Page 59 of Corrupted Guilt

His silence was unnerving. He just kept watching me putting everything away and then the same when I went into the bathroom to take off my makeup and change into the nightgown I just bought. Not quite lingerie but pretty close. The silence was unnerving, and his eyes felt like sunlight on my skin. Yuri used that silence on me before, like a weapon to put me off balance, making me defensive. Make me start babbling just to break the silence. Why was he attacking me with his silence? All I wanted to do was love him. But of course, Yuri would make that hard as possible on me.

“I prefer you sleeping naked next to me,” his voice pierced the silence from the bed.

He was on the bed taking off his pants, slowly unbuckling his belt, unbuttoning the top button of his jeans and slowly unzipping his fly.

Of course, I was watching with rapt attention like a cat watches a mouse or a bear watches salmon jumping upstream. The air around me immediately felt charged like before a thunderstorm and my throat dried up.

I tried to swallow, watching Yuri kicking himself out of his jeans, revealing his red underwear, then he shucked them off too, his cock springing to life between the V muscles of his hips.

My body was ready almost immediately. My heartbeat sped up along with my breathing, all of this was automatic for my body at this point. It has always been like this since the first time. And like that first time I can’t stop this if I wanted to — and I did not want to. I loved watching him and seeing how much he wanted me, how much his body wanted me, his cock growing and showing his own heartbeat speeding up with every throb. He wanted me badly, but he didn't like that he wanted me so much. That was what was behind the silence.

That realization hurt. It hurt a lot. It was pain deep inside, somewhere dark, but like Tasha's mammalian dive reflex, my body was on autopilot and didn't care about the twinge of heartbreak deep down. It's my chance to feel close to him and I’m going to take it, no matter if he shuts me out after. I won’t allow myself to panic or go straight to the hurt. I wasn’t going to skip the fun part and go straight to heartache. That would just be stupid.

This is the fun part.

“God, I want you,” I managed to say. It sounded like a cry of desperation. In it was sort of surrender. I wanted the freedom, the release, the freedom from thought that I had this afternoon, but I couldn't just forget about that searing pain deep down. “I’m going crazy here. I don't know what we have if anything. Every day I hope it becomes clear, becomes something real. And every day feels like a dream that I can't quite hold onto. What do you want from me? Other than sex and for me to be a little bratva wife?”

He answered me with silence and agitation, but I wasn't going to walk out of this bathroom until he answered me, or untilhe walked over to grab me and throw me over his shoulder and carry me to the mattress.

One or the other.

No in between.

“Finally, you're being honest with me, so you deserve a little bit of that same thing from me. You ask me what do I want from you? The answer is: Everything. I want everything from you. But I can't have it.”

“But you can. Of course you can.”

“You know I can't. And you know why.If I get lost in you again, I betray all these other people who rely on me. I betray the Bratva. I betray Dmitry, again. The closer I let you, the easier it is for my enemies to use you to get to me. To hurt you because they know how much I need you to be safe. You know that. That's why I have to keep you distant."

“So, you want me by your side but not an equal just a pet there for you to use when you need me. You talk like there haven’t been other women. I know there have been others. What was your excuse with them?”

“They weren’t you. They didn’t matter. There’s nobody who I’ve let come half as close to me as I have you. I told you, I tell you all the time: Dmitry died because I saw you crying and went to comfort you. I abandoned him and betrayed him for you, and he died. And all this mess because of that. That one moment when I forgot myself and what I had to do. I can’t do that again.”

“Do you think I want to love you as much as I do like this?Or at all if it was my choice? Because I don't want to, not one bit of me. But I've surrendered to it, and I’m brave enough to take a chance and not be a coward and run away from it like you.”

Shit.

That was too far.

26. Yuri

Tears again.

I hate a woman's tears.

Katya's tears are different this time because I was the sole reason, causing her pain. Why the hell was I the way I was? Everything I was, everything I turned myself into, the foundations, the absolute bedrock of my personality did this.

People can change but I would have to change my 90% not my 10%. If I could change that much, I'd be unrecognizable to her but maybe she would still love me?

It's not even worth thinking about. But she deserves honesty. She deserves my honesty and my bravery because she's given me everything she has.

Watching her cry, I felt like somebody cut me open and was poking and prodding all the tender parts inside me. For everything amazing that she was, she was also childish at times. A royal pain in my ass, but she was not the type of person who cries at the drop of a hat. And she was trying very hard not to cry in front of me right now. That was clear. But the tears were winning out. The vulnerability there, the bravery it took to be so vulnerable moved me. The tears began to overtake her body and shook her as she cried. They kept rolling harder the more she tried to fight them back, and the more she wiped them angrily. I got up and walked towards her slowly, brushed her hair from her face and took her in my arms, pressing her wet, weepy face against my chest and the crook of my neck.

“Know that I love you. Know that I have loved you since you were a child. Know that I'm not the type to love more than once in my life. Know that you're the only one. Know whatever happens. But you also know why I can’t give in to that. You know why. I can't risk you being in danger and my enemies using you to get to me. Hurting you to hurt me. You’re my vulnerable spot, my soft pink underbelly that if people like Petya see it, they’ll go after it. I can't walk around and lead a Bratva and be that vulnerable. You know that in your heart of hearts.”

She tried harder to accept it. She held me tighter and stayed there until her breathing calmed and any tears falling were the silent ones. It was heart breaking but necessary. I took her chin between my thumb and index finger and tilted her face up and bent my head down to slant my mouth over hers with a deep, hungry kiss that tried to reach that part in both of us that hurt so God damned much. We had very little time together like this and there was no use thinking about forever of the rest of our lives— this was it, and we could either enjoy it for what it was or spend our last moments mourning something that wasn’t dead yet.

I kissed her like I was trying to wipe out the pain in her eyes and in her heart and in both of our souls. Trying to savor every moment with her like this. I had little ego left to lose. She had my pride too.

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