Page 56 of Caught By the Bratva Beast

“And what am I coming home to? It's no better than what you do. I come home to a wife who doesn't give a shit that I'm in the door. Hell, you don't even come to argue with me for the sake of arguing with me anymore.”

“I thought you didn't want me to argue with you,” I say, hurrying to keep up with him even as my heel catches between cobblestones and twists the sides slightly. I yelp as I fall, my head falling against the side of the house.

He spins immediately, crouching down beside me, cradling my ankle in his hands. His touch is surprisingly gentle given the current situation. “We're a fucking mess.”

“I don't think we have been anything other than one giant shitstorm when we've been together. But I used to think it was worth it. I still think it might be.”

“What are you saying right now, Pearl?” He shifts my ankle this way and that in his hand, making sure that nothing is wrong with it before he stands, helps me to my feet, and checks my head over. Apart from a dull thud, there’s nothing wrong with it.

“Take Me Home. I'm tired of fighting too.”

He studies me with that stare that seems to go right through me. I let him. If he wants to strip back every single layer of who I am and who I've been, he can.

“No more fighting,” he says, taking my hand, and lacing his fingers with mine as we head to the parking lot. “We're starting over in this marriage.”

He leads me over to the black McLaren sitting at the edge of the parking lot, opening my door, and waiting for me to get inside.

“What's wrong?” I ask when he hovers with the door open a little too long.

“I thought I saw something, but it must have just been somebody sneaking off for some alone time.” Maxim slams the door shut and jogs around the car, getting in beside me before peeling out of the parking lot.

We leave the party behind, driving through the suburbs until we get to the highway. He drums his fingers on the wheel as we come to a red light, the last one before we take off into the oblivion that stretches ahead of us.

“You know, I've been thinking,” Maxim says, his tone slow, his words even and measured. “I've been thinking that it's time you move into my room instead of having one of your own.”

“What else have you been thinking about?” I put my hand on his thigh, fingers trailing closer to his cock.

He puts his hand over mine as the car shoots forward. “I wanted to get to know you since the moment I met you. You've done nothing but make that difficult. When we get home tonight, for every answer you give me, for every question I want to know. I'll give you an orgasm.”

“Oh, so now you're bribing me with orgasms. You seem to think highly of yourself, don't you?” My tone is light and teasing as I unbuckle my seat belt to lean over, kissing his fluttering pulse. “How about instead of sex, we just sit and talk?”

The suggestion is a bold one, and I know that once we start digging into my past, I'm going to have to tell him who I am. I’ll have to talk about my father's death and everything that's happened between then and now.

Maxim might kill me when he finds out that I was planted in his life to begin with. That our meeting wasn’t by chance.

I think that telling him might be worth the risk though. I don't want to keep living having to hide my secrets from him.

“You need to buckle up right now,” Maxim says, his tone deadly. “Right now, Pearl, I don't have time to argue with you, girl. Sit your ass down, buckle up, and hold on.”

I do as he says, shooting backward in my seat, slamming down, and pulling the seat belt back across my body. “What the hell is going on?”

“Whoever I thought was just outside the party is following us.”

I look in the mirror, searching for the car behind us. Headlights shine in the distance, but they're growing closer and closer.

My heart seizes in my chest. The road around us is inescapable. It's surrounded by thick trees growing too close together to drive a car through.

“We didn't bring security tonight,” I say, gripping the seat as Maxim wheels the car around, shooting back the other way.

The car behind us turns with them chasing us down.

“Fuck,” Maxim says, slamming his hand on the wheel. “Get down.”

I obey him immediately, ducking down in my seat, and holding my hands over the back of my neck.

Gunshots ring through the air before the car starts to careen to the side.

“He shot out our fucking tires,” he says. “I'm going to keep driving, but we're not going to make it. None of my men are close. And the car is gaining on us. When they catch up. It's going to be a firefight. You need to be ready to run if I tell you to run.”

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