Silently, he slides me down his body until I’m standing on the tiled floor.
“Why were you crying, zayka?” he asks as he peels the dress over my head.
I consider asking when, or saying that I wasn’t. But one look from Dimitri is truth serum. He hasn’t lied to me, and I’ve been afool. I thought I was his captive, and I should conform myself to the standards of what other people approve of in a relationship. I thought I should box myself into a boring existence like Howard.
None of those things are right.
He shucks off his jeans and I finally see his cock. All that’s-enormous-I-can’t-believe-it-all-fit-inside-me inches of it. He’s erect, and there’s a vein running down the length. My mouth waters with how much I want to lick him. Take him to the back of my throat and have him use me.
He’s gazing down at my breasts as he runs his hands reverently over my shoulders. Reaching over for shower gel, he moves me around him under the spray and washes me like I’m his cherished toy. It’s long minutes, but my tears stop.
I still haven’t answered his question, because it’s too vast, and the knot of fear remains, but it’s joined by an ache for him. I’m hot again, needy.
He isn’t taking anything for himself right now, except maybe that he’s not let me go—not stopped touching me—since that last chase. It’s as though he’s decided I’m never going to be apart from him and is patiently waiting for me to speak.
My heart beats faster. I drag my gaze up, up, up, to his face.
“Because I love you.”
I whisper the words, but I know he hears. His eyes flash with satisfaction, and he sinks down before me.
“You’re kneeling,” I say stupidly. As though he doesn’t know. But Dimitri Voronov doesn’t have to kneel for anyone. He is the master of all he surveys. The kingpin of Rotherhithe is no servant. He’s a dom.
“I need to be for this.” He taps my foot with a long forefinger to tell me to lift it. I put my hand on his shoulder to keep my balance as he places my foot on his hairy, muscled thigh and washes first it, then the other.
I’ve never felt this cherished. I can’t remember being cared for this way. Maybe I never have been.
“I was serious about the breeding,” he murmurs. Leaning forwards, he presses a kiss to my lower belly, his beard rough on my skin. “I’m going to put a baby in there.”
Excitement shimmies through me, despite my having thought I was done, finished, broken after that chase, and giving up my virginity.
Well. Having my virginity ripped from me in the best way.
There must be a clever response, but all I’m capable of is, “Okay.”
A satisfied smile creeps over his face. He catches my hand, and brings it to his mouth to kiss that instead, and looks up at me.
“I love you. Marry me?”
Before I’ve processed his question, he has slipped a diamond ring onto my finger. It gleams in the water.
“You’re not…” My brain is mush. “You’re a mafia boss. You’re a billionaire. You shouldn’t be on your knees for me.”
His lips twitch, but then the amusement fades. “I will kneel foryou. My tzarina.”
This turns me into a pillar of salt, and I immediately melt and flow down the drain, destroyed forever by his sweetness.This man. I don’t disappear. But I do sink to the floor and fall into his arms.
“Yes.” And then I’m crying again, because I’m so lucky, and my body is awash with happy hormones. I’m exhausted and content and safe.
“My stalker,” I say between kisses. “My love.”
“Yours,” he murmurs back. Then he pulls me flush to his wide chest and a hard length pokes into my soft belly. “Come. Let me show you how I love you, my fiancée. I’m going to claim you repeatedly. I need to ensure I’ve bred you.”
But as he lifts me, there’s an urgent knock at the door. And another.
A call of “Boss!”
Then again, and again.