Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 68630 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68630 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Fuck.
He brought handcuffs?
“Let me go!”
He gets off the bed and goes to the mirror over the dresser. I watch him wipe a speck of blood off his lip. At least I managed to hurt him. But when he turns back to me, I find myself backing up away from him as much as I can, which isn’t much.
“Please, Lev. Let me go. Please. I don’t know anything. I didn’t see anything. God, please!”
He looks down at me, and I realize how dark the room is. He’s closed the curtains. Not that anyone would walk by here. There’s no one for at least a mile in any direction. They won’t even hear me when I scream.
He sets his knee on the edge of the bed, and I cringe backward as he looms over me. Was he always so big?
He reaches a hand out, and I flinch, thinking he’s going to hit me. But he only takes a lock of hair and lets it fall through his fingers.
“Told you your hair’s prettier like this,” he says.
I start to cry then. I start to sob. This is it. This is how it ends. And Josh will be alone. Who’s going to bring him home? God, they can’t bring him home. What if he’s the one to walk in here and find what Lev leaves behind?
“Shh, Katerina.” He wipes away my tears with the rough pads of his thumbs. “I don’t like seeing you cry. Don’t you know that?”
“Please don’t hurt me. Please. I haven’t told anyone anything. I haven’t.”
“What would you tell them? You just said you didn’t see anything. That you don’t know anything.”
He’s using my own words against me. He sits down, cocks his head to the side, and studies me. His gaze roams down over me, and I follow it, see how my blouse has come out of my jeans and my belly’s exposed, see how one of my boots is gone, probably lost as I was kicking at him.
He touches my belly then, a soft touch, just his knuckles featherlight on me as he pushes the blouse a little higher. He pops the button on my jeans, and when I gasp, he spares me a glance, just a glance before returning his attention to slowly and purposely unzip my jeans.
I whimper, blubbering words that make no sense as he opens them, then pushes my panties down just a little, just enough to see the scar from my cesarean.
He traces it, and I quiet. He’s gentle, just following the line back and forth and back and forth.
“Did it hurt?” he asks, never taking his eyes from it, and I realize what he’s doing. He’s letting me know he knows about Josh. About our baby.
And I start to cry again, sobs wracking my shoulders.
Lev returns his attention to my face, leaving the scar and watching me, eyes hard and angry.
“Katerina, Katerina, Katerina. What am I going to do with you?”
14
Lev
She shivers beneath my touch, and I can’t help myself. I know she’s afraid of me. I know she’s fucking terrified right now, but it’s been so long since I’ve tasted her. When I lean down and squeeze her jaw between my fingers to hold her in place, she freezes, and I drag my lips over hers.
She bucks against me, and a choked sound escapes her before she starts pleading again. “Lev.”
The salt of her tears tangles with the blood on my lip, and it produces a violent want in me. I could cut the clothes from her body right now and squeeze my cock inside her. A punishment for trying to take this away from me.
“Don’t you know this belongs to me?” My thumb digs into the pulsing vein in her throat, the very lifeforce of her being. I want her to know there’s no escaping me. In life or in death, I will follow her.
“Lev, please.” Her chest heaves as she shakes her head. “My son needs me.”
“Our son,” I snarl. “He’s our fucking son, Katerina. Will you deny it?”
She bites her lip as more tears spill onto her cheeks. “He needs his mother.”
“And what about his father?” I drag my fingers away from her face and stare into her eyes. “You are content to let him believe he has none? You are content to take what is half mine from me?”
“You’re the fucking mob!” she cries out. “You killed Nina and her family! What choice did you leave me with?”
And this is what it all boils down to. I knew the day would come when we would need to have this conversation. Kat has had four years to ruminate on the events of that night. In her mind, she has already tried and convicted me. The only defense I have is my word, and I don’t know that she’ll ever trust me enough to believe me. Regardless, it doesn’t matter. She’s chained herself to me for life now. That just hasn’t sunk in for her yet.