Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 83814 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83814 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
If I weren’t already overheated and sweaty, I’d be absolutely pink with fury. “What do you mean this?”
“This apartment. It’s not really you.”
“And what do you think I am?”
“Five-star hotels and maid service.”
I pick up a book and throw it at him. He easily swats it away, smiling with a half-lidded, sexy stare.
“You don’t know me anymore, Sorokin.”
“I don’t know about that, Little Nat. I think we know each other quite well by now.”
“Fuck you, asshole.” And the spell is on the edge of breaking. Now I remember why I dislike Alex so muc.
The primal way he stormed back into my life again and took me like I’ve always been his to fuck and use is fading.
“Actually, about that.” He stands and tugs his boxer briefs back on. But he doesn’t bother with his suit pants. He lets his jacket fall away and begins to unbutton his shirt.
“What are you doing?”
“Undressing. It’s hot as fuck in here.”
“Uh, stop? Keep your clothes on and tell me why you’re even here.”
“I don’t want to get into that yet.”
My mouth falls open when the shirt drops off. His body his tanned and sculpted with muscle. Every inch of him is marked by either a tattoo or a thick knot of scar tissue. There are dozens of scars in all different shapes and sizes: puckers and slashes, tears and strips. And that’s not even mentioning the knives and the skulls, the blood and the strange vista of trees and lakes snaking around his chest.
His body is a canvas of pain and art, and it’s beautiful.
I can’t look away.
“You promised,” I say very weakly as he comes closer.
“And I’ll keep my promise, but the second we start talking about home is the second this—“ He gestures between us. “Will cease to exist. And I’m not done with you yet.”
A thrill runs in between my legs. I start to back away from him. “Who says I want more from you? You broke into my apartment. You watched me playing piano naked. You’re a creep and an asshole.”
“Guilty as charged.”
“So tell me why I shouldn’t run screaming?”
I bump up against the wall behind me. A thrift-store painting of some nice little ducks rattles and nearly falls.
Alex grabs my wrists and pins them above my head.
“Because we just learned something about each other,” he whispers, dipping down to kiss my neck.
I squirm, but don’t try to get away. “What’s that? You finally figured out what a bastard you are?”
“No, Natalya, I learned that we fit together. Maybe you’re a spoiled little Russian Bratva princess and your head’s filled with hot air and music notes, but you feel like fucking heaven. And I want more.”
My mouth hangs open at the devilish look he gives me. It’s half loathing and half lust, and I feel the same tearing around in my guts.
This prick, this arrogant bastard, but he’s right.
I hate it, but I can’t deny it.
We fit.
“If I tell you to fuck off?” I ask him, desperately clinging to my last shreds of pride.
“You won’t. No, you’re going to kiss me now, and then I’m going to drag you into that pathetic little cubby you call a bedroom, and I’m going to fuck you into a senseless puddle of messy bliss. I’m going to take my fill of you, Natalya, before we have to go back to the real world. I’m going to make you ache and moan and come so hard your toes curl. This is your last chance. This is your last escape.”
My last chance. My last escape.
But what he doesn’t know is, this year in Paris hasn’t been so much a vacation as it has been a prison sentence, and I yearn for something more.
Something to make me feel again.
He doesn’t move. His mouth is inches from mine. I’m breathing hard and my breasts rise and fall, my nipples brushing against his hard chest.
Then I twine my fingers through his, hold on tight, and lean forward to swallow the space between us.
Chapter 3
Alexander
Iwake up in Natalya’s sweltering Paris shit box, stare at the ceiling, and wonder how I managed to fuck this up beyond saving.
She is going to hate me even more than she already does when she wakes up and I have to tell her the truth.
But it was that song, that fucking song.
I didn’t plan on any of yesterday—didn’t even think it was a possibility. Not with Little Nat, not with my best friend’s spoiled little sister, the bratty little asshole that always made my life miserable when we were growing up. Constantly complaining. Constantly tattling. She drove me absolutely fucking crazy.
No, it was the music that shattered me.
That longing, brutal sadness. It opened something inside of me that I’ve struggled for years to keep locked down and closed away.
I knew she was talented. I heard her play when we were younger, and even her brothers both agreed that she could become a concert pianist or something like that if their father weren’t such a controlling prick.