Page 41 of Ivory Ashes

Before I can even think about grabbing it, a large shape rises up in front of me.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

15

VIVIANA

“Where do you think you’re going?”

The overwhelming smell of mint and cedar hits me before my eyes adjust. Mikhail is only a few inches away from my face, so I have to tip my head back to see all of him.

He’s wearing a black shirt that hugs his large biceps and gray sweatpants that somehow fit him better than the suit he’s been wearing all day. And his face is… sparkly? I might be hallucinating.

Before my mind can spin off in some Twilight-esque vampire fantasy, I realize Mikhail is sweating.

“Were you working out?” I blurt.

“I was… until I saw a hobo lurking in the hallway outside Dante’s room.” He kicks at my makeshift stick-and-bedsheet suitcase. “What in the hell is this?”

“Someone hid my actual suitcase.”

“Because you don’t need it,” he growls. “You aren’t going anywhere.”

Before I can argue, Mikhail throws me over his shoulder and carries me back into my room. I pound his annoyingly muscular back with my fists.

“Put me down!”

No sooner than the words are out of my mouth, he drops me on the bed.

I flop and flail like a fish for a few seconds before I get my land legs and scramble to the edge of the mattress—only to find a wall of hard, sweaty flesh there blocking my path.

“You can’t keep us here,” I snap, knowing full well he absolutely can and will. “This is kidnapping.”

“I think it’s actually abduction.”

“Same thing.”

“Not in the eyes of the law,” he says, his own eyes chilling me to the bone.

I cross my arms. “What kind of person knows those legal definitions?”

“The kind who can get away with them,” he retorts. “You aren’t going anywhere.”

I shove against his chest. “You smug, cocky?—”

In one move, Mikhail grabs my arms, spins me onto my stomach, and?—

The sound of his hand cracking against my ass steals the breath from my lungs, the thoughts from my head, and the “what the hell” from my “are you doing”?

I snap my head around, eyes so wide I’m sure my face will be stuck like this forever. Permanent shock and horror for the rest of my days, like a gargoyle with a messy bun.

“Did you just spank me?!” I scream.

Instead of answering my rhetorical question, he does it again. Pushes me down with the flat of one hand between my shoulder blades. Rears back. CRACK.

Hand, meet ass. Ass, meet hand.

Pain, meet pleasure. Pleasure, meet pain.

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