Deceitful Vows (Marital Privileges #2)

14. Zoya

14

ZOYA

M ikhail slices his hand through the air, wordlessly advising the waitress that we’re not ready to order yet, before he returns his eyes to me.

I’m not exactly sure how long I’ve been frozen with shock. I doubt it is close to minutes, but it feels like a lifetime.

My first response to Mikhail’s confession is anger. Then it simmers to redemption. I didn’t technically do anything wrong—all that weight belongs on Andrik’s shoulders—but I still feel like I need to defend myself.

“I didn’t know he was married.” I swallow the burn hitting the back of my throat before correcting myself. “That he is married.”

Mikhail exhales deeply, grateful my shock has lifted enough for me to speak. “I know that. I just hope you know I was also unaware.” My brows furrow. Mercifully, he endeavors to eradicate my confusion without me needing to speak. “His nuptials are so recent that news about them only started circulating hours after I texted him to meet me at my penthouse. My message was delivered mere minutes after you left the bar with my keys.”

Even with my confusion as thick as a slab of concrete, his confession slithers through the hairline fractures several tedious minutes of drilling established. “You set us up?”

I don’t know whether to scoff in disbelief or anger when he bobs his chin.

“I knew he wouldn’t be able to help himself.”

“Am I meant to take that as a compliment?”

It takes everything I have to keep my hands balled in my napkin when he nods again. “You were good for him. He was different this morning. Happier. He was so fucking light on his feet he practically floated.”

“That probably has more to do with the fact he blew his load all over your sheets.” I’m a snarky bitch when I’m angry, and Mikhail is learning that the hard way. “More than once.”

When I leap to my feet and march to the front of the restaurant to fetch my coat, no longer hungry, Mikhail races to catch up with me. “Running won’t fix anything, Zoya.”

“What exactly am I meant to be fixing, Mikhail?”

If he says his brother’s infidelities, his left eye will be as shadowed by a bruise as his right.

I am startled by the first contender on his list. “You.” He loses me after that. “Him.” A hint of vulnerability dulls his bright eyes when he murmurs, “Me.” He wets his lips as I stuff my hands into my coat. “There’s more to his sudden wish to wed than he will ever let on, but I won’t find out what that is without your help. You are the first person to push Andrik off his life plan. You made him remember that he’s human.”

I like Mikhail. He’s the kindest stranger I’ve ever met, but only yesterday, he was precisely that—a stranger—so it isn’t my job to fix his family’s woes.

Furthermore, I have enough of my own family drama to contend with. I can’t accept more.

When I say that to Mikhail, he uses my wish for a healthy relationship with my sister to his advantage. “Then stay for your sister. It is barely eleven. She’s still got an hour before she can damage her insides with multiple forms of curdled cream.”

“And risk a possible run-in with Andrik?” When shock that I read his game plan so easily forms on his face, I let out a long-winded breath. “You shouldn’t wish that on your worst enemy, much less your brother.” A rebellion streak fires through me when I mumble, “I might ball my hand this time.”

Mikhail is clearly aware of his brother’s hankering for violence. “It’s worth a shot. It worked well for you last time.”

I “ Ha!” in his face. “So well I was forced into adultery. Excuse me if I don’t rush to sign up for that again.”

I only get three steps away from him when his murmured comment stops me in my tracks. “Even if it will see him leaving his wife for you like he did this morning?” He waits for me to twist to face him before saying, “I only learned that he was married because his secretary attached his annulment paperwork to the quarterly business statements instead of the financial reports only ever compiled on Andrik’s laptop since he doesn’t trust anyone else with them.” He steps closer, his walk back to its cocky strut. “You rocked his world so fucking well that the first report he pulled up this morning was how to annul a marriage contract instead of the financials keeping his bank balance in the billions.”

The mention of his wealth is unnecessary because no amount of money can excuse Andrik’s mistake. He lied—point blank. And as much as my ego is desperate to be stroked, I don’t want it coming from a taken man.

My mother’s violative relationships exposed that if a man can cheat on his wife with you, he can cheat on you too. There is no loyalty with cheaters.

Realizing nothing he could say will erase years of teachings, Mikhail rubs his hands together before saying, “Will you at least let me buy you breakfast?”

“I’d rather push your courtesy for a ride back to my car.” It is chilly out, and although Mikhail’s building is only a few miles from here, I don’t want to walk. Anger hardens your muscles even more than multiple orgasms.

He looks like he wants to argue.

Mercifully, he doesn’t.

“All right.” He accepts his jacket from the smiling coat clerk and puts it on. “But we’re stopping at Vai Me! on the way for supplies. I’m fucking starving, and you haven’t had nowhere near enough caffeine to work through the pile of shit I just dumped on you.”

The flashes of multiple cameras pull me from my stupor state. They race for the vehicle too low to the ground for Mikhail to use the drive-thru at his favorite breakfast haunt before shoving them into Mikhail’s face and mine as if we’re doing something more interesting than lugging bags of fat and salt-laden fast food into the foyer of his building.

The first few questions are about me and what connection I have to Mikhail. His lack of comment soon shifts their focus to Andrik.

“Mikhail, do you have any comments on your brother’s recent relationship status update?”

“Are rumors of a rift between your grandfather and your father true?”

“How did your brother keep his relationship under wraps for so long?”

“Will you be attending the wedding?”

Questions are flung at us so hard and fast that they meld into one.

Thankfully, a combination of security officers and valet attendants stop them from entering the foyer of Mikhail’s building.

I’m left defenseless when we reach the private service elevator I only agreed to ride since I left my keys in Mikhail’s penthouse, though.

Before I can fathom what’s happening, my wrist is seized and I’m yanked into the elevator car with so much force orange juice and flavored iced tea spill over the rims of the plastic cups they were served in, dotting my open-toe heels and ankles.

The stickiness is bad enough to contend with, so I won’t mention my response to the discovery that Mikhail wasn’t pulled into the carnage with me.

He’s still outside the elevator, standing just back from the rapidly closing doors I’ll never reach before they snap shut.

I glare at Mikhail’s snickering face in warning of the wrath I’ll rain down on him once I’m freed from this hot box before I spin to face the cause of the sweat beading on my neck.

As suspected, Andrik is standing opposite me, raking his eyes up my body.

He takes his time assessing me, doubling the anger slicking my skin with sweat.

Justice gets served when his eyes finally make their way to my chest. I don’t know the university’s emblem slashed across the front of the shirt I borrowed from Mikhail, but Andrik clearly does. It firms his jaw to the point of cracking and has jealousy roaring through his body—jealousy he has no right to have.

After lifting his eyes to my face, he loosens the inflexibility of his jaw with a quick grind before he says, “You need to tell my brother you’re not interested.” When I roll my eyes in silent assurance that he has no right to bark orders at me, he lowers his tone from menacing to downright dangerous. “Let me rephrase. Tell my brother you’re not interested.” He steps closer, swamping me with his delicious scent. “Or I’ll make you watch when I remind him how serious my threats are.” The droplets of juice the lid caught are soaked up by his business jacket when he leans in so close his hot breaths revamp my hunger. “Your tally will never reach six, Лисичка . Your body count ended the instant I laid eyes on you.” A smirk curls his lips at one side. “Now it will only ever travel one way.” A shiver involuntarily runs through me when he murmurs, “Dead men don’t count.”

“Is that what you tell your wife so she sleeps better at night?”

Andrik is not a man I should mess with. He’s dark and dangerous, the epitome of threatening, but for some reason, I don’t fear him.

“That all your mistresses are dead, so they don’t count.” I tilt nearer, bringing our eyes so close that our noses touch. “Slashing their self-worth to nothing isn’t killing them, Andrik. It simply frees them of men like you.”

His anger is so white-hot the iced tea is no longer iced. “My wife?—”

“So you admit it? You’re married.”

“Yes,” he answers bluntly, his voice disgusted. “But that doesn’t need to change anything between us.”

“It doesn’t?” If my voice gets any louder, I will sustain permanent hearing loss. “How silly of me. I assumed that the vows you exchange automatically take you off the market when you get married. Now that I know that isn’t true, I have no reason to fret matrimony. I can fuck as many men as I please both before and after I replace you.”

I took it too far, and I realize that long before Andrik’s hand shoots for my throat.

After using his grip to pin me to the wall, he squeezes my windpipe tight enough for me to drop the drinks I was carting for Mikhail but not firm enough for no air to seep through the minute gap.

“Choose your answers very wisely, милая , because my leniencies have reached the end of the line today.”

His fingers around my neck flex, proving he still has some morsel of control. I can’t say the same. His hold is so possessive that I’m more horny than scared.

“Do you understand that I will kill any man you place between us, regardless of his title, status, or reason for being between us?”

His fingers flex again to ensure his firm grip isn’t behind the delay of my head bob.

They’re not. I’m just a stubborn fuck who shouldn’t be turned on by his possessiveness, but for some strange reason, I am.

When I eventually nod, his nostrils flare in victory.

“So what will that make your count when you take your last breath?”

“Five,” I squeak out slowly.

“Five?” he double-checks, his arrogance tripling. I nod again, and the smirk it produces would convince any woman that adultery isn’t so bad. A minuscule of attention far exceeds none. “It’s not five, милая .” He crowds into me so closely I am confident he is seconds from finding out I’m not wearing any panties. “Because, as I said earlier, dead men don’t count.” When he wets his lips, his tongue also moistens mine. That’s how close he’s standing. “So what will your number be?”

I want to say there’s a lengthy delay between his question and my answer, but that would be a lie.

I answer so fast I’m more angry at myself than Andrik.

“One.”

“One,” he repeats, pleased. “And what is the name of that chosen one?”

My delay is far more respectable this time around, but it is still shamefully honest. “Andrik.”

“Andrik.” He says his name with a throaty purr like he’s only ever heard it screamed in ecstasy by me.

As he smirks in victory, he moves his thumb counting my pulse from my neck to my lips. He drags it over them in arrogance like they’re not bone dry before he returns it to my neck, several inches lower this time. He brushes it past my collarbone and then drops it to my budded nipple.

“It’s cold, so maybe you should turn the elevator’s main power back on so we don’t freeze to death.”

I don’t need to look at his face to know he is smiling.

I can feel it.

“You’re cold?”

I nod, uneager to test his leniency with a worded lie just yet. I’m also not sure I can speak through the lustiness scorching my throat.

“How?” He doesn’t give me a chance to answer. “You’re so hot with lust that if I were to slide my cock inside you right now, you’d scald?—”

“Off any nasties your inability to keep your dick in your pants might cause your wife?”

I said he could make any woman believe adultery is okay.

I am not that woman.

He smirks like I struck him, so I make right of the injustice.

I slap him.

The triumph I feel when his head rockets to the side only lasts a second. That’s how fast he advances on me without warning.

In less than a heartbeat, I’m re-pinned to the wall of the elevator, and my mouth is being ravished by the man I swore only minutes ago I’d never let touch me again.

Andrik kisses me as if he can’t breathe without his mouth on mine while he removes the bulky jacket stopping our bodies from completely joining.

The kiss steals away every negative thought I’m having. A deep, lush embrace that surges both my heart and clit into a chaotic beat. It is greedy and devouring, so you can imagine how hard it is for me to pull back.

It is a battle I win—just.

“Stop.” What should be an affirmation comes out sounding more like a moan. “I don’t want this.”

There’s no doubt my last word is a moan. It can’t be helped. Andrik’s growl when he slips his hands under my skirt to grip my bare ass warrants nothing less than a desperate, needy rumble.

He knows I’m bare under my skirt, and like all cocky, arrogant men, he assumes I went without panties for him.

“Andrik…” I push out breathlessly when he falls to his knees and shoves up my skirt.

The more I try to push down the risqué flare, the higher he hoists it.

Within seconds, it is caught in the knot of Mikhail’s college shirt, erotically exposing me, and Andrik absorbs every minute detail.

“Christ. I fucking knew you were drenched for me.”

He backhands my clit before a single lie can fire from my mouth.

When he rubs his fingertips over my opening, my clit’s throbs match the brutal drumming of my heart against my ribs.

My defenses weaken more with every subtle touch, but I try to remember my objectives.

“We can’t. You’re married.”

“It’s an arrangement.” His hot breaths batter my sex as he talks fast and without hesitation. “A tactically laid out ruse. It’s not this.” He lifts his eyes to my face. “She isn’t you.” Vulnerability fires through his hooded gaze. “And since you are… you , I won’t break my promise.”

Again, confusion slaughters my smarts.

I stop thinking with my head when that happens.

When Andrik’s fingers finally shift their focus to my clit, I balance on my tiptoes. He massages the nervy bud with steady, unhurried swivels, tightening my core and removing the last of my objections my confusion didn’t wipe.

“She will never see me like this.” The pad of his thumb rubs my clit as he peers up at me over my thrusting chest. “On my knees, desperate to please.”

I lean my back against the wall and grip my breasts, desperate to ease the ache of their heaviness when his words stimulate my clit as much as his assurance does.

“I’d never had an interest in pleasing a woman orally until I tasted you.”

My knees almost buckle when he replaces the pad of his thumb with his tongue. He swipes it across my clit, triggering a throaty moan, before he gently sucks it into his mouth.

Everything tightens as my objections float away.

I couldn’t stop this even if I wanted to, so I may as well enjoy it.

I know. That’s a pathetic excuse. But can you judge me until you’ve endured the same? A sex god is on his knees, eager to please me. He exudes masculinity and intrigue and has so much confidence that in this very moment, he owns me.

The knowledge should clam me up, but it does the opposite.

I come with a hoarse cry, my limbs shaking as Andrik’s name rips from my throat.

“Yes,” he growls against my shuddering clit.

He guides me through the hysteria engulfing me with needy licks, sucks, and scrapes of his teeth before he rebuilds the wave that only recently crashed by standing to his feet and freeing his fat cock from his pants. It’s beaded with pre-cum and throbbing with want.

“She will never have this. I promise you that.”

A surge passes between us, its current so electrifying that I believe every word he speaks.

We lunge for each other at the same time. Our teeth collide as violently as the crest of his cock breaches the opening of my vagina a mere second after he curls my legs around his waist. He’s so impatient he knifes his hips upward without warning, impaling me with one urgent thrust.

Pain blisters through my veins. It only lasts as long as it takes for Andrik to remember one of the drawings in the brochure in Dr. Hemway’s office. He adjusts my position in an instant. My back braces against the wall, and my hips tilt before he fists the base of his cock with his free hand.

His fist represents the cock pillow the male cartoon character wore, meaning I now only have to acclimate to his girth and not the entirety of his lengthy cock.

The change-up doesn’t dampen a single spark firing between us. They launch through the air as regularly as the sweaty claps of our bodies colliding while we fuck like we have no control over anything.

He pounds into me, his hips churning with every thrust to ensure the crest of his cock hits the sweet spot inside me.

“Yes,” I moan before encouraging him to go harder. To take me faster. “Fuck me, Andrik. Make me yours.”

He pulls me away from the handrail before bouncing me up and down his rigidly thick cock.

I scream as he powers into me. His balls slap my ass as he fucks me with everything he has, making me feel invisible.

I have no shame. No guilt. I’ve completely forgotten how we got here and the angst that began our exchange. Nothing but my next climax is on my mind.

“Yes,” Andrik grunts as the waves crash to shore.

My vision blurs as tingles race over my skin, leaving a trail of goose bumps in their wake. I tremble through a climax so strong the frantic sucks of my pussy as pleasure convulses through it bring Andrik to release.

Blood roars through my ears when he shifts his hips upward before he stills and jerks.

His cum spurting hotly inside me is the first reminder we didn’t use protection.

The sheer ownership on Andrik’s face is the second.