Wild Billionaire Romance - Chapter 16: Chapter 16

SOFIA
I fidgeted with the hem of my dress. It was clingy and short, but it made my boobs look good with its plunging neckline and long-sleeves. The heels on my feet accentuated my legs, making them look longer, and I crossed them, grinning when Adrik’s gaze zeroed right on my ass.
“Do not sit like that when we are out,” he growled, and I lifted an eyebrow. “Please, unless you want me to kill someone tonight you will not cross your legs like that at dinner.”
“Okay,” I agreed. “But you bought me this dress, and you picked it out for me to wear tonight.”
“I did. Remind me to send a bonus to that shopper. You look divine, Zaika moya.”
“You don’t look so bad yourself,” I replied, and really, he didn’t.
The man stole my breath from my body. He was gorgeous. That thick chestnut hair was combed back, and his short beard was freshly trimmed. It was the middle of winter, but his skin looked bronzed like he spent hours tanning. Like some golden god, he exuded power and authority.
I already knew the tan came from the forty-five minute swim he completed every day after his meticulous workout. His private pool was on the top floor of his triplex penthouse and the roof was made entirely of some kind of specialty glass. Like the window, no one could see inside unless he made it so.
I could only imagine they were incredibly thick and reinforced. Sunlight filtered in through the glass panes, heating the pool and tanning his skin. I couldn’t even fathom the cost. Now that I knew his nickname for me meant bunny, I scrunched up my nose whenever he called me that. Two weeks. Just two weeks left. My heart squeezed whenever I started thinking about it. But time did not slow for anyone. Not even billionaires.
Fact was, the clock was running out on us, on this crazy torrid affair we were embroiled in. Soon my only taste of Adrik would be what I read about in the tabloids. The thought left a bitter taste in my mouth. I didn’t want to think about it. The possibility of seeing him in a tabloid with some society princess draped over his arm like a perfect, thin swatch of silk. My heart wouldn’t be able to take it.
Stupid, I knew it, but I had feelings for the man. Real ones. I was not from his world. Sure, I knew about the scandals and the marriages, both the loveless and the open kind that seemed to run rampant among the elite. Poor people didn’t have the same choices. But the rich seemed to live in a world where bodies were cheap. I couldn’t fathom behaving that way.
Adrik seemed different, but what did I really know? Even with all the digging I’d done and the minor facts he’d told me about his life, I still did not know him. Not really. His was a vicious, cruel world, where playing games could sometimes cost lives, or worse, hearts. I said worse because some lives got the end they deserved. A man like Adrik could not afford to form a real connection with anyone. And to soft hearts like mine, that kind of detachment was detrimental.
Working for Missy Castle for six months had taught me a lot about high society life, and if that was really Adrik’s world, then the likelihood of me running into him after this was over was slim to none. After all, Missy had fired me, and I did not run in those circles.
My heart squeezed thinking of the time when I wouldn’t be able to see him, smell his spicy cologne, or feel his powerful body moving inside of me, bringing me to a completion so strong I passed out once or twice from it. Only Adrik Volkov could possibly command that kind of response from a woman. He was certainly the only man who’d ever done that to me.
Shit. I was falling in love with him. Awareness filled me and I gasped as I darted my gaze to his handsome face, bathed in moonlight seeping in from the windows.
“Zaika? Are you feeling all right?”
“Oh, I’m fine. Sorry. Um, did you know that a Dutchman named Peter Minuit bought the Island of Manhattan in the 17th Century for what was about $24 worth of beads?” I asked, rattling off a factoid I’d recently discovered.
“$24? That was a steal,” Adrik observed, his grin quirking one corner of his mouth up in a rakishly adorable expression.
“Yeah. He was a total crook. Native people didn’t share the Europeans concept of ownership, so it was likely a huge misunderstanding,” I said, dropping my voice.
“I love that you know so many things, Zaika. You are the most interesting woman I have ever met,” he said, flashing me a smile I could only credit as proud.
He took my hand and lifted it to his lips, dropping a kiss on my palm that made my heart pound. His phone vibrated, and he took it out of his pocket with his free hand, still holding mine with the other. It was so big and warm wrapped around mine. I loved the feel of the calluses beneath my fingertips.
Shit. I bit my lip, stifling the gasp that almost slipped free. It was too late, I realized. Too late and I couldn’t do a thing about it. Denial wasn’t an option, at least not when I was thinking to myself. I didn’t know about anyone else, I only knew how I felt. Sex without feelings could not be this intense. There could only be one reason my body lit up like the fourth of July for Adrik and only Adrik. One reason I still refused to allow myself to sleep by his side.
Self-preservation.
That was the real reason. It was too late to guard my heart. But I could try to control how bad it would be for me afterwards. See, I was falling in love with him. Stupid, stupid me cared about the billionaire who’d actually bought me for a month. I shouldn’t feel that way. I knew it was dumb, but what could I do? It was too late. And when this was over, when he was gone, it was going to break me.
“How long till we get there?” I asked Adrik even though he was still on the phone.
He covered the receiver with his hand and turned it to look at the time,
“Five minutes, Zaika moya.”
I nodded, faked a smile, and casually slid my hand out of his, picking up my clutch instead. I turned my head to the window on the other side of me, trying for composure. But my heart was trying to beat me to death, and I couldn’t help the riot of emotions filling me. He was dressed up like some dark prince out of a fairytale, and I matched him like this. My outfit, my hair, but it was only temporary. And that was the part that broke my heart.
Fuck.
How did this happen? We had a routine dammit, and I thought it was working. Every morning, I worked on my book. In the afternoons, I either used his pool or the incredible entertainment system he owned. I was a classic movie junkie, and Adrik had them all. I’d started waiting for him in the nude at first as a sort of surprise. I always wanted to do that thing where the woman wears an apron while serving dinner and nothing else save maybe high heels.
It went so well it became our thing. Sometimes, he came out of the elevator, his shirt, and pants already off. We’d fall into each other, a tangle of arms and legs, sweat and arousal coating our skin as we fucked on every surface of that penthouse. Every day was exciting, every encounter made me want him more. I thought we were growing closer, but my refusal to sleep beside him was still a point of contention. Still, every morning when he left, I could not wait to see him again, and I missed him the moment he was gone.
But the book, well, that was coming along fine. What had started as a sort of tell all about high society was now a full on romantic suspense where the hero was a former underworld crime boss and the heroine an unsuspecting schoolteacher. It might have sounded cliché, but it was moving and gritty. Worlds apart and yet drawn together by an intense desire neither had felt.
Fuck you for thinking it mirrored my reality too closely.
No, really, though, what could I say?
If I was going to have to leave Adrik behind, at least I could have the fictional version of him to remember. Nothing we really said or did with each other made it to the pages, but the feelings I had, they were right there with my heroine as she fell in love with the one man in the world she could never have.
Adrik finished his call with a soft Russian curse, but the second he tucked his phone away in his inside breast pocket his demeanor changed. His black eyes raked me from head to toe and before I knew it, he’d tugged me back to his side and slammed his mouth to mine with a possessive kiss that I knew had just ruined my carefully applied lipstick.
“There,” he growled as the driver stopped and one of his men opened the door. “Now you look claimed.”
“What?” I asked, eyes wide, pulse hammering rapidly.
“You looked perfect before, Zaika. But now you look kissed. And kissed is claimed. If another man looks at you tonight for more than the two seconds it takes to realize you belong to someone else, I won’t be responsible for what I do to him.”
His nostrils flared and the hand that had been stroking my neck tightened with the last word to leave his lips. Then he was gone, standing outside the door with his hand extended for me to grab. I knew there was something really wrong with his statement, that I should not be turned on by his alphahole tendencies. But I was.
I guess maybe it was more than just my clothes that matched the sexy ex-criminal billionaire. Maybe my soul matched his as well. I bit my lips, allowing him to lead me to the entrance of Matthew Castle’s Long Island mansion. Why hadn’t I known we were going back to this place?
I hated the memory of the last time we were there, the one with Adrik wrapped around some skinny woman on the dancefloor, that flashed through my brain. I stumbled, but his firm hand around my waist steadied me, and he looked down, concern in his dark eyes.
“I swear, Zaika moya, I will touch no one else but you tonight,” he whispered in my ear, and chills danced up my spine.
Being so needy and clingy was hardly in my nature, but something happened in the last few days and though I’d tried to hide it from him, he was clearly feeling the same. Possessive instincts were pretty powerful stuff and if the way he glowered at the men taking invitations and standing guard at the entrance of the party was anything to go by, Adrik was having a hard time controlling himself as well.
His face was passive, but his arm contracted several times around me as we walked the perimeter of the ballroom. I got the impression Adrik would rather be anywhere but inside the opulent mansion with throngs of people drinking, shmoozing, and doing God knew what in the dark corners and shadows of the enormous angular room.
There was bass thumping music blasting and a DJ booth set up, special effects lighting flashed all around us, making the ballroom look even more like a Manhattan nightclub than it had last time. Women in haute couture gowns clung to wealthy men like second skins, writhing together as the waitstaff walked by carrying flutes of champagne and other drinks.
I saw people doing drugs right there and frowned. I knew Matthew Castle was a bit of a weasel from things his sister had let slip, and I felt bad for not even checking in on Missy since she fired me. It was stupid of me, really. The woman had let me go without a second glance, and for some reason, I was the one who felt guilty for not checking in.
“Excuse me,” a shrill voice said, and I jostled as someone bumped into me.
My eyes widened as I saw the barely dressed woman basically push me out of the way so she could land up against Adrik’s chest. But instead, she wound up being caught by Marat at the last minute. How his brother had snuck up on us, I did not know. But I was grateful as Adrik pulled me closer, the frown on his face deepening by the second.
“That was a close call, darling. Maybe lay off the drinks until you learn to walk in those things,” Marat said, pointing to her six-inch heels.