Page 25 of Hunted Bride

Lies. I want them to be truth. But they aren’t. She’s angry. Really angry.

Hurt, too.

“My parents will tear you into pieces,” she pants raggedly. “I’m going to watch them take you apart bit by bit.”

Fuck. She’s serious. This isn’t a game anymore.

Despite everything, I’ve won her over once. I know how to win her trust again.

“You will. You just need a little more time. I can smell your desire, Mia.” Mine. She belongs to me.

“If you really wanted me, Rion Orlov, you would go up there and tell your brother about me.” Her brow arches in challenge.

Upstairs, Max calls my name.

I have to get this fucking glitter out of my hair and off my face, fast.

No one can know what I’ve done.

Especially not my oldest brother. For a second, I don’t move. Then I push my hand deeper between her thighs and cup her pussy. “You know the rules. When I catch you⁠—”

“Rion?”

I freeze. I know what she’s about to say.

“Wingspan.”

Her soft body trembles beneath mine. Despite the raging need to take her—to prove that she belongs to me by physically joining with her—I hold back. The ferocity of needing her doesn’t diminish. I wrest control of myself away from my libido and push back. She’s splayed across the steps, her back arched, her gorgeous breasts tenting the shirt, her skirt twisted.

Already slipping from my grasp. She knows I’m not going to confess what I’ve done. A cold sinking sensation takes hold of me.

“Rion?” Max calls out, echoing her.

“I’ll be right up,” I call out. I’ll have to pop upstairs looking like Liberace with glitter splashed all over my face. Invent a plausible excuse. I run my tongue up the side of Mia’s delicate throat and push away. I step over her and mount the steps. At the top, I lock her in the dark basement. Alone.

Still my dirty little secret.

I deserve every ounce of pain I have coming to me.

I tell myself that the fact that she doesn’t pound the door begging for rescue means she has accepted the truth. She is mine. Forever. In the Orlov family, love is possession, the hunt is foreplay—and I never let my prey escape.

Yet this time, my mouse has turned the tables. Now she’ll be the one hunting me.

Milena

My brain takes in details without processing them—my khishnik has icy-blue eyes alight with predatory fire. His features are beyond handsome. Straight nose. Full lips bracketed by a faint line on one side like they’re quirked up in a perpetual smirk.

He could have any woman. Yet he wants me.

Or, wanted.

Slowly, the delight dancing in his eyes dims.

“Rion,” a man’s voice calls out.

I should scream. Shout for help.

I don’t.