Page 17 of The Bratva King's Auctioned Bride

“Is that really your choice?” I asked, making sure she could see the safety was still off.

Her lush lower lip trembled, but she lifted her chin, staring me down and refusing to answer. With a sigh, I pulled out her phone and showed her that I’d been texting with Nat, not saying another word. Let her take my silence however she wanted.

She slumped into the chair and crossed her arms, still furious but no longer spitting threats at me.

“Good,” I said.

I should have been relieved, but I was somehow pissed she hadn’t called my bluff. Did she really think I’d shoot her after that huge debacle out on the lawn? I rubbed the lump on my head, wondering if she had actually scrambled my brains with that cooking pot. Did I want this to be harder than it had to be?

No, but I didn’t want her to be a scared little mouse, either. Especially now that I’d seen her true spirit.

“There are probably some women’s clothes somewhere if you want to change,” I said, noticing for the first time she was wearing sweatpants that hugged her hips and thighs in a way that had me licking my lips. She was sexy in everything, but it wasn’t exactly wedding attire.

“There isn’t,” she snapped. “I already searched every closet.

I was mildly surprised, but not that she had searched the place. More that my brother didn’t bring his many conquestshere, or at least that he made sure they didn’t leave anything behind. He might have thought he was keeping the fact that he’d been using my villa in my absence a secret, but it was more that I couldn’t be bothered to berate him for it.

“Should I change to match you, then?” I asked, trying to cajole her out of her mood. “I could stand to be more comfortable.”

She went from pretending to examine her fingernails to glaring at me. “You just pointed a gun at my head. Do you think I’m going to have a cutesy conversation while I wait for you to force me into a sham marriage?”

I cleared my throat. Had I expected a conversation? Or merely wished for it? “I’m capable of making small talk after you actually pulled the trigger on me,” I reminded her.

She went back to ignoring me, and I paced as I waited for the priest to arrive. The wedding wasn’t going to be what I had planned, which was at a church the next morning. But I couldn’t keep her here, where there were people she could run to if she did somehow manage to escape.

I wouldn’t underestimate her again, and while this place was a fortress, she’d almost made it over the wall once. It was better to get things settled as quickly as possible, even if the wedding took place in a kitchen.

The priest finally arrived with a witness in tow, both of them disgruntled at being dragged from their beds. He looked shocked to see the state of both of us after our tussle in the grass and asked if we needed more time.

“No,” I said, eager to get the vows over with in a hurry.

The only thing I was looking forward to was another kiss. I planned to take my time with that.

Chapter 14 - Mila

I was so close, so damn close. My hand was reaching over the top of the wall to hoist myself to freedom. The next thing I knew, I was sitting in the kitchen again, being scowled at like a wayward child. And then he pulled his gun.

Terror washed over me, but it wasn’t the sight of the gun aimed squarely at my forehead. Arkadi had already established too many times that he wasn’t willing to kill me for that to be much of a threat, despite the flash of anger in his eyes. It was the sight of my phone in his hand. He must have gotten it from that foul old man at the bar, and he’d been going through it ever since.

Arkadi knew about Nat and had been messaging her as if he were me, to keep her from worrying or suspecting anything out of the ordinary had happened to me. He could easily find her now, and he’d eventually figure out who she was.

It wasn’t like Nat kept her identity a secret, but she had nothing to do with the Bratva. Nothing at all. Aleks made damn sure of that. My brother would have blown a gasket if he had an inkling that his firstborn daughter was getting involved with an art forgery ring. He would have been plenty pissed about me wanting to take part, too, but he would have turned the earth inside out to keep Nat from starting up a life of crime.

That handsome Russian man at the heart of the scheme had to be linked to Arkadi somehow. It was too much of a coincidence that I was here now with him, just a few days after meeting that guy. More than ever, I wished that I had called Aleks and squealed on my niece the second I found out about it. Nat being pissed off at me for a while was much better thanher being on Arkadi’s radar. In fact, I would have happily let her completely cut me off if it meant keeping her out of harm’s way.

Now, she was very much in it, and I had no choice but to give up my feeble fight. Arkadi’s fierce glare as he let it sink in that he really did hold all the cards had me slumping in my chair, pretending he didn’t exist.

After that, he had the nerve to try to talk to me, but I went back into survival mode, trying to think of a way out of this. I’d almost made it, I could try again. Until the priest arrived with a harried witness in tow, so clearly in Arkadi’s pocket that it would be futile to try to get them to help me.

This wedding was really going to take place. I was about to be Arkadi’s unwilling bride, and no one gave a damn. Every fiber of my being wanted to run, become superhuman so I could fly past them all and get straight back to LA, where someone would be on my side.

No wings sprouted out of my back, and the brief joke of a ceremony was over in a heartbeat. According to the corrupt priest’s proclamation, I now belonged to Arkadi Mikhailov. I had been staring straight ahead, keeping my eyes unfocused as the circus unfolded around me, but now I had to look up because Arkadi’s hands let go of mine and slid up my arms to rest on my shoulders.

The heat of his palms burned through the borrowed sweatshirt, and my gaze drifted upward until I finally met his icy black diamond eyes. Not so icy at the moment. Time seemed to slow down as he dipped his head, and then his mouth was on mine. His hands moved back down my arms to settle at my waist, his tongue nudging my lips apart as he tugged me close to his rock-hard body. It was almost soothing, the way my mind went blank at the onslaught of sensations.

No, not soothing at all. I was on fire, but not with rage. My hands gripped his shirt, but I didn’t shove him away. For some reason, I couldn’t comprehend, I didn’t want the kiss to end.

Probably because that meant reality would shove its way in.

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