Page 39 of Inked Adonis

I press myself against the wall, willing my breathing to stay quiet. My heart pounds so hard I’m worried they’ll hear it echoing off these pristine walls.

I’m both eager and horrified to hear what my “alternatives” might be. Based on what I’ve seen, anything from a dank, drippy dungeon to an all-inclusive resort are on the table. Samuil seems to deal in harsh juxtapositions.

“You think I should let her go?”

I slap a hand over my mouth before my desperate hope can squeak out of me. Freedom wasn’t even on my mental list of possibilities, filed somewhere between “unlikely” and “when hell freezes over.”

“It might be the best way to discover what she’s really up to,” Myles suggests. “We can put a twenty-four-hour surveillance team on her, tap all her devices, monitor her movements. She won’t be able to make a grilled cheese without us knowing about it.”

I frown. Gilded cage or invisible leash? Neither is particularly appealing, but one comes with my own bed and the possibility of seeing Grams again.

“It might be the fastest way to determine if she’s working for the Andropovs.”

The Andro-who’s? I’m being accused of things I can’t even pronounce.

“No,” Samuil decides. “I want her here, where I can keep an eye on her.”

His words slither down my spine, a mix of threat and promise that makes my skin prickle. Nothing about that should affect me. Nothing about him should affect me anymore.

But it does.

A heavy silence fills the air before Myles speaks again. “You sure there are no ulterior motives?”

“I don’t trust her.”

I bite back a snort.Yeah, right. Out of the two of us,I’mthe one who is untrustworthy? Says Mr. Let-Me-Seduce-You-Then-Kidnap-You himself in there.

If anyone should have trust issues here, it’s me.

“I don’t trust her, either,” Myles says. “But you can continue not trusting her from a distance, while she’s under surveillance. What you can’t do quite as easily from a distance is fuck her. Is this because you have in fact fucked her?”

Heat floods my face. Was that even real? Or was he trying to—quite literally—pump me for information? I feel like I need a shower. A long, hot shower—and then some time alone to think through every single detail of our interaction so I can examine it all from new, interesting angles.

Not the time for that, Miss Libido.

I press my ear closer to the wall, desperate to hear his answer.

“No.”

One word. Two letters. It shouldn’t hurt, but it does.

“Okay, fine. Is it because you want to continue fucking her?”

My fingernails dig into my palms. Whatever his answer is, I don’t care. He kidnapped me. Whether or not the rich, gorgeous psychopath wants to do the no-pants dance again is immaterial. I don’t sleep with kidnappers. Hard line in the sand for me personally.

Still, I find myself holding my breath, waiting for his answer.

“No.” His voice is ice. “It’s because I saw her with my lying, cheating ex-wife. And my lying, cheating ex-wife likes to use women like Nova to do her dirty work.”

Women like Nova?What the hell is that supposed to mean? Suave, sophisticated smokeshows?

Then my brain finally processes the slightly more important part of that sentence.

Ex-wife.

Katerina Alekseeva, Rufus’s owner, one of Hope’s fussiest clients, and theGossip Girl-style Queen Bee of Chicago…

… is Samuil Litvinov’s ex-wife.

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