Guarded Rebellion (The Baranov Legacy)

10. Eva

10

EVA

T he moment the lecture was over, I was filled with excitement. Intro to British Lit was my favorite class, and I couldn’t wait to start researching for the next paper. Maybe I was one of those hopeless romantics, always intrigued about time-worn relationships countless scholars had read about and analyzed. Shakespeare wouldn’t be touched on until the end of this course, but already, the book nerd in me was content with the material.

“Are you going to the study group in the library tonight?” Kelly asked. She frowned, though, craning her neck to see through the crowd. “Wait. Where’s Lev?”

“He had a meeting to attend.”

“Oh.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “I’m used to seeing him with you.”

“Even if he’s not paying attention to me.” I rolled my eyes, peeved about how often he was on his phone and grumpier with his distracted mood.

“Ah…” Kelly teased in a sing-song voice. “So you do want him to notice you.”

I wisely didn’t reply. “Well, he doesn’t need to be focusing his attention on that redhead who thinks colliding into men is a way to get close.”

She laughed, shaking her head. “Eva Baranov. You’re jealous.”

Again, I wisely kept my mouth shut. She hadn’t been giving me too much shit about this “crush” that she claimed I was developing for my bodyguard, and I didn’t want to fan the flames of that theory.

Why should I waste the time getting my hopes up high for a sexy beast of a man like Lev when my fate would remain the same? I wouldn’t be allowed to marry him. I’d be bartered off to someone for a power play. Coming here to college was bittersweet enough. I was chasing a dream I couldn’t even see finishing. If I were to let myself get carried away lusting after Lev, I’d only be disappointed to never get what I wanted where he was concerned, either.

Spotting Marcus in the distance, I walked with Kelly among the mob of people leaving. “I have a replacement, anyway. My uncle wouldn’t let me be completely unsupervised.”

“Supervised? I’ll volunteer to ‘supervise’ you,” Bryce said as he inserted himself between me and Kelly. She sidestepped clumsily from how forcefully he came close, but he didn’t notice her scowl.

Not again…

He slung his arm around my shoulders, and I couldn’t hide the deep sigh of exasperation that left me. I hoped I did a better job of masking my irritation, though. Locking my face into the usual neutral expression that Kelly called my resting bitch face, one that she envied, I acknowledged him. “Hey, Bryce.”

Ever since Lev showed me the difference of what it felt like to have his body up close and personal against mine, I had no interest in Bryce.

Or… any of the men on campus. They were my age. They were supposed to be my peers. But could only “understand” or relate to Lev and the other soldiers. All the young men here as students were innocents, random strangers who existed outside the sphere of organized crime, and that distinction wasn’t an easy one to cross.

“What are you ladies talking about?” he asked. Smiling at Kelly, he tried to sling his arm around her shoulders, but she shouldered him off. I bit back a smile, not having the energy to do the same. The sooner he said his piece, the sooner he’d walk away.

“Nothing,” I replied. “Just wondering about the study group at the library later.”

“You going?” he asked. “I might.”

I arched my brows, smiling. “You?”

“Hey, why do you act so surprised?” He mocked an injury to his chest. “I study.”

I rolled my eyes, playing along. “You do not. You either nap in class or skip them half the time.”

“What can I say? Life is short.”

“Then why would you go to a study group at the library?” Kelly asked.

“To get hooked up, of course.” He winked at me. “One of my… friends will be there later.”

“Ah.” I didn’t see any need to comment any further. I was no stranger to drugs. My uncle had deep reaches into the drug trade. All the Mafia families did, as well as the Cartels, mobs, and gangs. I never used anything myself, but I was all too aware and informed of how drugs made the world go round, just like money. Because at the end of the day, drugs were money.

Here and there, I’d overheard many students asking about where to get the “good shit”. I also saw plenty of students sneaking a line in the library or smoking who knew what. Kelly confided in me about finding needles and other bits of drug paraphernalia in the communal bathrooms at the dorms. On that note, I was grateful that I didn’t have to live in the dormitory—not that I would ever thank Lev for his decision to dictate where I’d live.

“I heard that one of the football players OD’d last night,” Kelly said.

“Damn,” Bryce said sarcastically. “He must have had the really good stuff.”

I rolled my eyes, but before I could think of a way to ease out of a topic I wanted no part in, I saw Lev’s furious face as he cut through the crowd. The entire hall’s worth of students were walking out . We moved as a long line with several across, trudging up the auditorium to leave, but Lev strode against the grain. Students moved to the sides as he wove through, his stern gaze locked on me.

“Not that fucker again,” Bryce said. “Who is he, Eva? Some pissed-off ex?”

“He’s—” I didn’t have to scramble for an explanation of who Lev was. It still wasn’t something I was used to having to do, explain that I had security around me. Being here at college was probably the only time I’d be able to experience living a “normal” life, and as soon as I was done, I’d be right back where I supposedly belonged, among the soldiers and Mafia family I was born into.

He deprived me of answering my classmate, though. Lunging forward, he shoved Bryce’s arm off me at the same time he wrapped his arm around my waist, propelling me to the side to walk along the narrower space of a row of empty, folded-up seats.

“Hey!” I caught myself from toppling over into the next row, moved too quickly from his maneuver to be balanced.

Lev urged me to continue on, though, not letting me fall. With his hand closed around my wrist, he pushed me to hurry along the row until we reached the side aisle.

“What the hell?—”

He spun me, cutting me off as he pushed me against the column there. My back smacked into the round surface, and by the time I huffed a breath to blow my hair out of my face, I realized he’d cornered me in a private nook off from anyone else’s view.

“What the hell,” he growled, stealing my words, “were you thinking talking to him?”

Fury radiated off him. His eyes were slitted in anger, and the tension in his hard body fueled me to react in kind. My temper boiled over, and I pushed to shove him back. He didn’t let me, of course, insistent on getting an answer.

“I can talk to whoever the hell I want to,” I argued, instantly enraged at his controlling attitude.

Yeah, I was controlled. True, I had no real freedom. My life wasn’t mine to decide. But while I was here at college and trying to fit in as an ordinary twenty-something, I wanted to bask in that illusion. And I hated how much he was a reminder that I could never have what I desired.

Freedom. Independence. The ability to make my own choices.

“Not according to me.” He advanced, closing in on me and caging me to the wall again. It was such a dick move. It was an action of an obsessive control freak trying to rule with the superiority of being a man.

Yet, it was hot as fuck. The closer he pushed his big, hard body toward mine, I wanted to cling to him more. To feel… all of him. Desire sped through my veins, and I hated how quickly my body could want what my brain warned against.

“You are here to study. To read your fucking books and take notes. Not flirt with punk-ass boys like him.”

A fleeting thought struck me that he could be… jealous. Marcus was near. He saw me next to Bryce, and he hadn’t freaked out. Rurik never seemed this overprotective and worried if a man ever spoke to me on campus. This feral anger belonged to Lev alone, and I wondered.

You’re jealous, aren’t you?

I couldn’t call him out on that. To address the tension simmering between us, I’d have to admit that I wanted him too. And no good could come from that.

“I didn’t give you permission to speak to him.”

I huffed, biting my lip as I glanced away, thrown off by this suspicion that he could be jealous.

If he’s jealous, it means he cares. It means… I matter.

“He approached me. He came to say hello to me. I did nothing. I didn’t encourage anything.”

“You didn’t encourage him?” He ground his teeth and shook his head. “I saw you. That shy smile. Laughing along. I saw you next to him. It didn’t look like you were trying so hard to discourage him.”

“Oh, fuck you, Lev. Fuck. You.” At the last clang of the hall doors closing, signaling we were the only ones in here, I pushed his chest and slipped to the side. “He talked to me . For maybe ten seconds. Get over it.”

“No. I won’t get over it. You need to follow my rules and my orders, and that includes not talking to that piece of shit who’s only trying to get in your pants.”

“I am following your rules,” I shot back as I walked up the aisle to exit.

“It didn’t look like it.”

“Oh, so you can be distracted and barely paying attention to me with all your calls, but the second you put it down, you have to take out your anger on me? Fuck you, Lev.”

“I’m not angry,” he replied as he marched alongside me.

“God. What a joke. You’re not angry?” I smirked. “Yeah, I’m not buying that.”

“I’m furious,” he growled instead. “Do not speak to him again. Have I made myself clear?”

My heart raced at his words. So controlling. So dominant. I was sick and tired of men dictating everything in my life. For once, I wanted a goddamn break from it.

“Crystal clear,” I bit back, knowing I had no intention of sticking with this rule.

His overbearing attitude was too much. He was too much. After a week of loose guidance while he was on calls, I wasn’t in the mood for him to overcorrect and come down hard on me . I wasn’t doing anything wrong. I was studying and minding my own business, reading and doing research for assignments. Life wasn’t fair, I knew that. But the way he wanted to take out his aggression on me was bullshit.

I wasn’t social. I didn’t go out of my way to speak to people. Socializing wasn’t high on my list of priorities, and for that reason, his reaction to one man talking to me pushed me over my tolerance.

I’ll show you.

So long as I was here and further from the Mafia world, I’d indulge in every thread of independence that I could.

Whether you like it or not.