Page 41 of Confession
“Solo, then. You’re trying to work solo.” When he looks out the window, I know I’ve hit on the truth. “Vitali. Why are you trying to work solo?”
“Because it’s mysoleresponsibility, Quinn.”
“What is?”
“All of it.”
I drive in silence for a few miles as we leave the city, trying to figure out what he means. He’s too difficult to argue with. He can run circles around me. I have to step back and see the whole picture.
I ask, “Are we talking about your uncle?”
His audible exhalation is my only answer.
I say, even though I know he won’t take it well, “You’ve got to stop blaming yourself for what Anton did.”
“I don’t blame myself for what he did. I am, however, responsible for my failure to notice it.”
“Vitali—”
“Watch the road, Quinn.”
I don’t say anything the rest of the way home. Vitali needs the silence, and I need to think. When we get back to the house and I park the car, Vitali gets out and walks away.
I walked away from him earlier today. He let me, and I’m glad he did. I needed him to let me. But what he needs is the opposite. So I follow him.
I stay back a good distance like maybe I’m heading somewhere else, but when he takes the stairs to his room, which is an upper corner of the house, it’s obvious what I’m doing. But he ignores me. He goes into his room and closes the door.
I hesitate outside it. I’ve never been inside Vitali’s room. I’ve never inserted myself into his personal life. I observe it, constantly, and sometimes he’s let me into it, like when Nonna Maria died, but I’ve never pushed. I’ve been so damn careful not to. And even though we’ve been fucking, it’s been him pushing at my boundaries. He’s had me constantly on the defense.
That’s why he’s closed this door. Because if I open it, if I go into his space, into his life, I’m the one changing things. I’m proving that this isn’t just sex like I’ve been trying to tell myself.
I take a deep breath, then I put my hand on the knob and open the door.
In the first few seconds, the room distracts me because it’s fucking palatial. That’s not exactly a surprise in this house, but Jesus. The enormous bed sits atop a raised platform at one end of the room. There’s a recessed floor space in the middle with sleek couches and a coffee table. A huge TV spans one wall. There’s a bank of floor-to-ceiling windows and the enormous deck that I’ve seen from outside. There are potted plants, whichsurprises me, and a minibar, which does not. That’s where Vitali is.
“Whiskey?” he asks, pouring amber liquor into a cut-crystal glass. He’s not upset that I’m here, which means that I was right. The closed door was him making a point, forcing my hand. Even upset and struggling, he’s in control of me.
“Sure.”
He pours whiskey into another crystal glass then walks over to me carrying both. He offers one to me. I take it.
When he turns away, I grab his waistband, stopping him. I cut past all the surrounding bullshit and go straight to the heart of what’s been fucking him up for months, maybe years.
“What happened to Roman wasn’t your fault, Vitali.”
He flinches, rocks away from me, but I keep hold of his waistband and step closer, right behind him. I slide my hand around to his stomach. His breathing is shallow. I can feel it under my hand. I can hear it when I press my face against the back of his head.
In the silence, my senses get overwhelmed. His body is warm and solid against mine. The subtle scent of his spicy cologne threads into my awareness.
When I kiss the back of his neck, he shivers. I keep going. As I work my way to his trap, his head tilts forward and to the side. He really is in a strange mood. Not exactly submissive but open maybe. He needs something tonight, and I can give it to him. I want to.
I bite gently at his trap. Holding him like this, I feel the reaction that goes through his body. My fingers, splayed across his lower abdomen, start to gently knead the muscle through his compression shirt.
I slide my fingers behind his waistband, working my way between the hem of his shirt and the elastic of his underwear, reaching inside.
“Ah,” he breathes, letting his head fall back on my shoulder as I wrap my hand around his hard cock.
Something in me cracks open, because this? Vitali opening to me, needing me? I never imagined anything like this. Not once.
