"I"ll protect you." His voice was slightly m.u.f.fled by the shirt I was pulling off him. G.o.d, his abs were as perfectly sculpted as ever. Before I met Anatoly I hadn"t even known there were straight men who had abs like his!
"But aren"t you in danger too?" I breathed as his lips moved down my neck.
He pulled away slightly, pulled my shirt over my head and took my face in his hands. "You"re worth the risk."
It was a stupid risk to take. We were waving a red flag in front of a bull; risking our very lives.
And I loved every second of it.
I sucked in a sharp breath as his fingers unclasped my bra.
He pulled the bra from me and gently ran his thumbs over my nipples. "I was so worried I would never feel you again," he murmured. Without a word I slipped my hand down to the front of his pants.
My fingers fumbled with the b.u.t.ton of his jeans and I felt him, hard and perfect, no batteries needed.
I let my fingers trace his ridges and tip and felt him harden more still. "I want to feel you too...inside me, Anatoly. Right now."
And just like that, we were on the bed again. I could barely feel the sheets beneath me. All I could feel was him. He pulled my jeans off and my panties went off with them. I moaned as he touched me. His fingers toyed with me until I could barely contain myself.
"More," I breathed. "I need all of you."
He removed his hand and I gasped again as I felt his weight on top of me...
...and when he entered me my world exploded.
I dug my fingernails into his back. I didn"t care if Anatoly had five friggin" wives. I didn"t care if he had a harem! I was never letting him go again!
"I love you."
He breathed those words into my ear and I tried to respond in kind but I couldn"t speak. All I could do was be here feeling this. I wrapped my legs around him as he moved over me and raised my hips to meet him. I scratched up his back as he sped up his rhythm. No one would be able to look at him shirtless without knowing he was mine. He continued to run his hands over my face, my b.r.e.a.s.t.s, the curve of my waist. He bit down gently on my lower lip all the while pushing further and further inside of me with increasing force until he finally pushed the words up through my throat and I was able to say, "I love you too."
And that"s when I felt him come inside me, my body immediately reacting with an o.r.g.a.s.m all its own.
We lay there, breathless and sweaty, too tired to move.
It was perfect.
CHAPTER 10.
"I promised myself I wouldn"t sleep with more than ten people in my lifetime. It works for me because I keep going back and sleeping with my ex-boyfriends."
--Death Of The Party It took a few minutes before reality sneaked back into the room. I stared at the ceiling trying so hard to focus on nothing but the feeling of the man next to me. But the reality had a sense of urgency to it and it smelled of fear.
"They"re watching me." I said quietly. "Natasha"s tracked me down twice and there are others...I don"t know who they are but I can sense them."
"You don"t have to worry about Natasha and those others don"t know I"m here," he said. He turned on his side and stared down at me. "But you"re right, they have been watching you. That"s why you have to go back to San Francisco."
"They won"t watch me in San Francisco?" I asked incredulously. "You know, they were in my house. They took my computer...with my ma.n.u.script on it, Anatoly. I don"t know if I can really hide from these guys."
Anatoly swore under his breath. "I was at your place several hours before I got on the plane to get here. They must have come in right after I left."
I paused for a second. "You realize that you"re confessing to breaking into my house, right?"
"For over a year it"s been my home too," he countered and then after a moment added, "You had already boxed up a bunch of my stuff. Clothes, books..."
"I did"
"There were some books I couldn"t find. Like my books on soccer--"
"That"s because I donated a lot of your books to the library the day after you left."
Anatoly squeezed his eyes closed. "Did you? That"s great. What library?"
"The one by the Civic Center."
I smiled to myself as he cursed in Russian. I hadn"t actually donated them although I had thought about it. I had even put them in a box marked, "library" and stored them in the garage. I knew how much Anatoly loved his books and I had wanted to hurt him...more to the point, I had wanted to get all the things that helped define him out of my line of sight. He had hurt me.
And now I had opened my arms to him again and made myself vulnerable despite the h.e.l.l he had put me through.
The least I could do is let him stress about his books for a day or two.
"What else did they take?" He asked.
"Just my storage discs."
"What about your MacBook?"
"I have it with me."
"OK, you can leave it here for them to take. Then everything will be good."
"Good? Then I won"t have any copies of my work! I"m two thirds through the book! That"s 280 pages of bad Anatoly!"
"Save it on Google Docs. If they know they have everything that you can store an electronic file on they probably won"t be back to your home."
"What are they looking for?"
"Evidence," he said with a sigh. He sat up and rested his back against the wooden headboard. "Working for the mafia...it"s not the kind of job you can just walk away from. I had to prove my loyalty and prove that I could keep my mouth shut."
"And they weren"t convinced of that?"
"They were convinced. But for some reason they"ve changed their mind. All these years I"ve been silent. I have information that could be catastrophic for them if I shared it with the wrong people."
"So why do they think you"re going to start talking after all these years?"
"It might not be them...not entirely."
"We"re dealing with the mafia and...and then some? Who else?"
Anatoly tightened his arm around me. "It doesn"t really matter. What matters is that there are people who know I have d.a.m.ning information. They know there"s a chance I"ve stored it in some kind of written or electronic medium. Once they have that all they have to do to suppress the information is kill me."
I sat up next to him. His eyes wandered down to my bare b.r.e.a.s.t.s and I s.n.a.t.c.hed up the sheet and used it to cover myself. "Stay focused! If these guys can a.s.sure themselves that you don"t have any files on them then they can kill you...and you want me to leave them my MacBook? Are you suffering from a head injury? Let them think there"s a file!"
"If they think there"s a file they will either come after you because they"ll suspect you can lead them to it, or they"ll come after you to make me tell them where it is."
"Anatoly--"
"I"ll do what I can to get your stuff back...but Sophie you have to go back to San Francisco. They have to think we"re completely through with one another. Otherwise they"ll use you to get to me."
I shook my head, refusing to accept that. "What was the deal with Tanya?"
Anatoly sighed and rested his hand on my thigh. Although the sheet kept our skin from actually touching I could still feel the warmth of his palm. Again I shook my head. I would stay focused even if it took every last bit of will power I possessed.
"Tanya had a crush on me while I was with Natasha," Anatoly explained. "I thought I could get her to help me and lead me to you. But apparently she was still bitter that I rejected her back in the day."
"So she tried to kill you."
"She has a tendency to overreact."
I glanced at the open door that connected my room to Dena or Marcus". Either of them could walk in at any minute. "But was this all her plan?" I asked rushing my words together. "Is she the one who made the mob lose faith in you?"
"No, she just agreed to lead me into a trap. She was never a big planner."
"Anatoly, we may not have much time," I said. "Tell me now what the evidence is that they"re looking for."
Anatoly hesitated. "I don"t want to lie to you any more."
I smiled wryly. "It"s nice to know we can still agree on something."
He nodded and pulled me back toward him so that my head was resting on his shoulder. I waited for him to say more. He didn"t.
"Wait a minute," I said slowly, "you don"t want to lie to me so as an alternative you"re just going to stop talking?"
"If I tell you more it"ll put you in danger. Like I said, they know what they"re looking for isn"t in your house, so if they think I"m out of your life they"ll leave you alone."
"Yeah but the problem is, you"re not out of my life. You"re not even out of my bed."
Anatoly was quiet for a moment. He shifted his body toward mine and let his fingers run over my now tangled hair. "You"re beautiful."
I liked that. It was so much better than, you look beautiful. No, with Anatoly my beauty was a state of being that couldn"t be disturbed by bloodshot eyes or a tangled nest of hair. I tilted my head toward him and smiled up into his eyes. "Tell me what you"re going to do. I promise not to get mad."
He kissed me gently. "I"m going to have to be with Natasha for a while."
I slapped him across his stupid face.
He rubbed his cheek which was now bright red. "I thought you weren"t going to get mad."
"Well gee, I guess you"re not the only person who can break a promise! You can NOT go back to Natasha!"
"Sophie, if the mob thinks that torturing someone I love will get them what they want that"s what they"ll do."
"Sooo....you"re going back to Natasha so they"ll torture her?" Suddenly his plan sounded a lot more appealing. I mean I didn"t want them pulling her fingernails out or anything but a little Chinese water torture never killed anyone.
"They won"t torture Natasha because of who she"s related to. But she might be able to help me convince some key players that I"m not as dangerous as they think I am. And if she can"t she might at least be able to help me kill the individuals leading the crusade against me."
"You"re planning on a murder?"
"It"ll be self-defense."
"And Tanya? Did Natasha kill her in self-defense too?"
"Tanya had a gun so yes, you could make a case for it."
"You could make a case for it? The woman was stuffed in a closet with a bullet in her head! I"m not sure this is one of those times when we should be coloring things in shades of grey!"
"I don"t think Natasha needed to kill her." Each of Anatoly"s words were carefully measured. "She could have shot her in the leg or the shoulder and Natasha"s a good enough marksman to have done that. But still, she saw the gun in Tanya"s hand and she had to make a snap decision. If she hadn"t of shot Tanya I might not have been able to get away."
I hesitated a moment as I turned this over in my mind. The last thing I wanted was to be indebted to Natasha. "What happened after you left the hotel room?"
"The less you know the better."
"Perfect," I said flatly. "So you"re leaving?"
"For a while, yes."
"And you want me to go back to San Francisco."
"On the next plane."
"And if I do you"ll be able to defeat the Russian mafia."
He hesitated at that. "I might be able to get out of this without anyone important getting hurt."
"And who are these important people? You"re an important person, right?"
"Sophie-"
"And what are you going to do with Natasha while you"re with her?"
Again, Anatoly hesitated. "I"ll do what I need to do to keep her on my side. No more no less."
"Oh f.u.c.k that." I jumped out of bed, completely naked and started the search for the clothes I had been so anxious to get out of just a short time ago. "I"m not leaving Vegas. I"m not going to sit around twiddling my thumbs while you play Bonnie and Clyde with a Russian psychopath."