skin, I felt closer to that girl with dirt on her face and Edgar Allen Poe in her hand than I had in a long time. And that terrified me. Like a single snowflake drifting to Miami’s hot pavement, if I escaped this alive and returned home, I wouldn’t belong.
I remained still when Ronan’s presence touched my back, ready for the torture to begin. He lowered to his haunches in front of me and brushed the tears from my cheek. His words held steady against the breeze that tousled my hair.
“Where is your God now, kotyonok?”
Goose bumps rose to my skin, but they weren’t from the cold. The shiver was out of fear the devil had a soft side. Nothing was more frightening than a whisper beckoning me to step into the dark.
Then he lifted my deadweight and carried me back to hell.
hagridden
(n.) troubled or tormented, as by a witch
If someone asked how I envisioned my five-year life plan, it wouldn’t have included carrying a bloody American back to a guest room where I was keeping her hostage. I had a specific area for hostages in the basement. I also didn’t pick up a woman unless my dick was wet, and the angle was wrong.
Mila remained silent as I carried her up the stairs. Her weight felt solid in my arms. She was shaped like the kind of woman I preferred—the kind who could take a hard fuck without the worry she might break.
Just the feel of her body against mine sent a rush of blood to my groin. Meanwhile, the object of my hard-on reeked of despair.
As she should.
She actually elbowed me in the face. I didn’t want to kill the girl—necrophilia wasn’t my kink—so, after she split my lip and self-control, I released her with the belief Adrik holding an AK-47 in the hall would stop her in her tracks. I didn’t account for her ability to lay him out and take his fucking gun.
Oddly enough, when I heard her cry of pain, a hot and unpleasant sensation expanded in my chest. I could only relate the feeling to the anticipation of receiving a package in the mail, only for the delivery man to shake it like a Christmas present and break it. Adrik had fucked with my package.
Mila may have been raised as a soft-hearted American, but it was now clear she could be a Mikhailov when she needed to be. The fact shouldn’t turn me on, though after she’d gotten one over on me and I watched her unload three bullets into Adrik, all I could think about was fucking her raw in his blood. The urge was a little twisted, even for me.
Annoyed with this girl and the constant hard-on she aroused, I dropped her to the floor in her room.
She gasped, tossed the hair from her face, and shot me a look of resentment. I suppressed a smile and moved to the dresser to grab the discarded ropes from the top. Mila got to her feet, and, warily, piercing blue eyes met mine.
Fuck, she was stunning—even while she emulated Stephen King’s Carrie with a singular obsession for Elvis.
She was drenched in blood and hadn’t fainted. Maybe I’d broken my pet’s phobia. I walked toward her, evading the broken chair on the floor, with the ropes in my hand.
She backed up and shook her head. “No.”
There she went with that word again.
My eyes narrowed. “We’ve had this talk.”
Her almond eyes softened with something almost pleading, and the sight hit me in the chest and ached in my cock both at once. The unsettling sensation brought anger to the forefront. She drew my blood when I was focused on her naked ass. Foolish error on my part. And now, with a single look, she was making me question my ill intentions.
When she only stood there, I warned, “You don’t want to fight me right now.”
I’d do something I’d regret, like hurt her or fuck her. I realized I didn’t like the former, and I didn’t want to force the latter.
After a momentary stare down, she took my threat seriously and moved to the bed to lie on her back. As she dutifully raised her hands above her head, her shirt rode up her thighs. Forcing my gaze from the sight of the shadowed apex between her legs, I started to tie her wrists to the headboard.
She stared at the ceiling and didn’t say a word. So blue and clear, her eyes were practically transparent, and right