my voice is dry when I speak. “Okay. I can do that. What else?”
Molly curves her fingers around her thigh, inching closer to her center, and I can’t peel my eyes from her body. I want to watch her touch herself. Even if the driver is only a thin piece of glass away from us. I lick my lips.
With her free hand, Molly reaches out for me. She slides her hand down my arm until her fingers brush across my palm and then grip my own. She draws my hand across the space between us and towards where her other hand is dangerously close to her sweet heat. The only thing better than watching Molly pleasure herself would be pleasuring her myself. My mind is empty of everything but her as she lays my hand on her thigh. I want her. Now.
“More than anything, I want you to …” She leans forward, her lips parted in delicious seduction. My fingers grip her soft skin through the material of her dress, and I want to tear the fabric off her. She is too beautiful to be covered. Her breath is warm against my mouth when she speaks. “Open my door for me.”
I blink, confused.
Molly tips her head behind me, and I look over my shoulder.
“We’re here,” she says.
I groan and fall back against my seat, and Molly laughs behind me. “Come on, husband. It’s time to make an alliance.”
That was my priority ten minutes ago. Now, the hardness between my legs has other ideas.
I rearrange myself before getting out of the car and doing as my wife asked. I open her door and escort her inside.
11
Molly
The restaurant is at the top of a skyscraper downtown. Three of the four walls in the dining room are floor-to-ceiling windows, and the room is bathed in the faint glow of the city. Candles flicker on the round tables, a four-piece band plays softly in the corner, and everyone is dressed in their best.
And looking directly at me.
At us, really.
Viktor has his arm wrapped tightly around me, his fingers splayed across my hip, and I know I should feel nervous. Hell, an hour ago I was contemplating faking being sick and hiding under the covers. But now, standing next to Viktor with his arm around me, I can’t find the fear.
Somehow, while distracting Viktor in the car, I managed to distract myself, too.
The way his eyes traced my shape, the way he devoured me with his gaze, made me feel powerful. If I can bring a man as fierce as Viktor to his figurative knees, then what do I have to fear from anyone in this room?
He told me back at the apartment that he would take care of me—that he would take care of all of us—and I wanted to believe him. At least for tonight, I want to trust that I will be in good hands. I want to trust that he won’t let me make a fool of myself. So, to the best of my ability, I shed my nerves and fear and trepidation over meeting new people and making new alliances and focused on the one thing Victor and I have always had in abundance: chemistry.
Viktor wears a kind smile as we move through the room and greet his guests, but it is surface level. It doesn’t reach his eyes the way his smiles in the car did. This is business Viktor. Mafia boss Viktor.
And I’m his queen.
I hold my head high and shake the hands of women who, only a few months ago, would have found me undeserving of the energy it would take them to spit at my feet. Now, they bow their heads in small signs of respect and don’t make eye contact with Viktor as we pass. But I can feel their attention snag on the two of us. On Viktor’s hand claiming my waist and my body molded against his as though we are carved from the same clay. They may doubt whether we are equally matched in our marriage, but they won’t doubt whether there is passion.
In the center of the room, with a wide berth around them, stands a couple who I assume are the Irish boss and his wife. Viktor hastily described them in the elevator on our way up.
Seamus and Niamh are older than I expected them to be. He has a shock of gray hair and hers is pure white, but trimmed neatly around her ears. They smile as we approach,