his plan to deal with James Allard. Things have been quiet on the French front for a while, but that makes Boris more uneasy.

He told me his plan was to strike the Allards once, to get even and to warn them away from taking any more action against the Milovs. Then, Boris plans to go through with the arms deal that went so wrong the first time.

Last week, before his study-imposed absence, we'd slept together in his bedroom, having mind-blowing sex before falling asleep together.

Every night, after he falls asleep, I whisper I love you into the pillow, waiting for the day when he might say it to me first.

When we're right in the middle of the throng, Anya stops, grabs my hands, and dances with me. Soon, plenty of guys and girls danced with and around us, all grinding and gyrating to the same beat.

After the long, exhausting week of presentations and exams, it feels good to let the stress out. Then, I look up and spot Boris above the crowd, leaning against a rail and chatting with someone.

The someone is one of the most gorgeous women I've ever seen—with long, silky black hair and cat-eye makeup so sharp it's like she applied it with a dagger. She's leaning casually on the rail with Boris, looking so steady and professional in her stiletto heels.

She smiles at him, twirling a piece of hair around her finger.

"Who the hell is that?" I ask, pointing at the woman. Anya follows the gesture, her eyes searching until she lands on the woman I'm talking about.

"Oh," she says, shaking her head. "That's Miranda Lu. She's been working with the family forever . She's like, into weapons or something. I'm not 100% sure what it is that she does, but if Boris is talking to her, he might be arranging another arms deal."

I'm not sure Anya is even supposed to know about the arms deal, but I'm glad she does. Otherwise, I might start to be jealous of the woman who's just placed her hand on Boris's forearm. She's laughing daintily at something he just said, tucking her hair behind her ear.

Boris is funny—I know that. But he's not that funny. This woman is laughing it up to get Boris to pay more attention to her, and I feel something itchy and uncomfortable roll through my body.

Jealousy. It's not something I'm used to feeling, so it takes me a moment to identify it.

Besides the whole fake marriage thing and calling me his wife and his girl in front of his family, Boris hasn't actually asked me to be his girlfriend or to marry him for real. For all I know, he comes to the club every weekend to have his fun.

I've been so busy this week, cramming and finishing projects, that I haven't seen or been with Boris in at least a few days. Is that what he does when he comes here? Gets off with another woman?

I feel my face get hot.

Well, two can play that game.

"Hey, there," I say, sidling up next to a man who's been eyeing me for at least twenty minutes. He looks like he can't believe his luck, and Anya throws me a confused look, but I don't care. I start to dance on him, fitting my hips against his, feeling as he gets harder and harder behind me.

The man's hands roam my body. He flattens a palm against my stomach and pulls me into him, breathing in my hair. When I glance up, I see that my tactic is working.

Boris is standing at the rail, the woman still talking to him, but his eyes are on me. I turn, facing the man I'm dancing with and pressing our bodies together. His hands go to my ass. I run a hand through my hair, tossing it over my shoulder.

When I turn around again to grind on my dance partner, Boris has disappeared from the railing, and so has the mystery woman. I grin at how well it's working and see Boris edging his way into the crowd, looking furious.

"Time to go!" I say to Anya, squealing and grabbing her hand, pulling her away from the center of the crowd.

"Where are we going?" she asks, laughing, until she looks over her shoulder and sees Boris, frustrated and trying to muscle his way through the guests to get to us. "Damn, Fiona, do you always have to fuck with him?"

I grin.

"He had it coming! Did you see the way he was flirting with that woman?"

"First of all, Miranda is like fifty years old," Anya laughs as I tug her along. "And second, she flirts with everyone. I'm sure Boris wasn't flirting back."

"Doesn't matter," I counter as we finally break free of the dance floor. Anya's wrists breaks free of my grasp as Boris emerges, grabbing her, then growling in frustration when he realizes he got the wrong girl.

I wave to him just before taking off down the hallway.

"You two are ridiculous ," I hear Anya mutter, but the rest of her sentence breaks away. I'm running at full speed down the hallway, my breath mixing with laughter, when I hear Boris coming after me, pushing people out of his way.

He may be bigger and stronger than me, but I'm faster than him.

I dash through the kitchens and back into the nightclub, blinking at the change in lighting. When I slide behind the bar, I fall to my hands and knees, holding up a folded twenty to the bartender.

"Double if you keep me hidden," I whisper just before I hear Boris approach.

"Hey," he says, sounding only slightly out of breath. "Tucker, be honest with me—your job depends on it. Are you hiding—"

"Yup," Tucker, the traitor, says, and I launch out of my hiding spot, erupting into giggles as I push through the staff exit and run down another hallway.

"Fiona," Boris growls, and when I turn to run down another hallway, I realize it's a dead-end. If Boris was a real attacker, this is the part where I would turn and fight, but I know he's not actually going to hurt me, so I slip into a closet at the end of the hall just before he rounds the corner.

Slowly, I back into the corner of the closet, my hand over my mouth to keep from making noise. It's so dark that it takes my eyes a moment to adjust, but I can hear Boris in the hallway, opening and closing doors.

"Fiona," he whispers, and it sounds like it's coming from right next to me. A shiver runs down my spine. "There's nowhere to go. If you give yourself up now, I'll go easy on you."

I don't want him to go easy on me. When the door to the closet opens, and Boris is standing there in silhouette, his massive body rising and falling with the force of his breath, I feel my core tighten.

Who knew being chased could turn me on this much?

"Got you," he whispers, closing the door behind himself and stepping into the closet with me. I feel my back hit the wall, and I let out a little gasp.

Boris is on me the next moment, our lips fusing together, tongues sliding over one another. It's like music, harmony, the way we move, our bodies immediately sensing what the other wants.

When Boris puts his hands under my ass, I immediately jump up, allowing him to lift me so I can wrap my legs around his.

"Did it feel good?" Boris asks his mouth right next to my ear. His hand is already traveling down, brushing over my panties, which are soaked from the chase. "Having that man against you?"

"Not as good as you feel, Bor-y," I breathe, and he presses against me, making my entire body shake.

"Just so you know," Boris says, "you signed that asshole up for a beating. How does that make you feel?"

"I saw him groping some other girls, even when they told him to stop," I say, blinking through the dark, trying to make out Boris's features, but I can't. I only have his body, his hands, his voice, with which to map him. "Why do you think I picked him?"

Boris growls, and I feel him hardening against me.

"What should your punishment be for letting another man touch you?" Boris asks, smashing me against the wall so my breath comes out all at once.

"What's your punishment for letting that woman touch you?" I throw right back, which makes him chuckle low in his chest, the rumble of that rolling through my body and converting to need.

"Fiona," he says, "you do know that I haven't been with anyone else, right?"

I close my mouth. I didn't know that. But I do now, and it sends a wave of warmth through me. Somehow, knowing that he's been with nobody but me makes me even hotter for him.

"I have a few ideas for the punishment," I say, practically whimpering when he rocks his cock against me through my panties. The real punishment would be if Boris stepped away right now, leaving me panting and wet in this closet, but he won't.

He wants me too much, which is evident by how he reaches down and rips my panties right off me.