I pushed them open, icy air caressed my skin. Unsurprisingly, Albert was reclining against the car at the curb smoking a cigarette. His eyebrows lowered as I made my way over to him. I leaned against the car next to him and breathed in the cold, industrial smell of the city.
“Your face is all blotchy,” he said indifferently, blowing out a breath of smoke.
“Albert,” I sighed, “sometimes, a girl doesn’t want the truth. Just like when she asks you if her butt looks big in that dress, she doesn’t want you to tell her so.”
He frowned. “Someone said you have a big butt?”
No, they just called me a useless whore.
“Something like that.”
“You do not.”
I released an amused breath. “Don’t look at my butt.”
“I am a man. We look.”
Right on cue, a heavily pregnant woman walked by, and Albert’s eyes didn’t hesitate to settle on her ass.
I smacked his stomach. “Stop. She’s pregnant, you perv.”
“That only means she puts out.”
The male mind was an enigma.
“What is a perv?” he asked, his gaze following the woman down the sidewalk.
I laughed softly. “You know, a pervert.” He still looked confused, so I continued, “Today, it just means someone with sex on their mind all the time.”
“That is every man.”
“Maybe, but not every man wants to gag and spank women, Igor.”
He blew out a breath of smoke and met my eyes with a significant look that sent a shiver down my spine. “You’re not in Miami anymore, blondi.”
After a moment of awkward silence, I held my hand out for his cigarette. Albert eyed me suspiciously before he put it between my fingers. Feeling bold, I inhaled deeply, which brought on a cough so hard I thought a lung would come up.
“Oh, my god, that’s awful!”
He took the cigarette back. “What did you expect?”
“I expected to look really cool,” I complained between coughs. “Like Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”
“I do not know what you’re talking about.”
That was such a travesty, I couldn’t even speak of it.
I put a hand on my chest. “God, I can already feel the cancer.”
He laughed.
A dizzy buzz rushed so fast to my head I stumbled. Albert steadied me by placing an oversized paw on my arm.
“Whoa,” I said with a laugh. “I think I’m high.”
“Fuck,” he chuckled. “You are a lightweight.”
And then he released me, the amusement in the air snuffed out by something tense and combustible. Something that could detonate a bomb. My smile wavered, and I turned to see Ronan standing behind me.
“Nyet,” was all he said to Albert. A very hard and restrained no.
I swallowed, feeling like I’d done something wrong.
Ronan opened the back door, his penetrating gaze not leaving his driver, while I climbed into the back seat. As soon as he sat beside me and the door shut, I had no idea what I was apologizing for, but I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “I’m sorr—”
He grabbed me by the back of the neck and pulled my mouth to his. I gasped, heat erupting like fire between my legs and licking at every cell in my body. I melted into his rough hold, getting lost in the hot glide of his tongue against mine. My nipples tightened as they brushed his chest, sending sparks lower, and I hummed against his mouth. He groaned low in his throat, pulling my bottom lip between his teeth.
As his hand slid up my bare thigh, I trembled at the feel of those inked fingers on my skin. His touch set my nerves tingling with a panting, unadulterated want. He tasted so good; an injection of vodka straight to my blood. Every inch his palm moved farther up my leg pounded deeper in my core, leaving an empty ache in its place.
I was shaking with need, burning up with each press of his lips. I couldn’t even find the will to care Albert was in the car. But before Ronan’s hand reached where I wanted it—needed it—he stilled, stopping the kiss.
“Nyet,” he said coarsely against my lips, his fingers tightening on the back of my neck.
We exhaled into each other’s mouths, soft breaths and a Russian no vibrating in the air. His hand slid down my leg, pulling my dress back to a decent length, and then he released me. Tension tightened his shoulders as he wiped a hand across his mouth and looked out the window.
Confusion entwined with the hot buzz beneath my skin. I had no idea what just happened, and the strain settled thick in my