Page 66 of Fierce Pursuit

But that was just my own desperate hope clawing at something impossible.

Veronika wouldn’t understand. She wouldn’t forgive.

If she had witnessed what had just happened between Kostya and me, she would have cursed me. She would have turned her back and walked away, cutting me out of her life so cleanly, so completely, that it would be as though I had never existed at all.

That thought squeezed my chest, sharp and suffocating.

I needed to leave. I needed space, air, distance,anything that would let me think clearly, anything that would remind me who I was before this. Before him.

It wasn’t safety I felt. It was surrender.

Carefully, I eased myself out from under Kostya’s heavy arm, moving with painstaking slowness to avoid waking him. My breath caught as I tried to climb over him without touching him.

But of course, he woke up.

His arm snaked around my waist before I could escape, dragging me back into the bed, into his warmth, into him.

My body betrayed me. My muscles went soft against his chest, melting for just a second before I forced myself to remember. To resist.

“Where do you think you’re going?” His voice was thick with sleep, rough and lazy in a way that tightened my stomach.

“I just need to pee.”

He rolled over, pulling me with him until I was facing the small cabin wall, his chest firm against my back, his cock pressing into the curve of my ass. I swallowed hard, trying not to react, but my body was still too attuned to him, still too aware.

He pointed to a small shelf on the wall.

“That pulls down to a toilet.”

My stomach turned in horror. “Absolutely not. I don’t care what sick kinks you have, that is not happening. I’m not going to pee in front of you.”

Kostya shrugged, completely unbothered. “Then I guess you don’t need to pee.” He buried his face againstmy neck, his grip tightening, his breath warm against my skin.

I had to be strong. I had to be.

It would be so easy to close my eyes again, to sink into the warmth of his body, to let myself drift into sleep wrapped in the one thing that had ever truly made me feel safe. But that safety was a lie. A gilded cage.

“Kostya, please.” I had to keep my voice calm, reasonable, even if there was an edge of desperation in it. “There’s a bathroom three doors down.”

He didn’t respond. He just held me tighter.

I swallowed, pushing forward. “There’s nowhere else for me to go. If I was going to tell a train official what was happening, I would have done it before you ever dragged me in here. You know I know better than to get the cops involved or try anything stupid. Please…” I exhaled shakily, trying to keep my voice steady. “Just let me keep some of my dignity. Let me pee in peace.”

For a moment, there was silence.

And then his arm loosened just enough. Not enough to let me go—not yet—but enough to make me wonder if he would. If he’d let me have this one small mercy.

Or if he would keep me here, trapped in this bed, in his arms, drowning in a war of my own making.

“I’ll keep my eyes closed,” he said, his body still wrapped around mine.

That wasn’t good enough.

I really had to pee, but there was only so much humiliation I could endure in one night. The spanking—embarrassing, maddening, and God help me, thrilling—had been more than enough.

Veronika had always been the one who could bend men to her will, who could turn a sharp look or a honeyed word into a weapon. She had been made for seduction, for manipulation. But I wasn’t like her. I wasn’t elegant. I wasn’t effortless.

Men didn’t stare at me the way they had always stared at her.

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