Sergei hadn’t battled feelings like this since college and didn’t know what to do about any of it, so he went with what worked. He pushed her against the wall, his lips finding hers again. Her mouth was lush and soft, so fucking sexy his dick was hard as stone. He grabbed a fistful of her hair and wrapped it around his hand as he kissed her, his mouth grinding against hers, lips and tongue punishing in their attack. To his surprise and delight, she didn’t hesitate to respond. Her mouth opened and her tongue met his fervently, one hand grabbing his left butt cheek and squeezing hard. He growled, a low rumble in his chest that let her know he liked it before pulling away.

“Mine,” he grunted. “You gave me your cherry and I’ll be damned if I let another man have what’s only been touched by me before I’m ready to give it up. It’s not forever, but it’s definitely for now, and it’s exclusive—for both of us.”

“But you said you don’t do relationships.”

“I said I didn’t want to get married again. Not the same thing.”

“O-okay.” Her eyes were wide and confused but the way she looked at him told him she wanted him. Now. Again. Even as uncomfortable as it had been for her. Damn if that didn’t make him even harder.

“God, you’re fucking amazing,” he murmured, holding her close. “I’m going to show you a whole new world, baby. I’m hard and edgy in bed and going to spend the rest of the summer making you want things you never knew existed.”

Her eyes were sparkling with excitement. “I like the sound of that,” she admitted, her breath a little raspy.

He chuckled. “Hearing you say shit like that is hot as hell, but not yet, not today. You’re definitely sore and I want you to enjoy it next time. Okay?”

She licked her lips and nodded. “Yes.”

“I don’t think you have any idea what’s to come in the bedroom.”

She nodded. “I haven’t done a lot of stuff, but I’ve read a lot and I want to experience it all. Everything.”

“Yeah?” His eyes glittered as he wondered how far she would let him go. “You going to let me put my cock here?” He pressed his forefinger between her cheeks, right through the thin fabric of her shorts, and felt her jump.

“I, um, I guess,” she whispered.

He smiled, impressed with her openness. “When the time is right, you’ll really like it.”

“Okay.” She swallowed hard but met his gaze without wavering.

“Come on, let’s have breakfast and when Niko wakes up we can go to the gym together. You can’t want to get away from me already.” He tried to be playful, keeping his gaze warm so she wouldn’t see the lust burning up inside of him.

“No.” She rested against him, her head falling on his shoulder.

He wrapped his arms around her, content to have her close. Last night had thrown him for a loop. In retrospect, all the signs had been there, but she’d masked them with her sweet demeanor and fierce independence. She’d been so open about her insecurities it hadn’t occurred to him she was that innocent. Inexperienced yes, but not a virgin. He wasn’t angry about it—she’d wanted him and told him so. She hadn’t tried to back out or even asked him to stop when he was hurting her, so she’d been ready and willing to make love with him. He just didn’t understand why she’d wanted a man who didn’t have romantic feelings for her to be her first.

He gently pushed her away, reaching down to take her chin in his fingers. “Will you tell me the truth about something?” he asked softly.

“About what?” There she went blinking those green eyes at him.

“Why me? Why would you want a broken shell of a man so much older than you to be your first?”

“Because no one else ever appreciated me or made me feel sexy or made me want it so bad. That first day, when you yelled at me about Niko calling me Mama D, there was something so raw and masculine about you, I knew instantly you were the one.”

“You knew you wanted me to be your first while I was being an asshole?” He quirked a smile at her.

“Okay, I knew instantly I wanted something because you made my heart beat faster, but by the time we got here to Alaska, I was already fantasizing about being with you.”

“Shit, baby.” He slid his hands around her waist, a little disconcerted she’d felt about him exactly what he’d felt about her. Right from the beginning, no less. Now what was he going to do?

“Look, it’s all good,” she said, turning to the counter and starting to make coffee. “There’s no reason we can’t enjoy the summer and each other while taking care of Niko and getting ready for hockey season. We’re friends, aren’t we?”

“At the very least.” He kissed the back of her neck.

“We can have fun while I’m here and shake hands before I go, right?” She turned to look at him, whatever she was thinking masked behind inscrutable green eyes.

“Is that what you want?”

“It’s what we both want, right? Let’s not overthink it, okay? I appreciate your sensitivity about it being my first time, but I’m okay. I got a little overwhelmed this morning because I’ve never had a morning after before. Now that I know we’re okay, I won’t break down like that again.”

Her eyes were practically pleading with him to agree, so he did, nodding easily and following her lead in starting to get breakfast ready. It didn’t sit well with him, though, and he wasn’t sure why. She was going out of her way to convince both of them that the loss of her virginity hadn’t changed anything, but he knew better. Those tears this morning hadn’t been because of mere discomfort; she’d been emotional, experiencing intense feelings that were new to her but for whatever reason didn’t want him to know it. Whether she was protecting him or herself, he couldn’t be sure, but later, when he had her in his bed again, he’d find out.

---

That afternoon they gave in to Niko’s repeated pleas and took him ice skating. Dani had taken him a couple of times in Las Vegas, along with Tiff’s twins and Toli’s stepdaughter, and Niko had been a natural. She’d tried to play it down since Sergei seemed to feel so guilty about not teaching him to skate, but it was obvious the moment they set him on the ice at the local rink. Sergei had a wool cap over his head and kept his head down to stay under the radar, but Niko took off like a bat out of hell.

“Holy shit,” Sergei laughed. “You weren’t kidding. He can barely stand up and he’s practically lighting it up.”

“He’s going to be fast, like his father and uncles.”

Sergei cut his eyes to her. “You know about Vlad?”

She smiled. “Zakk and Toli are best friends; Zakk’s my big brother. There’s no way I could live in that house and not know. And yes, I understand Vlad being your half-brother isn’t public knowledge because of your father’s enemies.”

“So you know what happened in Russia.”

“When your wife died?” She nodded, moving her feet across the ice slowly, her eyes never leaving Niko.

“Her father was mafia,” he said, even though she hadn’t asked. “For whatever reason, even though we were both in the NHL, both wealthy, both healthy and successful, he wanted her to marry Toli. That was the plan. When she and I foiled it by falling in love, he was furious. That’s why she agreed to leave her career as a physician and come to the U.S., even though she didn’t want to. It was the only way to get away from whatever bullshit he had in store for us.”

“She loved you.”

“I’d like to think so.” He gazed at his son, slipping and sliding across the ice as fast as his awkward strokes would allow.

“It’s okay. You don’t have to talk about it.”

“I want to,” he said slowly. “I never have before. I mean, Toli, Dom and Zakk were there and we’ve told Vlad, but I’ve never actually talked about it to anyone else.”

“About which part?”

“The way she died.”

“You can tell me anything.” Dani slid her hand into his, matching his paces as they moved together, his gaze now focused on nothing in particular while she kept an eye on Niko.

“The details are complicated and go back to when she and Toli were teenagers—he’s five years older than I am and she was three.”

“I didn’t know she was older than you.”

“Did you know my father was KGB and is still loosely involved in whatever faction of that organization is active?”

She nodded. “Zakk has only ever talked about the basics, saying the less Tiff and I know the better, but he told us you and Toli don’t ever plan to set foot in Russia again because of it.”

“Which is why no one outside the family can ever know that Vlad is our half-brother. That would put him in danger as well.”

“I certainly would never tell anyone and Zakk only told me because I spent so much time at Toli and Tessa’s, it was hard not to put together parts of the story.”

“What it all boiled down to was her father wanting an alliance with our father to link the mob with the KGB, but for reasons we’ll probably never understand, it had to be Toli, not me. We didn’t know that, so when Tanya and I fell in love, we figured her father would have the alliance he wanted regardless, especially since at the time I wanted to stay in Russia. But he was furious, told her he would kill me to keep us apart. She was pregnant, though, and her mother was still alive, so she had some control over him. We got married and moved to the U.S. For a while, it seemed like everything would be okay.”

“Couldn’t the Russian mob or the KGB or whoever get to you in Boston almost as easily as they could in Russia?”

He nodded. “It’s a lot harder here, and if they were caught, they’d go to jail, unlike over there, where shit like that happens every day.”

“That must’ve been scary.”

“I was busy with hockey,” he said after a minute, his jaw working in irritation. “Tanya took care of everything—Niko, the house, and apparently the situation in Russia, though I didn’t know it then. She kept her father at bay, kept our home together, and took care of our son, all while being threatened and badgered.” He let out a ragged breath before he continued.

“The night she died, they’d kidnapped Anton, and Toli had gone after him. He was fully prepared to die in exchange for the safe return of his son. Tanya was pissed, and she got on the phone, trying to call in favors, do anything she could to help. I refused to let my brother go in alone, you know? I mean, he’s my big brother and he needed backup. Zakk and Dom had flown in, anxious to help, but at that point no one knew what was going on. Toli said his goodbyes to us, to our parents and to Tessa, and he went to get his son. I was hiding under a blanket on the floor of the back seat of the car—”

“I can’t even imagine how scared you all were,” she murmured, reaching out to lift Niko to his feet after he wiped out in front of them.

“I know,” he replied, unconsciously reaching for her hand again. “I don’t know what Tanya did while Toli and I were heading to the meeting point, but she showed up about fifteen minutes after we did. I was lurking outside the building, so I saw her go in but couldn’t get to her in time to stop her.” He paused, a dark shadow covering his face as he slowed to a stop, leaning against the boards of the rink. “That’s when I knew it was all about me, that her father was only going to give Anton back in exchange for me, not Toli. The old bastard knew I’d never let Toli go alone and he was right. I walked into that warehouse and announced myself, told him to take me… Tanya pulled a fucking gun out of her pocket and shot her father at the same time he shot at me. Except she stepped between us and took the bullet.”

“Oh, Sergei.” Dani squeezed his arm, moving close to his side. “I’m so sorry.”

“She killed her father and took a bullet to protect me, but I couldn’t protect her. How fucked up is that?”

“None of it was your fault, Sergei. You couldn’t help that her father was an asshole or that yours was KGB.”

“My dad sacrificed a lot to protect us boys—even Vlad, who grew up in an orphanage—and then my wife made the ultimate sacrifice to protect me. What kind of man does that make me?”

“A survivor,” she whispered, leaning up against him, forcing him to look at her. “A strong, loving man who knows life isn’t always fair. A devoted father who’s going to make sure his son has a better future. Those things make you better, Sergei, not weaker.”

“I couldn’t defend my own wife. I stood there and let her jump in front of a bullet.” The pain and shame in his eyes was so poignant it was like someone was squeezing her heart from the inside.

“Oh, Sergei.” Dani moved up against him so they were almost eye-to-eye. “You had no way of knowing what her father was going to do—you’re a hockey player, not some kind of mafia thug. She grew up with that life, and probably knew her father better than most people. There’s no shame for you in her sacrifice. She was prepared to defend you and she did. Feeling guilty about it makes a mockery out of what she did. She didn’t do that to make you suffer; she did it so you and her son would be free.”

“It sure doesn’t feel that way when—” He snaked out an arm to catch Niko as he tripped. “Easy, buddy, you need to slow down.”

“Skate with me, Daddy.” Niko’s eyes shone with excitement. “Can we go fast? Mama D can go really fast!”

She gave them a little nod of her head and Sergei only hesitated a second before gripping Niko’s hands and then turning backwards so he could pull the little boy. He paused to lean over and brush his lips across hers before moving off with his son. Dani watched them with a grin, Niko’s excited laughter echoing off the walls. Sergei’s face was relaxed now too, the dark shadows of his memories fading with the light provided by his son’s happiness.

She’d known most of that story, but not the details, not that Tatiana’s father had hated him or that she’d gone in most likely knowing she would die to save her husband. She had to have been a remarkable woman and for a moment Dani wondered how Sergei could ever get involved with anyone else after having a woman that had loved him enough to die for him. She’d never been truly in love so that concept was foreign to her. It made her a little sad, too, because she liked him a lot. There was a tiny part of her that wished they could explore something beyond sex and friendship. He was handsome, sexy, rich, athletic, gentle, loving and brave—what else could any woman ask for?

Sighing, she pushed off, picking up speed to catch up to Sergei and Niko, who were speeding around the ice as fast as was safe. She matched Sergei’s stride, grinning as he winked at her.

“Mama D, it’s so fast!” Niko squealed.

“I know.” She laughed, losing herself in the moment and determined to enjoy what time she had with them. They weren’t her family but they were her friends and that should be enough.