Page 101 of Cashmere Cruelty

And when Matvey fucks my hips down onto himself, impaling me on his throbbing cock, that’s exactly what I do.

I stop thinking.

And it feels so, so good.

30

MATVEY

As soon as I climb into the car, Grisha’s nose twitches like a hound on a scent.

I watch him sniff the air without even trying to hide his intrigue. I’d remind him of curiosity and all the cats it did in, but honestly, I’m just too goddamn spent.

“Bath salts?” he ventures.

“Yes,” I drawl, sliding in my seat. “New brand. It’s calledNone of Your Fucking Business.”

Grisha whistles. “Never heard of it.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.”

All I wanted tonight was to stay in that bathtub. Stay until I’d had April in every conceivable position above and below the water. Above and belowme.Until my fingers pruned beyond repair, until my neck spawned gills. For one more taste of that little siren, I’d have learned to breathe underwater.

Unfortunately, work is a thing.

I gaze out the window as Grisha carries me through Manhattan traffic. It’s a nightmare during the day, but at night, it’s… not any different. It’s the purpose of it that changes: under the sun, people trudge to work, cursing the day they were not born rich. Under the moon, they thrive.

It’s not quite the same if you’re Bratva.

Being Bratva means standing on top of the world regardless of how you were born. It means biting into life and feasting on the juices, knowing no one can keep you from drinking it dry.

It also means you don’t get to keep office hours.

But my mind doesn’t seem to care about that. Tonight, my mind has well and truly betrayed me, deciding to stay behind in that tub with the object of my desires.

And, now, my concerns.

“She must have loved you very much to say that.”

“Yeah, right. She was talking about Charlie, not me.”

It isn’t the first time April’s mentioned her family. Or rather, that she talks about it like a special kind of hell she’s lucky to have escaped from.

It is the first time she’s mentioned her mom.

I shouldn’t care. The former Mrs. Flowers should be no one to me except my child’s futurebabushka. I should pretend she never mentioned anything and move on with my?—

“Grisha, what do you know about April’s mother?”

Goddammit.I tell myself that practicality is why I’m asking. If this woman is a danger to my child, I need to know.

If this woman was a danger tohers?—

“Not much,” Grisha answers. “We checked the basics. Eleanor Hill, forty-four years old. She has a daughter from her first marriage—that’d be Ms. Flowers—and a son from her second. Currently lives on Staten Island with her husband and kid.”

It sounds so utterly mundane. So unlike anything worth investigating.

I don’t trust it one bit.

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