Page 9 of Bound By Longing

Nothing and no one will take it from me.

Which is why I’m annoyed when Mikhail himself stalks into my club. He’s with his second in command, Aleksander.

“What do you want?” I ask lazily, keeping my eyes on Giselle. She doesn’t stop dancing, not even when Mikhail grabs my shirt and pulls me up.

“Where is she?” he growls.

“Who?” My drink spills as he drags me closer to him. I sigh. “Look what happened. You made me spill my drink. This had one of my finest gins in it.”

“I don’t give a fuck about your gin. Where’s Mila?”

I stare at Mikhail for a moment before laughing. “Wait. Did you lose her again?”

Mikhail growls and pushes me back so hard I fall against the couch. Giselle hesitates for the first time.

“Keep dancing,” I tell her.

“Go home,” Aleksander tells her.

“You don’t get to tell my dancer what to do.” I straighten out my jacket. “I did not take Mila. I had no reason to.”

“You like her,” Mikhail says. “You came to her birthday.”

“Because I wanted to make an impression. And I like getting under your skin, Mikhail. It amuses me.”

“Aleksander, start looking around,” he orders. Aleksander nods and heads toward the back of my club.

“I didn’t give you permission to go looking,” I call out, but he ignores me.

“If you have nothing to hide,” Mikhail says, “then you shouldn’t be worried.”

“It’s not about having anything to hide, Mikhail. It’s about respect, and you don’t respect me. I do not have Mila. I have no interest in kidnapping women. Any woman. So you can stop wasting yours and my time and go find her.”

Aleksander comes back, shaking his head. “She’s not here.”

I give Mikhail a smug look. “What did I tell you?”

Mikhail points his finger at me. “We’re not done here.”

“I think we are.” I sit back down and nod at Giselle. “Keep dancing.”

Mikhail and Aleksander leave. For a brief moment, I hope they find Mila. Her innocence seemed delectable. I would have loved to have had a taste of her.

But alas, if she’s gone, then she’s not my concern.

MILA

Vladimir stops the car outside a large house. It’s grand and extravagant. “Come along.” He points his gun at me. I have no choice but to get out of the car and follow him inside.

“I want you to wear this.” He grabs a dress from the floor and tosses it at me. Getting a better look at it, I see it’s a maid’s uniform. So, the question becomes—why does he have a maid’s outfit, and why was it on the floor? What happened to the other woman who had this uniform?

“Why?”

“Because you are going to clean my house. Unlike Gleb, who wanted to use you for money, I want free labor. I have no interest in sex with you, girl.”

I’m grateful for that, but it still doesn’t mean I want to work as a maid for a man who kidnapped me.

“Put it on.”

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