Page 104 of Ruined Vows
“I gamble smart.”
We’re side by side. Separated only by the ache in my shoulders and the fact that we’re both pretending this isn’t erotic.
“I’m sure your assistant had fun booking this. Was she jealous?”
“I handled every detail myself. You’re too important to me,” he replies, his voice raw with emotion.
I’m speechless. Something stirs in me. I’m falling for him. I can’t deny it. The trip is personal, intimate, and he did it for me. He didn’t have to come. But he did, for me.
He probably has a ton of things to do that are more importantthan me, but he’s here. There are many layers to him, and I’m only scratching the surface.
My thoughts are interrupted by his groan during his shoulder work.
I arch a brow. “You okay there, old man?” I tease.
The massage table muffles his voice. “You gonna nurse me back to health?”
“You couldn’t afford me.”
“You’d be surprised at what I can afford,” he says. “But your price isn’t money, it’s intimacy, of knowing that there’s no other woman I’ll ever want to touch, ever.”
Damn him for rendering me speechless. That hits home. He knows me, inside and out. I’m filled with relief when we finish and move to the private sauna. I can use the heat to loosen up. It’s hell keeping my guard up all the time.
I shift on the lower bench, dragging my fingers through the sweat beading at my collarbone. My towel clings in places I don’t want it to. He watches me from the top bench, like he’s above it all. But I can feel the tension radiating off him in slow, as it rolls in baby waves.
I shouldn’t ask the next question, but curiosity has the best of me.
“What was your plan that night? The warehouse. The guns. The stare-off with my brothers like you were untouchable.”
He exhales, leans back, and closes his eyes like he’s remembering it second by second.
“I was untouchable,” he says. “Untilyouwalked in.”
I blink. “That’s not an answer.”
He opens his eyes. “I didn’t go there to start a war. I went topreventone. Matteo and I had already made the deal quietly. Miloš didn’t know. Only a few of my men knew. Milan and another soldier Radovan didn’t know. They would’ve torched the alliance before it could stabilize.”
“And me?” I ask.
He smirks. “You were the surprise variable. The unexpected. You were the wild card with a mouth like a switchblade.”
“I aimed to kill you.”
“I know. I liked it.”
I pause, eyes narrowing. “You’re seriously turned on by the fact that I nearly stabbed you?”
He leans forward, elbows on his knees, voice low and brutal. “I’m turned on by the fact thatyou didn’t blink.You walked into a room full of men who’d kill for the wrong look and didn’t flinch. You were chaos wrapped in class. And I haven’t stopped thinking about you since.”
The air gets hotter, and it’s too thick to breathe. He’s reached my heart. And it’s racing. He’s honest and real. It’s so overwhelming, and I have to look away. Because if he sees me, he’ll know he’s broken my defenses.
My voice is quieter now. “You let me believe you were my enemy.”
“Because Iwas.Until I wasn’t.”
I stare at him. “What changed it?”
He meets my gaze. “You.”
