Page 29 of Kidnapped Bride

Every woman had a vagina worth using for my pleasure, and every woman had a rack of tits to fondle.

But Kira… It wasn’t about her body to me. Or the fact that enjoying her gave me something to look forward to the next time she mouthed off.

She was right about one thing—we had clicked.

When we were messaging, I let her see the Nikolai Dragonov who grew up in St. Petersburg with a mother who cooked hot cross buns at Easter and decorated for Novy God in December.

I had shared that with her because I wanted to sell myself, but in doing so, I'd made myself vulnerable to her. And her response had hooked into me like a fishing lure, piercing something inside me I never let anyone touch.

No way in hell was I letting that get away, not when having been seen for who I really was hadn't chased her off entirely.

She still came on to me, and well into the act of sex tonight, she wasn't faking it.

She had wanted me as badly as I wanted her, and I let her sink those talons of hers into my thoughts so deeply, I still wanted her, even after she lashed out in rage.

Kira was mine now, and I wasn't changing my mind about that. I didn't know how she would ever come around to have anything resembling a real relationship, but sending her home was off the table for good.

But what was definitely on the table now was a glimmer of hope in an otherwise inky black sky. A gunmetal grey shredded by the sliver of dawn on the horizon.

If I forced Kira to marry me and spread that announcement across this entire city, every man, woman, and child who had any connection to Xavier Markin would hear.

And when they heard that his daughter had married his worst enemy, he would have no choice but to tuck his tail and run. It would be humiliation upon humiliation for him.

So that was what I planned to do.

And I planned to do it immediately.

8

KIRA

I was somewhere between sleeping and lucid dreaming when the mattress shifted, and my whole body rolled a little. Though, I didn’t move. I lay there frozen solid with my eyes shut, flat on my back as I tried to keep my breathing calm. My heart wasn't cooperating, though. It slammed against my ribs so hard, I was sure he could hear it.

Nikolai had never chosen to come to this room for bed. The entire time I'd been here, he slept somewhere else in the house, downstairs maybe, or in some other room I hadn't been allowed to see. This bedroom had become mine by default, the one tiny scrap of territory I controlled, and now he was climbing into bed with me like he owned me.

It was infuriating but this was his bed, his house, his everything—except me. I didn't belong to him and I wasn't about to start letting him do whatever he wanted with me.

My skin prickled and my pulse wouldn't come down no matter how many times I told myself to relax. He had catfished me and then locked me up. There was absolutely no reason my bodyshould've been reacting to him, and yet here I was, flustered and hyper-aware of every inch of space between us. And pretending to sleep wasn't working for me.

Not only would he get the idea that I was okay with this if he found out, but he would keep doing it. If I pushed back, however, he might do something worse, though he hadn't been that way with me at all so far. I just wasn't sure what sort of man he really was. I knew nothing about the real "Niko", only the façade he'd played me with.

He shifted and his knee grazed the back of my thigh. It was barely anything. It was just accidental contact that happens when two people share a bed. But heat shot up my leg and pooled in my belly and I clenched my teeth against it. It made me squirm a little as my cheeks flushed and I remembered how incredible it felt to be owned by him.

"I know you're not sleeping, Kira."

God, I hated him. I kept my eyes shut and didn't answer, but it was obvious he'd read me like a book.

"Your breathing changed the second I got into bed."

"Go to hell," I whispered.

He chuckled and then I felt him shifting, turning over toward me and causing the blanket to pull back a little. It didn't expose me, but it let a gush of cold air rush under the covers. I turned to my side, hoping to put more space between us, but the bastard hooked his arm around my waist and pulled me back until my spine stretched along his body from shoulders to hips and I felt his warmth wrap around me.

"Get out of my bed," I told him angrily, but he only tightened his grip.

"It's my bed."

"It's been mine for a week. You forfeited it when you decided to hold me hostage."