Guarded Rebellion (The Baranov Legacy)

11. Lev

11

LEV

S he’s not yours.

She’s not yours to get possessive over.

She’s not ? —

“Lev? Are you even listening to me?” Rurik demanded.

I exhaled, wishing I could lose the pent-up frustration trapped in my chest.

All afternoon and into the evening, I mentally berated myself for losing my cool with Eva earlier. I came back to see the punk with his arm on her, like she was his , and it pushed me close to snapping.

The idea of another man with her wasn’t supposed to piss me off. She would be married off whenever the Boss decided.

Bottom line, she wouldn’t end up with me . And I was struck by how much I had let that idea get into my head.

Marcus raised his brows at me, and I stifled the need to groan. He’d been watching Eva during my meeting with her uncle. And he hadn’t intervened with Bryce’s sudden approach to her. He hadn’t seen a need to step in, sensing the guy to be a non-threat. But his comment that came later irked me.

“ She wasn’t interested in him,” Marcus had said after he met up at the apartment following the lecture. “Eva didn’t look like she wanted to bother herself about that guy. So I trusted her judgment on the situation and didn’t see a need to rush in and extract her.” His reasoning was just, but it also pointed out how over the top I had been.

Now, hours later, Marcus and Rurik joined me outside the library, where Eva studied in a group with Kelly. Marcus said he’d linger on campus because of something he heard from students as they left that lecture hall. Rurik was nearby as well, as I expected him to be as my backup and remote eyes and ears.

“Yeah,” I told him, lying. “I’m listening.”

Marcus cleared his throat. “I’m going to take off, all right?” He lifted his hand in a wave, excusing himself now that he’d shared his intel with us.

Once we were alone, my fellow soldier and friend scowled at me. “You were thinking about Eva again.”

I furrowed my brow. “Of course, I was. She’s my assignment.”

He shook his head. “No. More than that. Lev, man. You can’t let her get under your fucking skin like this.”

You think I don’t know it?

I crossed my arms, determined not to zone out about her again. Or at least I’d keep that habit to when I was alone, lying in bed and not sleeping because I’d never find decent pillows to rest on again. “You were saying?”

He sighed. “I was saying that what Marcus overheard and followed up on is the same shit that I was wondering about.”

“Drugs on campus aren’t exactly a surprise,” I reminded him. I’d never gone to college, but everyone knew people experimented during those formative years.

“I agree. But there’s an uptick on reports of female students being drugged. And raped.”

“Duly noted. But this doesn’t relate to Eva. She won’t be in the position to be taken advantage of. I’m with her all the time. And if I’m not, you or another man are assigned to her.”

He grunted a wry laugh. “And that’s expected. She expects it too. Eva knows that she’ll have guards with her, but if you keep acting like a fucking asshole with her, I wouldn’t be surprised if she reacted in kind. She might try to sneak away from you, just to spite you. Then she might end up somewhere she shouldn’t.”

I straightened, lowering my arms. “Are you suggesting I’m not cut out for this job?”

“Fuck, man. Yes, you are. Obviously, you are. The Boss wouldn’t have chosen you if he didn’t trust you. But this goddamn push-and-pull bullshit you’re playing with her can backfire.”

“Eva will always be protected,” I reiterated, not wanting to touch on what else he’d noticed.

I enjoyed being hard on Eva because those were the rare times she let me see her, the real her. Not the icy princess she was supposed to be. Not the obedient niece who followed rules and expectations. But the woman. The free spirit who wanted to rail against me and protest being ordered. Eva didn’t have a submissive bone in her body, but I intuited how much she reveled in the opportunities to defy me and stand up to me.

I never saw her more alive than when she argued with me. I never heard such heat and passion in her voice as when she threw my attitude back in my face.

I couldn’t get enough of it, but I had to watch it. I had to watch myself, because Rurik was right. Letting my desire grow would backfire, one way or another.

“Do you hear me?” I asked him, pushing off the wall I’d been leaning against as I waited in the corridor just outside the area of the library she was studying in. “She will be protected. Under my say so, no harm will come to her.”

“Because you can control everything, huh?”

“I will control the measures that are required to keep her safe.”

“Including yourself?” He raised his brows, dubious. “Are you going to control yourself with her?”

I clenched my jaw. “Yes. Of course.”

I brushed past him to find her and take her home. Even though it was a few minutes before the end of the designated study group meeting, I imagined she’d be ready to leave.

“It’s not like she needs to study anyway,” I muttered to myself as I opened the double doors. It wasn’t any of my business, but I saw her grades when she left her laptop open. I’d skimmed over her shoulder when she checked emails from her instructors and professors, all complimenting her on work well done. Eva was brainy. A bookworm and an industrious scholar. Maybe it came naturally to her, and this excuse to attend a study group was just another way to spend time with Kelly.

Hell, maybe I could ease up and let the woman visit at the apartment. My reservation about letting Kelly into our apartment was for security reasons only, but if easing up on that rule would make Eva happy?—

For fuck’s sake, I’m not here to make her happy.

She’s a job.

An assignment.

I’m here to keep her alive and ? —

I spotted her at the same table I saw her taking a seat at an hour ago. Rage colored my vision now, though. She was still there. Books lay open on the table. The only difference now was that Bryce had his mouth on her.

“What the fuck?” I growled, trying and likely failing to keep my tone down. Other students turned as I strode into the area of tables and lamps. Kelly lifted her face and grimaced. “Shit. Eva.”

Eva turned, pulling her face from Bryce. He leaned over from the chair he straddled, closing the distance to her. As she pivoted to see what had alarmed Kelly, she moved her face further from that ass’s mouth. He’d only put his lips on her cheek, but even that was far too much for me to tolerate.

But then she narrowed her eyes. Sensing the wrath I couldn’t mask, seeing the very real and evident anger I couldn’t hide, she did exactly what Rurik predicted.

She reacted.

She retaliated.

Before I could reach their table, she grabbed the front of Bryce’s shirt and hauled him toward her. She couldn’t have planted her mouth against his for more than a second, but I stole the bastard’s opportunity to respond in kind and kiss her back any harder than the peck it was.

“Get lost.” I yanked him up with one hand clutching the back of his leather jacket. He stood, arms flailing as I ducked toward his ear. “Stay away from her. This is your last fucking warning.”

Shoving him back, I scowled at Eva.

Pissy and put-out, she rolled her eyes and gathered her things. “Looks like it’s time for the overlord asshole to tell me that it’s time to go,” she quipped to Kelly.

Kelly avoided making eye contact with either of us, busying herself with collecting her books and highlighters. “Yeah. Um. Yeah. I’ll talk to you tomorrow at History,” she replied.

Eva stood, shoving her chair in with more force than necessary. It seemed like she wanted to preempt me and avoid my having a chance to tell her what to do. Stiff and jerky with frustration burning in her cool-blue eyes, she shot me a withering glare and stormed off past me.

I caught up easily, walking at her side out of this study area of the massive library. Silence hung between us, but the tension and mutual flurry of hot emotions crackled with every step we took. The need to hold her arm and force her to look at me taunted me. This drugging pull to her tempted me to stop her in her tracks and scold her, regardless of the quiet mandated in this facility.

The second we were outside, though, I whirled her around to me.

“What the fuck was that?”

She tipped her chin up, not speaking.

“I told you?—”

“Not to talk to him,” she finished hotly. “I didn’t. I didn’t speak to him. Ask Kelly!”

“But you think it’s wise to kiss him?”

She softened her glare into an expression of sarcastic amusement. “Don’t worry. My ‘purity’ is intact.” Then she shook her head and walked off.

I caught up again, taking hold of her arm and stopping her again. “That’s not the issue.”

“Oh, it isn’t? Gee, here all this time I was assuming you were here to keep me alive and virginal.”

And she would be. Under my watch. But I doubted she’d kissed him in any effort to lose her virginity. “Why’d you kiss him?”

She shrugged. “Because I could.”

I shook my head, stepping closer and remembering Marcus’s comment about her not seeming interested in Bryce. “If you didn’t want to talk to him, why’d you try to kiss him?”

“Because.” She tried to wrench her arm out of my grasp, but instead of letting her go, I walked her to the car.

“Why?” I demanded once she was in the car and sulking, arms crossed.

“Because!” she shouted, losing her temper. “Because I wanted to make a stand!”

I ground my molars, pissed off to no end.

“I saw you rushing up close—mad, again —and I was sick of it. I’m sick of you ordering me around and being such an asshole!”

“This is my job.”

“Yeah, well you’re taking it too far. I can talk to a man without the risk of being fucked, Lev. I can even kiss a man and still be pure for the husband my uncle will force on me. For fuck’s sake, I just want to live my life and not have to dwell on the fact that I can’t really have one.”

“And you think that’s the way to go about it?” I shot back as I drove.

“If kissing some guy can be a way to show you that I can’t be owned, then yes.” She whipped her head to stare out the window instead.

My fury scaled higher. Gripping the steering wheel tighter, I counted back from ten to keep a steady hand on my rage.

She’s not yours.

She will be owned, but she’s not yours .

She stewed and steamed, glaring out the window as I brought her to the apartment. With her silence, I tried to check my anger. To calm down before yelling how wrong she was. She would be owned, and she had no life other than being a pawn for her uncle. We both knew it. It was just the way of life. But I hated that it had to be so.

I had no right to her.

I had no grounds to tell her it didn’t have to be that way.

That was the way it would be, no matter how much I was starting to wish otherwise.

“Regardless of your stubborn opinions about this fallacy of independence,” I told her as we got out of the car in the parking garage, “you can’t afford to be this stupid.”

She growled, turning on me as we walked to slap me. “Don’t call me stupid!”

I grabbed her, wrapping my arms around her as I carried her the rest of the way to the elevator. Roughly letting her down, I watched as she slammed her back to the wall. I pushed the button to go up. “Don’t act stupid, then.”

She lunged forward to slap me again, and I stopped her hand midair, using the opportunity to spin her in my arms and hold her tight. Her back to my chest, we both heaved for air and panted from the rush.

“Women have been drugged on campus lately,” I told her.

“Yeah, I know.” She wrestled to get away to no avail. “But I’m not. It was a fucking study group, Lev. Not a rave.”

“And there have been rapes,” I added.

“Again, yeah. I know! But that doesn’t impact me . Because I’m not on campus. And I’m always with one of the soldiers!”

I tightened my arms around her. “That doesn’t matter. You could do better than to act so careless and kiss some random fucking idiot. One who’s been seen with the ones raping those drugged women.” I let that nugget sink into her brain. Marcus was the one who’d found out that detail, and while it justified my not wanting her to be near Bryce, it didn’t excuse my jealousy of another man having dibs on her.

I released her when we reached the door to the apartment, but I didn’t let her go far. Taking her arm again, I dismissed the smoothness of her skin on her wrist. I ignored the charge of a shock that warmed me from making physical contact with her. Now wasn’t the time for it. It would never be.

“I hope you’ll learn your lesson and think twice about associating with a potential threat again,” I told her. “Consider this your first lesson of discipline from your ‘overlord asshole’.”

She didn’t flinch, keeping her neck craned so she could face me with fury written on her gorgeous face.

“You’re not going anywhere tomorrow. You’re staying in this apartment where you can use this time out to think about your mistake.”