Page 13 of Brutal Union
The man smiles in a way to most that looks like politeness but to me looks like fear. “Mondai nai desu.”There's no problem.
Sho slightly bows his head and guides me towards the golden elevators across the floor. I don’t look back to make sure Draco is gone, but I hope for his sake he goes to Sergei before Sergei finds him. I keep my head up high as all the eyes in this club follow us across the floor.
The elevator doors shine like polished sin, and just before we reach them, Sho leans in again—his voice low, husky, and threaded with heat.
“Move your ass,Hime, before I have to start a war in here just to keep you to myself.”
His lips brush the shell of my ear as he speaks, and I swear the air leaves my lungs in one slow, stunned exhale. I step faster—not away from him, but toward whatever this is unraveling into.
The elevator dings. Sho presses the button with the same hand that still carries blood beneath his fingernails.
And just before the doors slide shut behind us, he murmurs— “Now…how do you want to learn your manners?”
4
SHO
Nadia Petrov standsin the center of my hotel penthouse suite like she owns the air I breathe. She's adjusting the lines of her midnight dress, smoothing the fabric over the soft swell of her breasts with a grace so effortless it feels weaponized. I have to grit my teeth to swallow the groan crawling up my throat.
Her long blonde hair—usually cascading like a damn halo—is twisted into a high, elegant bun, exposing the nape of her neck and the delicate line of her spine. My fingers twitch with the urge to undo it, to drag her back to the version of herself I remember best—wild, undone, and whispering sins in Russian.
I feel like a starving man in a locked room with the feast he was told he’d never deserve. Like a desert wanderer hallucinating a mirage, and yet here she is—Nadia, my personal delusion dressed in silk and danger. A fever dream made flesh.
And I should treat her like what she is: a fiction. A ghost of a mistake I should never touch again.
But fiction never looked this good pressed up against reality.
“Are you going to keep staring at me?” Nadia purrs, sliding her fingers down the curve of her cleavage.
“I’m just admiring,” I counter, my steps measured as I make my way across the expansive living room area. A smile curves slightly on her lips.
“And what are you admiring?” She murmurs, just as my hands rest on the curve of her waist. “Is it my winning personality?”
“Of course.” My voice drops as I dip my head into the silk of her throat, letting my breath dance across the hollow beneath her jaw. “I love how cold you are, Hime. I think about it when I can’t sleep.”
Her elbow jabs me—playfully, precisely—right into the ribs. The soft roll of her glacial blue eyes only makes me grin harder. I stumble back, letting the impact take me, falling into the supple drag of black leather behind me. The couch welcomes me like sin.
She doesn’t follow. Not yet.
Instead, she glides—predatory and poised—hands drifting down the swell of her hips, her fingertips grazing the fabric of that slit dress like she’s unwrapping herself just for the hell of it. Then she turns, one brow arched, her expression carved from ice and fire all at once.
“I’m not cold,” she purrs, voice sharp as broken glass. “I’m precise.”
That word hits somewhere low and hot in me.
She steps forward.The dagger-thin black, red bottom stiletto of her heel finds its mark and presses into the center of my chest. Not hard enough to wound, but with enough pressure to see ifI will buckle under the pressure of her. The cool weight of her sends a jolt straight through me, and I laugh, breathless.
I reach up slowly, eyes locked on hers, unbuckling the delicate straps of her heels with the kind of reverence one usually reserves for religious icons or high explosives.
“Then let me worship your precision,” I murmur, dragging her shoe off her foot, knuckles grazing the silken skin of her ankle. “AfterI punish you for your lack of manners.”
She sucks her teeth as she slides her foot off of my chest and replaces it with the other heel. “I have manners.”
My fingertips graze along the buckle, and I chuckle low. “You do,” I murmur, loosening the strap with practiced ease. “But you have American manners.”
“What does that mean?”
The heel slips free, and I cradle her foot gently, letting my thumb drag along the delicate arch like I have any right. My eyes trail up, devouring the silhouette of her curves—the dangerous dip of her waist, the swell of her hips, the dress clinging to her like sin tailored just for her. She is elegance sharpened into a blade, venom in heels, and I should kick her out right now. Tell her to get the fuck out before this turns into something I can’t come back from.
