Page 18 of Lethal Devotion
I back up until I feel my legs hit the side of the mattress and sink down onto the edge of the enormous bed, my legs suddenly too weak to support me. I’ve never been so tired, I think, not even when Adam was a baby and I barely slept at all. I lick my dry lips nervously, and I see Damian’s gaze flick down to my mouth for a split second before he looks back up at me. “So what happens now?”
“Now, you get some rest,” he says flatly. “We’ll talk tomorrow after I’ve discussed things with Konstantin. You’re safe here, Sienna, and so is Adam. Focus on that.”
It’s strange, hearing him say my son’s name. I feel an odd flutter in my chest. I’m afraid of this man, and yet…I don’t think he’ll hurt me or Adam.
“Damian?” I blurt out his name as I see him reach for the door, and he pauses, looking back at me. “Thank you,” I manage. “For saving me. For bringing us here. I… thank you.”
Surprise flickers across his face. "Lock the door behind me," he says instead of acknowledging my thanks. "And don't open it for anyone except me or Mrs. Horvat."
Then he's gone, leaving me alone in the opulent bedroom that's now apparently mine.
I sit there for a long moment, trying to process everything that's happened. This morning I woke up in my cramped apartment, worried about buying groceries and whether I’d be able to keep the electricity on, if I’d be able to pay Mary to watch Adam the next week while I was at work. Tonight I'm sitting in a mansion, married to a man I barely know, my son asleep in a room that's nicer than anywhere we've ever lived.
I’m also a target of people I don’t know, trapped in a situation I don’t understand. I don’t know why I was taken tonight, why they chose me, what I did that caused me to end up in that van.
But I know that if Damian hadn’t been there, I might never have made it out. I might never have seen my son again. I’m grateful to him… I just don’t know what our lives look like now.
Don’t think about it,I tell myself as I fall back onto the bed. I can only take one day at a time. Tomorrow, there will probably be more information, more things to think about. I can consider it all on a clearer head, after a decent night’s sleep in a bed that feels like a cloud, with the horrors of tonight further behind me.
I stare up at the ceiling. I can’t stop hearing Damian’s voice in my head, the harshness when he told me to stop, to put my clothes back on. He could have taken what he wanted—if he wanted it. In his world, I'm sure that's exactly what most men would do. But he didn't.
What if Carmen was lying?Maybe she just wanted the other girls to think that she’d been with Damian. Maybe he’s not like that at all.
Or maybe he is, and he just doesn’t want me. I wonder if I should feel insulted by that, hurt… but I can’t process it enough to feel anything right now other than relief that I’m lying in this bed alone, instead of having to pleasure a man I barely know.
Maybe there’s more to Damian than meets the eye—or maybe he is just a brutal, cold Bratva enforcer. Either way, I’m not going to figure it out tonight.
For better or worse, this dangerous, complicated man is all that stands between my son, me, and the people who want us dead. And right now, that’s enough.
I should take a shower,I think. There’s blood on my skin andclothes, and I’m sweaty and grimy from the events of the night. But the bed is soft, and the room is blessedly cool, the softswishof the air conditioning a gentle background noise instead of the rattling sound I’m used to.
Before I can find the energy to pry myself out of bed, I’m fast asleep.
6
DAMIAN
Imake it exactly three steps down the hallway before I have to stop and lean against the wall, my hands braced against the cool plaster as I try to get my breathing under control.
Christ.
The image of Sienna pulling her shirt over her head is burned into my retinas, seared there like a brand I can't escape. The pale curve of her shoulders, the way her strawberry-blonde hair tumbled around her face, the delicate line of her collarbone disappearing beneath the lace straps of her bra.Of course it was fucking lace.A soft peach that cupped her small breasts, thin enough that I could see her nipples peaking through it from the cold.
My cock throbs. I’m rock-hard, stiff and aching from the sight of her slender body in nothing but those damned cutoff jean shorts and her bra. She had a sprinkling of freckles beneath her collarbones—my jaw tightens. I can imagine running my tongue across them, tracing a line from dot to dot as she shuddered and trembled beneath me…
She’s so fucking beautiful.
She’s beautiful in a way that I don’t often encounter in my world. Sweet and delicate and innocent, that soft, girl-next-door beauty thatmakes me think she’d taste like lemonade on a summer day and smell like the sweet scent of fresh grass and flowers. She’s the kind of woman that a man like me shouldn’t touch… ever.
And she asked me to touch her.
I’m not a fool. She’s not as innocent as she appears—she was taken from a strip club, for fuck’s sake. She’s clearly not a virgin, since she has a child. I have no idea what her past is or how experienced she is, but I know she’s young, and I know she’s under my protection.
I have power over her. I’m a brutal man, a killer, a man who has wielded violence all his life. I’ve done unspeakable things to other men, killed in horrific ways… but I’ve never hurt a woman. I’ve never used my power or violence to compel a woman to do something she didn’t want to do. I’ve never taken anything that wasn’t mine to have.
The law says Sienna is mine. But my conscience, what’s left of it, says that I shouldn’t touch her. No matter how badly I want to.
My cock is still hard, straining against the confines of my pants like a fucking teenager who's never seen a woman topless before. The irony isn't lost on me. I've had plenty of women over the years—beautiful women, experienced women who knew exactly what they were getting into when they came to my bed. Women who wanted the danger I represented, who got off on the violence that clings to me, that follows me wherever I go. Women who wanted it rough, who wanted the beast. They got off on the fear. On the knowledge that I could hurt them, would, even, if they begged for it.
