Page 88 of Punish Me, Daddy

I decided that I didn’t want to run anymore.

Sure, I could disappear and make a new life for myself somewhere on a beach with those deliciously boozy drinks with the cute little umbrellas, but that wasn’t what I wanted anymore. That was boring.

This?Thiswas living. Maybe I was sick for liking it. Maybe it said something about the way I was wired that I didn’t flinch when Nikolai opened the car door and ordered me to get in.

I slid into the passenger seat without asking where we were going, or what we were doing. He climbed into the driver’s seat and the low rumble of the engine purred to life. In moments, the city of Boston was sliding by like a moving picture.

“I meant what I said back there,” he said finally, his voice breaking through the quiet.

I glanced at him, cautious. “Which part?”

“The part where I said I was proud of you.”

My stomach flipped.

I looked away too fast, eyes flicking to the city like the skyline might rescue me from that kind of sincerity. It didn’t. The window only reflected my own stunned face back at me.

“People don’t say that kind of thing unless they want something,” I muttered.

“I already have what I want.”

I swallowed. Hard.

“You’re dangerous when you talk like that,” I said, trying to smirk, trying to hold back the part of me that needed that sentence to be true more than I cared to admit.

“I’m always dangerous,” he said, turning the wheel with one hand, eyes still fixed on the road. “But I’m never careless. And I don’t hand out praise like candy.”

“You’re not exactly a Hallmark card, no.”

“And yet,” he said, glancing at me for just a second, “you stood in a room full of men who run this city, and you didn’t even flinch.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I didn’t say anything at all.

I just let the quiet fall again, heavier this time. Like it meant something. The dynamic between us had shifted and we were both waiting to see what would settle in its place.

He didn’t speak again until we pulled up to the curb at what appeared to be a really nice steakhouse. The valet opened my door before I could really get a look at anything beside the name of the restaurant.

Relic.

Nikolai was already at my side.

He didn’t offer his arm. Just placed a hand on my lower back like a silent claim. We went through the doors and into the warmth of candlelight and stone walls, velvet booths and shadows. We stepped into the kind of hush that only came with raw power and exclusivity.

He didn’t have a reservation, per se. He didn’t need one. Apparently, he’d bought the whole place out.

Because of course he had.

The host led us to a table at the far end of the room, semi-private, lit by the flicker of soft gold light from a hanging lantern. At the table, he pulled out my chair, not as a gentleman, but as someone who knew I would sit where he wanted me to. As someone who expected obedience without demanding it.

He ordered our food without asking me what I wanted, and I let him.

The truth was my thoughts were still spinning, still tangled around what had happened back at the Iron Wolf. I’d stood up to my father. I’d told a room full of criminals exactly how to burn a man to the ground. I’d claimed a seat I was never supposed to have.

Now here I was, being rewarded for it.Seenfor it.

I glanced at Nikolai as he studied the wine list, as calm and collected as ever, like the war we were about to wage was just another business transaction. The waiter came back, and he ordered a bottle of red. I was too lost in my own head to pay attention to what kind it was, but when a portion was pouredinto my glass, I nodded, sipped it, and groaned with pleasure at the taste of rich blackberries and smoky bourbon exploding across my tongue.

The first course arrived without fanfare, just the soft thump of porcelain against the wooden tabletop and the quiet clink of silverware.

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