Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 92549 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92549 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
Her voice was barely above a whisper. “What happens now?”
I rose to my full height and leaned back against the door again. Less temptation. “What happens now is you answer my questions.”
Her fingers twisted on her lap. “And if I can’t?”
“You mean if you won’t?”
She glanced up at me, peering out from behind a curtain of silky blonde hair, a spark of defiance in her eyes. “If I won’t…”
I rubbed my hand over my abdomen as my shaft lengthened. It was game time. “Well, moy zaichonok, you and I have twenty hours alone in this room."
I let the words press into her. Let her feel them settle like shackles on her wrists.
"There are several ways we could spend that time," I continued, tilting my head. I let my gaze drag down her body, slow and assessing, watching how her fingers twisted into the hem of her sweater. "Some…are far more pleasant than others."
Her cheeks hollowed as she clenched her jaw, appearing to physically swallow a bratty retort.
At her continued silence, I pushed off from the door and let my hand drop to my belt, fingers unfastening the buckle with slow precision. The metal clinked in the silence.
She sucked in a sharp breath. "What are you doing?"
I pulled the belt free, sliding it slowly from the loops, letting the leather whisper against the fabric. Folding it in half, I ran my fingers down its length before snapping it through the air.
A sharp, deliberate crack.
She flinched. Not in fear. Something else.
"You can't do anything to me," she said, voice trembling, cracking.
A lie.
We both knew it.
I took a step forward, the belt still loosely looped in my hand. "Can't I?"
Tossing the belt aside, I reached for her, grabbing her hair with one hand and lifting her off the bed to drag her over to the window.
The city lights were nothing more than an indistinct shimmer in the reflection. "Look at it," I murmured, my breath hot against her cheek. "That is civilization in the far distance. Now you are only surrounded by darkness.”
I also had slipped the bonds of civilization.
Alone in the tense stillness of this train cabin, she and I were the only animals left on the planet. I no longer gave a damn about what was right or wrong. All thoughts of decency and morality had been burned away in my anger and lust. The resulting embers glowed with a primal drive to claim and conquer.
Her body jerked, but I tightened my grasp on her hair before tearing the leather jacket off her shoulders and down her arms. The Russian shawl I noticed in her room floated to the floor at her feet. She was left in her sweater and jeans.
“Put your hands on the window.”
“What are you—”
“Do it,” I growled.
I had reached my fucking limit. All the fear, all the worry that had built up inside of me over these months of chasing her had come to a boiling point in my blood, churning into a toxic, obsessive need.
Releasing her hair, I spread my hand over her stomach, pressing her back against me until her ass brushed my already hard cock. With my other hand, I flicked the button of her jeans open.
Her hand flew to cover mine. “What the—”
I brushed her hand aside and lowered the zipper.
“Kostya, you can’t—”
Before she could even get the objection past her sweet lips, I’d yanked the jeans down over her hips. Using my arm around her middle, I lifted her off the floor and kicked them and her canvas sneakers out of the way. My hand then slid up her back to wrap around her throat from behind.
The middle finger of my free hand hooked the back of the red thong where it nestled between her ass cheeks. “What the fuck is this, Marina?” I growled, snapping the fabric back into place.
The only reason a woman would wear a red thong was for a man. Earlier today she had on a pair of simple blue silk panties.
She breathed heavily. “They’re just panties.”
My hand gripped her left ass cheek and squeezed. “Which dead man are you wearing these for?”
She rose on her toes. “No one.”
“Don’t fucking lie to me, babygirl, because I’ll find the man and snap his fucking neck.”
It had better not be one of the pasty fuckers she was living with.
Perhaps it was why she was fleeing to New York.
Was she racing into the arms of another man?
Did I have a right to be so jealous? No.
Was that going to stop me? Fuck no.
Her fingers clawed at the hand I had around her throat. “There is no one, Kostya, no one.”
My arm stretched out and snatched the discarded belt from the bed. In the tight confines of the room, I had to shift my body to the side, keeping a hand on her throat. With a tight grip on the buckle and the leather strap, I raised my bent arm high and swept it down over her flesh.