Page 38 of In Her Blood
Otto scoffed, pressed a hard kiss to her lips, and hauled them both up until she was sitting on his lap—and still anchored over his dick. “Thatis not in question.” His hands spread out over her back, one sliding up to her nape. “But if I get too rough, you need to promise to tell me.”
How could I possibly regret this?She’d wanted him for so long, she had no room for regret. Evelina leaned in and teased his lips with hers. “I promise,” she whispered, rolling her hips slowly over his. She swallowed his low groan and threaded her fingers back into his hair. “We still have some time….”
Chapter twelve
New Boundaries
It was rare whenLina allowed anyone into her private suite—increasingly so in the short time since her father’s death—but Otto knew that wasn’t the real reason he was finding it so damn hard to stand still. There was some stupid, barbaric part of him that had come to view her suite as a space she only shared with him. It was only within those walls that he could be marginally more relaxed. And it hadbeen within those walls when she’d grabbed hold of his shirt and hauled him across the line of acceptability.
The bed was still an unmade mess, even if the scent of sex had thinned from the air after their shared bath.
He struggled to believe all of that had happened. But for as often as he’d succumbed to the temptation of fantasizing about her when he was alone, his imagination had never been so thorough. It sure as hell had never left such an addictive aftertaste on his tongue.
Lina was his, as he had long been hers. He wasn’t going to push her to define what she wanted that to mean while so much of her life was in upheaval, but he wasn’t going to let her forget it or think he’d merely been speaking in the heat of the moment, either. What he did need to do, immediately, was remember that just because Lina had allowed Artem into the sitting room in her suite did not mean the man had suddenly become some kind of threat to him.
They were just really fucking short on time.
Lina blew out an aggravated sigh. “And your guy is sure this is accurate?”
Otto studied her, noting the subtle nod of Artem’s head in his peripheral vision as he drank in the way the tunic she’d pulled on managed to highlight her curves. Her legs were covered in black leggings, feet tucked into the same boots he’d pulled them from earlier, and her still-damp hair was for once hanging entirely loose down her back. The tunic was a dark forest green, thick like a sweater, and just high-collared enough to obscure one of the marks Otto had very intentionally left on her perfect flesh.
Yeah, looking at her was not helping him pull his shit together.
“It’s the latest on record,” Artem replied. “You can always have the property re-surveyed. That takes time to organize, and there’d be records of the request.”
Lina straightened. “So Pyotr could—”
“I’ve already made it clear I need to be notified ifanyonemakes that request. If I hear word on that, you’ll be the first person I talk to next.”
Lina blew out a breath, reached up, and laid her hand over her mostly concealed collarbone—over the area Otto had teased just enough with his teeth to leave a mark. She’d assured him it didn’t hurt, but the motion seemed awkward otherwise.
Otto’s brow furrowed as he debated calling out to her.
She leaned into her hand, as if it were a thinking pose, her lips pursed. Then she looked up, past Artem and toward the wall of shelves. “Otto, could you grab me a colored pen? Something bright and obnoxious and very distinctive.”
He almost jumped at being directly addressed. He almost fucking jumped.I have got to get my head on straight.He pushed from the wall. “Unicorn pen, got it.”
Artem chuckled. “Shame I didn’t think to raid my daughter’s collection before I swung by. She’s got a shit-ton of those things.”
Lina laughed, the sound light and comfortable and alarmingly soothing. “I mostly buy them so I can leave visually obnoxious notes for all the strong macho guys around here. Which I suppose is a habit I should break once I’ve kicked Pyotr’s ass.”
“I’m pretty sure the pakhan’s expected to terrorize their people from time to time,” Artem said. “Threats of assault by way of glittery pink ink seem much more unique than threats of blood and dismemberment.”
“I could always threaten both,” Lina said as Otto extracted a vibrantly gold, sparkly pen from the collection and turned toward the pair. Her gaze shifted from Artem up to him as he neared, her grin widening with never-subtle mischief. “I do have Otto.”
Brat.But he allowed his lips to twitch, oh-so-slightly, as he held out the pen. “I’ll let you handle the glittery assignments.” That earned him sounds of amusement from both parties.
Lina took the pen, her fingers grazing over his in a way that was surely intentional, and turned her attention back to the blueprints spread before her. Without uncapping the pen, she tapped the paper. “Okay. If I split it straight down the middle, that’s going to cause a nightmare for managing boundaries, right?”
Otto adjusted to lean over her shoulder, since she had kindly arranged her chaise with room to walk around it anyway.
Across the coffee table, from his perch on the ottoman that matched what Otto considered to behiswingback, Artem leaned forward as well. “Splitting it fifty-fifty from north to south might not be feasible.” He laid his finger beside one of the smaller boxes that represented a room on the first floor, which was the floor they were focusing on currently. “In addition to the common rooms that would be invisibly split and inevitable hot-spots for confrontation if we tried to hold those lines, there’s this bathroom. You could argue it’s mostly onyour side and lock it down, but he could argue it’s partially on his and demand access.”
Lina scrunched up her face. “That is problematic.” She tilted to the side, shifted papers, and pulled up the second-floor map. “Whatever I do, I am not relinquishing this zone.” She circled her suite and the connecting hall with the still-capped pen. “In fact”—she hovered for a moment, then expanded her invisible boundary to include the adjacent hallway Otto’s room formally connected to—“all of this is my bare minimum. So, we have to figure out a way to split the property that does not relinquish my fifty-percent or the side of the property that’s already effectively mine.”
Otto bounced his gaze between the two semi-curled papers. He understood why Lina was set on holding onto her fifty-percent, but the building hadn’t been designed to be split down the middle from any angle. There was no way to do that that didn’t result in rooms being sliced metaphorically in half. And neither party was going to quietly give up the garage.
Lina tapped the gold pen against her lips, sighing in thought.
