Page 40 of Wicked Pursuit

It’d be smart for an enemy to plant the seeds of dissent now. To target us. Whether to tee us up to be perfect victims later... or to merge with us in a more traditional format. Marriage.

I swallow hard. “How many Romanovs are in Carver City right now?”

He gives me a wolf’s grin. “Smart girl.”

Fuck. Fuck, fuck,fuck. Michelle hasn’t said anything about suspicious people in her life, but she’s definitely been acting strangely. I was dating a damn Romanov for two fucking years and I had no idea. She might have someone close to her. She might be indanger. And Zayne... and the others. Fuck. “Who?”

He just stares at me, expression stony.

A slow-dawning horror takes up residence in my chest. “Tatiana. She’s one of you.”

“My . . . sister.”

The horror inside me grows claws and teeth. His sister. I had hissister’smouth and fingers all over my pussy. I sent him a picture of it. Oh gods... “What thefuck, Casimir?”

“I told you to leave her alone. You didn’t listen.”

I stare at him, trying to see the man I fell in love with. The features are the same—his handsome face, sensuous lips, pale eyes—but Luke never wore a cold expression like Casimir does now. They don’t evenmovethe same. “What was your endgame? Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you never planned to tell me the truth.”

He shrugs. “Once we were married, I would have mentioned something.”

“Mentioned something,” I repeat numbly. “You lied to me. You’vebeenlying to me from the beginning.”

He gives me a long look. “Keep throwing stones, baby. You were so quick to tell me who your parents were to Carver City—who your aunt was. Oh wait, you weren’t. You never did.”

Because I thought he was outside the life. I thought he was something just for me. I hadn’t planned on us getting so serious, moving in together, the whole nine yards. It just kind of happened, and it never felt like a good time to explain that my parents were overprotective because we’re in organized crime. I tucked that conversation away in the same place I’ve tucked my thoughts and feelings about being heir. “That’s different.”

“Sure.” He doesn’t say it like he agrees. “Then let’s do one easier. I might have lied about who I was... but so did you.”

“No, I didn’t. You knew my name from the start.”

“Come on, Red.” He picks up a flogger, and my whole body goes tight. But he doesn’t approach the bed with it. He just runs it lightly over his palm, almost contemplatively. “We wouldn’t be here if you were the good girl you pretended to be for years. You’d still be sleeping next to Luke, the nice guy who’s perfectly safe.”

“Perfectly boring,” I snap.

“You never thought so when you were coming on my tongue.”

I flinch. It’s true. During the first year of our relationship, we were insatiable.Iwas insatiable. I’m still not sure when it all changed. “Not recently.”

“No,” he agrees. “Not recently. I’ve been distracted with work, with things back home that required my attention. I would have course corrected, but you took that option away when you...” His fist clenches around the flogger. “Youcheated, baby. So before you get on your high horse about lies, consider that I haven’t touched another fucking person since we started dating. You’ve done it three times.”

My body flushes with shame, which only makes me angrier. Yeah, I cheated, but would I have if I’d known who he really was? The logic is deeply flawed, but I’m too mad to care. “I cheated onLuke, not you. Once.”

“Semantics.” He drops the flogger and moves to stand at the foot of the bed, his cold gaze raking over me. “Once on Luke, twice on Wolf. It all amounts to the same thing.”

He’s right. I hate that he’s right. I could argue that I was never in a relationship with Wolf, that we never agreed on anything at all, but that doesn’t feel like the truth. “If you were honest with me?—”

“Then you would have gone running to your precious parents.” He crosses his arms over his chest. “And your fathers would have taken exception and tried to do something about it. So I would have killed them, and we still would have ended up here.”

He says it so calmly. It’s not even a threat. It’s just fact. I stare. “No.”

“Yes.” He shrugs. “This is better.”

He’s been four steps ahead of me this entire time. What the hell am I supposed to think of that? I don’t know. I can’tthinkat all. “Did you hurt Tatiana? Threaten her?” Her text hadn’t seemed worried but I was a stranger. It’s no like she’d confess to me.

He actually has the nerve to look insulted. “We’re family. She might be a bitch, but she’s blood. And she hardly forced you into that little threesome. That’s not on her.”

“Funny how you make an exception for her when you didn’t for the others.”

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