Page 43 of Forced Virgin Bride of the Bratva
I wonder what kind of wife I’ll have to become to survive him.
***
I wake before the sun rises. The sheets are still warm, twisted around my legs. My skin hums with the memory of histouch, a low ache between my thighs and a weight in my chest that won’t lift.
The room is quiet. Too quiet.
Maxim’s side of the bed is empty, the space where he lay cold. He didn’t even stay.
A faint breeze slips through the cracked window, brushing cool air across sweat-slick skin. I pull the sheet tighter around me and sit up, slow, limbs heavy.
The dress I wore earlier is gone. Someone must have taken it. In its place, a new silk robe hangs neatly from the wardrobe. It’s paler than the one I wore last night, embroidered at the cuffs. Another decision made without me.
I put it on anyway.
Outside the window, the grounds are still cloaked in mist. Trees stand like sentinels, motionless in the morning hush. The estate is a kingdom, and I am the queen with no crown—only a ring that still feels too tight.
I move to the mirror. My reflection is flushed. Lips swollen. Hair a mess. I trace a finger across my collarbone where his mouth lingered, half expecting to see the print of his claim left behind.
I don’t recognize the girl looking back at me.
A knock sounds at the door. Polite. Precise.
I don’t answer right away. When I do, my voice is steady. “Come in.”
A maid enters, eyes cast low. She curtsies. “Breakfast will be served downstairs, Mrs. Sharov.”
The name doesn’t feel like mine. Not yet.
“Will he be there?”
“I don’t know, ma’am.” She waits a moment longer, then slips out.
I stare at the door after it closes, heart thudding.
This house is too big. The silence too thick.
Still—I want to see him again. I want to know what last night meant. If it meant anything at all.
Chapter Fourteen - Maxim
We sleep together every night, after that. Wrapped around each other in a tangle of limbs.
Sometimes I stay the night, sometimes I’m gone before she wakes.
Today, I wake before the sun. The room is dim, all soft shadows and the lingering weight of heat. My body aches, but not from sleep. It’s the ache of control held too long. Of release taken—finally, and completely.
Beside me, Kiera lies tangled in the sheets.
Her hair is a mess of curls against the pillow, wild and soft, one arm flung overhead, the other resting palm-up on her chest. Her robe is gone. The silk sheet covers her only halfway, baring the gentle swell of her hip, the curve of her thigh. The marks on her skin stand out in the pale light—reddened flesh where my mouth had been, where my hands had claimed her. A bruise at the curve of her breast. Scratches along her ribs.
Mine.
Her breathing is slow, even. She winces faintly, a small sound escaping her throat as she shifts.
My handiwork.
The tightness in my chest creeps in slowly. A mix of satisfaction and something darker—pride, possession. Beneath it, quieter and more dangerous, is longing.
