Page 48 of The Brutal Arrangement

“That doesn’t shock me,” I replied curtly. Katerina knew what I was like, who I was, and the dark and gruesome violence I was capable of. She, like any other Mafia woman, would run away from the idea of getting married to me.

“But Katerina couldn’t have known it’d beyouthat she would marry,” Maxim said. “The correspondence we had with the Kozlovs was just that it would be one of us brothers.”

I rubbed my face, aggravated and noticing again how tense I’d been lately, clenching my jaw. “She couldn’t have thought it was you, since it’s out there now that you’re engaged to Sloane.”

“And if she knows that Nik is taken,” he said, “she would’ve known he wouldn’t be her groom either.”

I crossed my arms and leaned back against the wall. “I can keep at Lucy about why she agreed to this marriage. She had to have gone along with it for a reason. Either someone there forced her and scared her into this, threatening her, or she was bribed. I’ll get her to tell me which.”

Maxim nodded. “Maybe that will help shed some light on what Anton’s up to.”

I doubted it, but it hardly mattered now.

I was stuck with my wife.

Lucy.

She was mine because she’d come here for whatever reason she had. She’d signed that contract. She’d let me inside her to mark her as mine.

I wasn’t fond of having to settle, but I wasn’t stupid. I knew this would be the only way I’d have a wife, if one was forced to be with me. Even though I’d sort of assumed I’d be a bachelor for the majority of my life, I could adjust and tolerate this arrangement too.

“You’re sure?” Maxim asked as the elevator opened to my floor again. “You don’t want to annul this marriage?”

“I still think you should,” Grandmother added with a frown. “I don’t think this will end well, and you deserve better.”

I laughed once, bitterly and darkly.

I deserved better?

Yeah, right.

I was a scarred freak. Too hard for any woman to desire. It was my fate, and I’d live with it.

“Yes. I’m sure. What’s done is done, and I’ll tolerate this the best I can,” I repeated.

Like hell I will.Telling my brother that I’d put up with this felt like a lie.

No matter how many times I tried to remind myself that my wife was only here for the purpose of being questioned and treated as a way of keeping the enemy close, I couldn’t forget about how damn good she’d felt. How triumphant she made me feel when she came, knowing that I had been able to give her pleasure without having to sacrifice how rough I’d wanted it to be.

If I could look forward tothatagain, this marriage wasn’t some bother that I’d have to put up with.

Fucking my wife like that could become my addiction.

“Besides,” I said after I stepped out of the elevator, suddenly eager to see Lucy again, “if Katerina is going against Anton’s wishes enough to swap her maid for her in this arrangement…” I smirked. “Then fine. I’d love to see him pissed off about someone thwarting his plans. I won’t complain about Anton being outsmarted, even by his own niece.”

Maybe in this regard, Katerina was doing us a favor. More thought was needed to figure out why Katerina would’ve done this, but I wasn’t in the right headspace to dwell on it now. I had a wife to speak with.

Maxim almost smiled too. “If not outsmarting him, then reminding him that he can’t get away with everything.”

“What if this maid is trying to outsmart us, though?” Grandmother asked, still too skeptical of the idea of Lucy staying here.

I shook my head. “I won’t let her. I dare this woman to lie to me or trick me.” Turning from them as the elevator doors slid shut again, I strode right back toward my bedroom.

Dipping my chin in acknowledgment to the guard at that door, I gave him permission to leave.

I didn’t needthatmuch help showing one scared maid who the boss was here.

I entered without a knock, finding her seated on the very edge of the bed. I couldn’t help but notice that she had chosen the opposite side from where I’d fucked her last night. As though she were timid and embarrassed to be in that spot again.

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