Page 34 of Mafia King's Ruthless Obsession

My breath catches, caught between the urge to move and the burn of defiance crawling up my spine. My bare feet press into the hardwood, grounded and trembling all at once. He watches me from that leather throne like a king awaiting tribute, his expression carved from restraint, his eyes anything but.

He’s daring me. Testing my edges.

But so am I.

“Does sitting on your lap qualify as ‘no touching’?” I ask, voice smooth as glass, laced with barbs. I raise a brow, letting the smirk curl at the edge of my lips.

His chuckle is low, sliding from his throat with a predator’s patience. “That depends,” he says, the words slithering through the space between us, thick with heat. “Are you sitting as a performer…or a business partner?”

Business partner.

So that’s the game now.

I take my time—not because I’m hesitant, but because I want him to feel every second of it. His eyes follow. His jaw flexes. His hands curl tighter around the armrests like he’s resisting the instinct to reach for me and shatter every inch of control he’s built.

Good.

I stop just short of him, close enough that the scent of his cologne hits—dark and clean and painfully familiar. “Business partner,” I echo, low and lazy, my fingers grazing the back of the chair as I lean in, lips hovering near his temple. “But we both know there’s nothing clean about our business, Vasiliy.”

“Nothing clean,” he murmurs, eyes flicking to my mouth. “Nothing simple.”

Carefully, I lower myself onto his lap.

It’s not a collapse. It’s not a surrender. It’s a statement.

I position myself with precision—knees angled just enough to keep us from fully touching, but close enough that he can feel the heat pulsing from my skin. Every inch of space between us vibrates like wire pulled taut. My weight settles against his thighs, and his body tenses beneath me like a loaded gun.

He exhales slowly, like a man trying not to break open. “If there’s no touching,” he says, his voice velvet-wrapped steel, “how does this work?”

The danger is in the softness. In the way he’s barely holding on.

“That’s the point,” I say, resting my palms lightly on his shoulders. “They don’t get to touch. They can look. Crave. Ache. But they don’t get to take. Only the performers decide who gets more.”

He goes still under my touch, but the silence between us roars.

“Untouchable,” he repeats, tasting the word like it offends him. His knuckles pale where they grip the chair. “And what happens when someone decides they’re tired of boundaries? When frustration turns to demand?”

“Then they pay for the illusion of control,” I say, fingers curling slightly into his suit. “And the more they want? The more they give. Frustration isn’t a weakness, Vasiliy. It’s leverage. And leverage…is profit.”

He silently studies me. Eyes like razors, stripping me bare.

“You think you know what men want?” he says, low, lethal.

I lean in until my mouth is a breath from his ear, the heat between us a storm about to break. “I don’t think,” I whisper. “I know. Men want to believe they have power. And they’ll sell their souls to chase the one thing they’re not allowed to touch.”

His hands don’t move. But his body betrays him. Every muscle tightens beneath me. His breathing roughens. And for a moment—for one heartbeat—I feel him start to come undone.

I sit straighter. Smirk sharper.

And wait for the next move in our little war.

His breath hitches—a flicker, barely audible, but I catch it. The way his body coils tighter beneath mine, the quiet strain in his jaw as I ease back just enough to look him in the eyes.

“And this rule of no touching…” he murmurs, each word heavy as a loaded weapon. “Does it apply to everyone, Galina?”

My name on his tongue feels like a challenge, like a dare.

The question hangs in the air, thick with heat. I let the silence stretch, let it ache. Then I let a slow, lazy smile unfurl across my lips. “Everyone,” I say, soft but unyielding. “Even the boss.”

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