He sent the most sinister, most triumphant smile my way, and my hands grew clammy.
“Stand,” he ordered after returning the non-contraband items to my purse.
I rose to my feet, nails digging into my palms. I wanted nothing more than to lay a stinging slap across his arrogant face.
“Jewelry,” he said.
“You’re stealing my jewelry? You’re no better than those street thugs,” I spat out.
He said nothing more, holding his hand outstretched.
Knees quaking, I removed my diamond stud earrings, the slim gold chain around my neck, an antique opal ring left to me from my nonna, and the heavy bangle bracelet from my wrist.
He took all the items and examined those too. Finding them clean of bugs, he dropped those into my handbag, which he then tossed at me.
When he pivoted away, I rushed at him from behind.
I didn’t even make contact before he whirled around to capture me in an iron-like embrace. Snarling wildly, I pummeled him on his unyielding chest, but my hands made little impact on his hard musculature.
I’d never detested a man more than I did in that moment.
When I jerked my leg to knee him in the balls, he released me so fast I stumbled. I didn’t even get a chance to steady myself before he grasped me behind the legs and swiftly tipped me onto my back. I landed on the floor, scrabbling to get back up.
He simply reached down, heaved me back up, and pinned me against his body, once more demonstrating his overwhelming power.
His face darkened, restrained fury thinning his lips and, with one hand, he clasped my wrists behind my back.
The next thing I knew, he held the barrel of his gun against the bruised side of my face.
Breath left my mouth in a hiss as cold metal kissed the skin of my throbbing temple.
Arkady slid the barrel down and across my lips.
True terror seizing my insides, I clamped my mouth shut, and his eyes became deadly blue slits as he skimmed the gun beneath my chin.
Then I felt two hard things at the same time—the muzzle of the gun pressed beneath my chin to angle my face up and the rigid thickness of his cock nestled tightly against me.
“Are you scared of me yet, dragotsennaya printsessa.” Gruff hoarseness deepened his voice.
I was petrified and, yet, sudden intense so-wrong arousal tickled across my body to settle low in my belly.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“Good.”
I heard him holstering the sidearm then his hand was at my throat.
I became transfixed by the different kind of heat that entered his blue eyes. Smoldering heat. Male lust as he squeezed my neck, and my nipples traitorously pinged up within the cups of my bra.
Arkady’s head bent toward mine as his hand moved up my elongated neck.
Heat flashed. I thought he was going to kiss me. His mouth would be warm and firm, unlike the kiss of his gun. His hard cock pressed into my belly, and fluttery sensation swarmed lower to pool between my thighs.
His lips barely whispered across my cheek, and my breath hitched in my throat.
My head was spinning.
I had no idea what was going on.
His grip on my neck tightened then loosened then squeezed again, and his lips touched the shell of my ear.
I almost moaned before I swallowed the sound.
I was pressed wholly against this killer Russian who’d just held a gun to my head, and illicit lust spiraled out of control inside of me.
“I don’t need a gun to make you do what I want, Lucia.” His deep drugging voice made my toes curl.
In the next instant, Arkady released me. Mind reeling, I staggered backward. I came up against the sofa and slowly sank down.
He turned his back again, so certain he’d proven his point. Perhaps he had since that overwhelming unwanted arousal hardly abated even while I watched him open a safe in the wall. He placed my phone and gun inside. Then he tossed the destroyed remnants of the trackers and SIM card into a small trash can from which he lifted the bag and twisted it closed.
Having finished his tasks, he stalked toward me, a leonine presence. Without another word, he tugged me up, and I held my purse as a safeguard in front of me.
He walked me out of the large room into a corridor and clicked on a light while I tried to get my bearings. Through the hallways and toward a beautiful staircase, he marched me. I continued to be surprised by the fact he didn’t live in a scummy building in the underbelly of Boston. In fact, the place was well-appointed and designed with luxury finishes everywhere the eye looked.
But grandeur and money did not make Arkady any less of a savage. The Bratva brute had every reason to make me just disappear. I’d admitted I wanted his brother dead—and if that death didn’t come at my hands then I hoped someone else got to him.
Steeled against the weird swirls of attraction that would only weaken me, I glared at Arkady. “Where are we going?”
“Up,” was all he said.
Up we went, and I used the polished cherry banister to steady my steps because I was on such uneven footing with this man that I felt like I might lose my life at any moment.
Upstairs on the second floor of what appeared to be three, we stopped in a bedroom. Again, the room was clean, sharp, and expensively furnished. The masculine area smelled of him—dark and spicy, exotic and criminally tasteful.
I hadn’t noticed anyone else in the house. There was no heavily armed presence of soldiers, which was odd given his high rank in the Bratva. The fact that he was capable of protecting himself without guards made him even more dangerous.
No maid and no wife going by the fact he wore no ring.
I was utterly alone with him.
Swallowing the lump in my throat, I watched as he removed his jacket, tossed his tie away, and shrugged off his shirt. The entire time, he kept one hand at my neck. His light touch nearly felt like a caress, and my pulse again sped.
The heat of desire and the flame of hate battled within me even more as I took in his bare chest. A multitude of scars denoted his notorious lifestyle while black ink represented his prominent stature and family allegiance. His muscles rippled and gleamed beneath a tantalizing smattering of black hair that marked him as a completely virile man, and I had trouble looking away from all that honed flesh.
He removed his holster, kept the pistol in his grip, and a foreign glimmer entered his strangely hypnotic eyes that became as potent as a lover’s kiss.
Again without words, he motioned me toward a second doorway, his gun leading the way. We entered a huge bathroom, and Arkady shut and locked the door behind him.
Is this the end?
I supposed it was the perfect place to commit a murder.
Easy cleanup and all that.
My gaze flying to his, I gulped down a bubbling hysteria.
I expected to meet a quick death and there was nothing I could do about it now, not even as I glanced around for any escape or some type of weapon. I backed into a corner between the long marble counter and the big tiled shower with Arkady tracking me across the floor.
He shoved the pistol into the back of his pants, bunching and flexing muscles glistening beneath the shine of recessed lights.
His gaze roamed over me before he ordered, “Get naked.”
“What? No way, stronzo.” I thrust my chin out. “I’m not making any of this easier for you.”
He snorted, taking one step closer. “Get undressed so I can see to your injuries, Lucia. Or don’t, and I’ll be forced to tear that lovely outfit right off of you with my bare hands, which wouldn’t pain me at all.”