I wanted to curl up against him like a kitten but figured he needed to get used to the idea of having me in his bed first. It was true—I was bored to tears.

But I also just wanted to be around him right now. I couldn’t explain it.

He put something on Netflix on the TV in his room. After fifteen minutes into the movie, I slid a little closer to him, sighing as my body curved against his harder one. “Why did you get into the mafia?”

“I thought you weren’t going to ask any questions.” His voice was gruff, but his tone mild.

Right. My curiosity was about as easy to control as my arousal around him. I responded with silence, and my palm on the muscles of his belly. His sharp intake of breath was a contrast to the sighs I usually heard around him.

Surprisingly, he answered after another five minutes of the movie that neither of us was actually watching. “It wasn’t really a choice for me. I was an orphan at a young age. You know, back then, when things changed, there was a lot of…” He paused, searching for the right word for the collapse of the Soviet Union. “There was a lot of unrest. Grown men didn’t feel safe walking around on the streets alone, much less boys who thought they were grown up.”

Now giving up any pretense of watching the movie, I hit mute on the remote. Hopefully Viktor wouldn’t go mute, as well. I looked up to see the corner of his mouth turn up. “And?” I prodded.

He shrugged. “And I learned to fight, to be sneaky. And soon, Petrov took notice. He drew me into that lifestyle because of his wealth, his confidence, his intelligence. I wanted to be that man—the one with power. The one that held all the cards and made other men scramble to find a place beneath him.”

“But you are still beneath Petrov,” I said, confused.

He nodded. “But to no other man but the Pakhan. Besides, until this moment, I’ve never really had a desire to be in charge. With that position comes paranoia, drama, and the failure to ever have a normal life.”

I sat up, surprised. “You want to have a normal life? I just figured…well, you’re so perfect in this life. It feels like you were meant for the mafia.”

My hand went over my mouth as he laughed humorlessly, and I heard my words in my own head. It might not be considered a compliment to tell a man that he seemed perfect for a life of crime and violence.

“Thank you, Anya. I’m sure it’s what my parents wanted for me, as well.”

My face flaming, I dropped a kiss on his lips. “I’m sorry,” I said softly. His beard both scratched and soothed, a sensation to which I was becoming accustomed. “What did you want to be when you grew up? When you were younger, I mean?”

He was silent for a moment. Could he remember? Maybe he had no ambition as a child, but it didn’t seem like him to not have a goal—even if it wasn’t where he ended up. “I wanted to study. Maybe to teach,” he finally said, staring unseeingly at the TV on the opposite wall.

“Literature.” Of course.

“Yes, printsessa. Russian literature. Tolstoy, Chekhov, Dostoyevsky, Gogol, all of it. I loved all the stories of old Russia.”

“Old Russia is no more.” But I didn’t need to tell him that; he already knew, from hard experience.

“No? Sometimes I feel like I live in a feudal kingdom.”

I looked around at the silk sheets and opulent furniture and rolled my eyes. “Somehow, I don’t see you as a serf.”

“Perhaps not, but I still serve the Tsar. The Pakhan. For now. I always figured at some point I could get out of it, but that was before I was this involved. Now it seems like a tunnel with no end.”

I lay back down, rubbing his arm absentmindedly. Worrying that it was all my fault, this tunnel with no light at the end except for the flash of fire from an automatic weapon. “So what are you going to do?”

He sighed, curving his arm around me and drawing me in, giving in to my comfort. “I have a plan, but time will tell if it’s a good one. It could cause both of us to be killed. I just want you to be prepared for what comes next.”

“Being killed? You want me to prepare for that?” Panic welled up in my chest.

He squeezed me tighter, which paradoxically loosened fear’s grip on me. “I won’t let that happen, Anya. I only said it could, to point out how dangerous this game is that we’re playing. But I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”

“What’s coming next?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “And I will be damned if another man comes for you, but I have to consider the possibility that if both families hunt us, it’s only a matter of time before something happens.”

“But I thought that’s why we got married?” I asked, lifting one leg and placing it in between his.

“It is. That’s why they’ve left us along for this long. But it won’t last forever. I have a feeling that Boss Petrov is less interested now, but Boss Ramone will surely want you back at some point.”

I saddened, realizing that our little bubble would be burst soon enough. While I was bored and I was sick of being in this massive house, that didn’t mean I wanted to give it up for some strange ‘family’ that I’d never known I’d had. Somehow, it didn’t feel like that was the answer I’d been looking for. It felt more like a trap. A trap that was going to pull me away from him. And probably soon.

I still didn’t understand my place in all this. What was so special about me? Ramone—or whatever his real name was—apparently felt free to abandon me to my uncle in Ukraine when I was too young to remember. That uncle, who then promised me to Petrov in some sick trade.

I knew Viktor better than I knew any of my family. Suddenly I realized that we were both orphans of a sort, clinging to each other. Did he see in me what he could have been, had he not been taken under Petrov’s wing? And what if Ramone or Petrov… possessed me?

My mind wrapped up in that, I unconsciously pushed closer to him, wanting his heat and his protection around my body. He responded by pulling me as close as possibly, half on top of him. We lay like that for a while, throughout the rest of the muted movie—both of us deep in thought. Or at least, I was pensive, but wondered if he’d fallen asleep.

When the end credits started to roll, he made a move to get up. I pulled him back down. “Not yet,” I chided. He seemed surprised, but gave in easily enough.

I wanted to try something. To see if he would let me try something. I leaned over him, looking deep into his eyes. He had an almost pained expression on his face. As if my nearness caused him discomfort. Based on the bulge I could feel against my thigh, I had a good idea of the source. I hid a smile.

Idly, I rubbed his handsome face, caressing his mouth and the jawline that always seemed so tense. I slowly moved in, giving into temptation. I kissed him until I felt his lips start to respond. I increased the pressure, wanting to feel what I’d felt earlier. Finally, with a groan, he gave in completely. He arched up and over, covering my body with his, wrapping a hand behind my ponytail, pulling down on it to keep me in place and expose my neck. I moaned, feeling his mouth on my neck, nibbling.

His hand dropped down to my breast, squeezing and kneading until I was a writhing mess, begging and pleading. Suddenly, he stopped. I whimpered at the loss.

“We shouldn’t be doing this,” he said softly.

“What? Why not?”

“You know why, Anya. A time will come where you’ll have to choose. And you don’t want your mind clouded by lust and lust alone.” He placed a soft kiss on my mouth, one very different from the kisses he’d just been giving me.

Something twisted in my chest at his use of the words ‘lust alone.’ “Well, I wouldn’t be so lust-driven if you’d just give in.” I pouted.

“Anya,” he warned.

I grumbled, but sat up, giving him some peace. He sat up as well, then stood and turned off the TV. I admired the ripples of muscles of his back and arms. He held out a hand to help me up and I let him pull my body against his.

“Goodnight, printsessa,” he whispered, placing one more kiss against my mouth.

I hungered for him but knew that he wasn’t a man to be trifled with once he’d made up his mind. “Night, Viktor. Thank you.” He looked at me blankly. “For talking to me, I mean.”

When he nodded, I headed over to my room. After lying in bed there for only a few minutes, my hand crept into my panties and I thought of him. Thought of his hands, his mouth and his body, sliding over me. In only a few minutes, I came, wishing that he’d been the one to cause it.