Page 81 of Little Blue

Every inch of my skin flushes at the way I’d woken to Ilya’s hot mouth on my skin, his fingers playing between my legs. Like the first time he made me come unstitched at the seams, Ilya didn’t enter me, didn’t demand more from me. With one hand around his cock, the other pleasuring me, he came.

When he’d come the time before, he’d been drenched in darkness. This time, morning light had illuminated him in a soft, December glow of pale white. Pleasure, and something like pain, twisted his expression in the moments before a glorious roar had ripped from his throat.

Ilya is not a loud man. In fact, he’s impossibly quiet, stealthy even. He does not scream or yell or bark orders in a command everyone hears and obeys. He speaks quietly, the undercurrents of a deadly threat ever-present in his quiet tones. His eyes are never wild, unless he’s looking at me, that is.

I seem to bring out something in him that otherwise is not there. It’s in my presence that a little of his still, deadly calm, unravels.

Tara smiles a soft, knowingly pleased smile as she lifts a thick, well-buttered piece of fresh banana bread. “Do you want a piece?”

My banana bread. I totally forgot about it.

Thank goodness someone had the presence of mind to take it out of the oven.

I force myself to speak, blushing even harder when it comes out as a croak. “Yes. I think I will.” I feel shy for utterly no reason as I look up at Ilya. “Can I get you one?”

“Did you make it, or my mother?”

Tucking a strand of hair behind my ear, I mutter, “It was a joint effort.”

Ilya chuckles, but it’s gone quickly. His hard blue eyes, filled with so many jagged shards of ice, turn soft and warm as he studies my face. Then, he says gently, “Yes, please.”

I step past an Abu who is gnawing happily on a bone on a little cushion that’s been set in the corner. He eyeballs me but doesn’t stop nibbling to give me a yap of hello.

It’s odd for Polina to not be in the kitchen, but I find it nice to be able to gather my own coffee and bread. It feels more like home, doing these simple things for myself.

Home…

Don’t think about home, Irelynn. This isn’t your home. This will never be your home.

But maybe…

I shove the thoughts from my mind as I bring Ilya a cup of coffee and his bread. Then I return for my own, noting the chair he’d pulled from the table beside his own. I sit next to him as nervous butterflies swarm my belly.

“I trust you had a good night, talking of your differences.” Tara takes a bite of her bread. Her eyes twinkle. “And a very good morning.”

Horror strikes me. She knows.

She knows me and Ilya—she knows I—he—we came.

How does she know? Realization hits me like a blow. Ilya’s roar.

“Stop taunting her,” Ilya commands around a sip of coffee. “It took hours last night to undo the damage your truth caused.”

“She needed to know.” Tara’s eyes settle coolly on her son. “You should have told her.”

“I would have, in time.”

They’re talking about her little—or rather big—Bratva revelation.

I want to melt into my chair. I want to sink into a nondescript puddle on the floor. I do not want to be here for this.

Ilya had frightened me before. Now, knowing what he is and what he’s capable of—he terrifies me.

Even still, I’m oddly curious about him. Oddly, uncomfortably drawn to him, and shamefully responsive.

“It is imperative to hers, and your safety, that she know.” Tara doesn’t give up, doesn’t back down to the cool snap of Ilya’s blue eyes.

She’s got stones, I’ll give her that. If Ilya looked at me like he was looking at her, I think I’d turn to ice and burst into a million shards under the pressure. I shift nervously in my seat.

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