Page 58 of Forced Plus-Size Bride of the Bratva

That’s not enough.

I don’t want her just in pieces. I want the whole of her—her thoughts, her loyalty, her pride. I want her to look at me and know exactly what I am… and still choose me. That kind of surrender—the real kind—that’s what matters.

The kind that can’t be undone.

I draw from the cigar one last time, the taste bitter on my tongue. The smoke lingers in the back of my throat as I hold the image of her there, soft and restless in my bed. I can almost feel her skin beneath my palms again, hear her voice break on my name.

She’s dangerous to me.

Not because she could betray me. Not because she could run.

She’s dangerous because I care.

The realization tastes like poison.

I thought I’d burned that out of myself a long time ago—any softness, any vulnerability, any pull toward something I couldn’t control, but she’s wormed her way in, slow and silent, and now I can’t look at her without wanting. Not just to keep her. To have her. Entirely.

I extinguish the cigar in the tray beside me, a final, vicious stab—ash grinding into glass.

Then I rise.

The door closes behind me with a low click, and the night greets me like an old adversary.

Chapter Seventeen - Alina

I wake slowly.

The sheets cling to my skin, still tangled from restless sleep, and for a moment I lie still, eyes closed, hoping my body might forget before my mind remembers.

It doesn’t.

The thoughts come fast, unrelenting. It’s been a week since we had sex, and still I can’t stop thinking about him.

His hands. The weight of them. The heat of his mouth on my skin. The hunger in his eyes when he looked at me like I was something he’d earned, not taken. It replays in perfect detail—each touch, each gasp, each moment when I stopped pretending it was survival.

The shame hits hard and fast, like a bruise pressed from the inside.

I tell myself—again—that it was for my father. That I did what I had to do to keep him alive. That I gave in to protect something more important than pride.

Even I don’t believe it anymore.

The lie used to be a shield. Now it’s just a weight. Useless. Hollow.

I remember the moment I stopped fighting.

It wasn’t when he kissed me. Not when he laid me down, not even when he touched me like he already owned every part of me.

It was when I wanted it.

When I looked up at him and didn’t feel fear. When I reached for him instead of pulling away. When I gave in not outof defeat—but because I craved the way he looked at me. The way he touched me like I was his.

That thought alone makes my stomach twist.

Something inside me cracked that night. I feel it now in the silence—the silence that followed, that still follows. He hasn’t spoken to me once since.

Not the next morning. Not the days after. Not once.

He’s gone before I wake. Sometimes the sheets beside me are still warm, but he’s never there. When I finally fall asleep again, he doesn’t return—at least not where I can see him. It’s like he’s erased himself from the space between us, leaving only shadows and silence in his place.

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