THE FIXER

The security officer calls us forward and checks our tickets and passport. Maxim keeps me tucked at his side. My skin tingles with the nearness of him, but more than that, a strange satisfaction filters through me. Knowing Maxim’s proud I’m with him is a new sensation. Granted, it’s just because I’m pretty arm candy-exactly what my mother was to my father-but I still like the feeling. There’s an intoxicating power to it. One I guess I’ve been seeking my whole life but rejected every chance of having because I refused to ever give myself to a man. I played the cock-tease, baiting the hook and then casting them back in the ocean.

Now, I have no choice. I belong to Maxim. And in this instance, he doesn’t seem sorry about that fact.

That doesn’t mean I’m going to lie back and spread my legs for him. It doesn’t mean I’m going to play nice or be sweet or any of the things my medieval father expected of me. But things could be worse.

My husband thinks I’m hot and will let me flaunt it.

Fabulous. Because that is the one thing I’ve always enjoyed and been good at.

Maxim

“I’M NOT HAVING sex with you,” Sasha declares again in Chicago after I lead her by the elbow, past my boss and his pregnant lover and the rest of my suite-mates into my bedroom.Property belongs to Nôvel(D)r/ama.Org.

She’s unimpressed by the grandeur of the Kremlin-the name the neighborhood gave to Ravil’s twenty-story building with a view of Lake Michigan. I don’t bring women home to my suite a lot, but they usually drool over the penthouse I share with the upper echelon of the brotherhood-the more than half a story made into our private bratva mansion.

“Worried you can’t satisfy me?” I toss at her.

For an instant, I see her confidence slip, like I poked a wound. Right-probably the one I left when I rejected her back on that yacht in Croatia. In a flash, though, she covers it with a sniff and a toss of her long red mane. “As if,” she throws back, going to stand by the wall of windows to look out at the lights of the boats out on the water. She’s been speaking English since we got on the plane, and apart from the light accent, she sounds exactly like an American college student.

Despite it all, despite what she did to me, I still feel protective of her. Maybe because I saw the way her father treated her. Saw the beautiful, hurt teenager desperate to be loved.

She may be an adult now, but I still see through her bravado.

I set her suitcase on my dresser and walk over. “I didn’t mean that, caxapok.” I lightly touch her upper arms, insinuating my body against her backside without quite making contact. Close enough, so I can feel her little intake of breath. See the goosebumps that raise on her neck. Relish the subtle heat from her body. “It’s my job to satisfy you.” I lower my head and brush my lips over her shoulder. “And believe me, doll, you would be satisfied.”

She stops breathing.

It’s not that I’m dying to consummate this marriage. Although Sasha is hot as fuck, and the chemistry between us is still explosive. I’m just thinking sex might take the edge off. Give us a place to start.

She hates that her father traded her like he was selling a thoroughbred horse. She hates that he picked me, the man who humiliated her right when she was coming into her own sexuality. She especially hates that I control her purse-strings now.

I’m not so thrilled with being saddled with her, myself. But Igor won my loyalty when he saved my life and took me under his wing as a young man, and that loyalty didn’t die when he banished me.

I’d love to park Sasha in some apartment and pretend she doesn’t exist, but I can’t. Her life’s in danger, and I’m responsible for keeping her safe. So like it or not, we’ll be in each other’s faces. Likely for the rest of our lives.

So we might as well make the best of it.

“Not happening.” Sasha’s shut-down is weakened by the wobble in her voice, the breathless quality of her words.

My dick punches out against my zipper. I slip my hands under her arms to coast down her sides. Her body melts back against mine. I splay one hand over her belly, bring the other to squeeze her breast. “You’re mine now, Sasha,” I murmur against her ear. “You might as well enjoy the benefits.”

Her knees wobble. I flick my tongue against her ear, draw her earlobe between my lips and suck. I find her nipple beneath the padding of her bra and pinch it.

She grips my hands and tugs them away, spinning to face me. “Not happening.” Her pupils are blown, cheeks flushed. “I want a separate bedroom.”

I shake my head. “Not happening.”

A seconds-long staredown happens. I can see her gears churning, and I doubt I’m going to like whatever they produce.

“I’m never having sex with you,” she asserts.

“Oh, I think you will. But it won’t be because I force you, sugar. No, you’ll be begging me for it. And I promise you’ll enjoy it.”

For some reason, that promise seems to make her confidence slip for a flash, but she lifts her chin. “Dream on, my friend.” She tosses her hair and heads to the en suite bathroom. I hear the bathtub start, so I undress and crawl in bed. I didn’t let myself sleep on the sixteen-hour flight, knowing we’d arrive in Chicago at night, so I’m fucking exhausted. I watched the movies they showed on the flight, but Sasha watched her own entertainment on her iPad-episode after episode of Downton Abbey. I don’t know why it surprised me, but it did. When I asked, she said she loved historicals.

I guess I thought she’d be watching something insipid. Some stupid romcom thing. But I have to remember she studied theatre. It makes sense she has a thing for period pieces.

I leave the bedside lamp on and doze off, waking when she emerges.

Naked.