10: In Which She Closes a Chapter

10.0: In Which She Closes a Chapter

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After Lev hauled Nikolai’s one suitcase up into the guestroom, I sat on the edge of the queen-sized bed and watched Nikolai set it beside me and open it. LV might have been spattered all over the outside but the inside was a warzone.

“What?” Nikolai followed my open-mouthed stare to the mound of clothing in the valise. “I was kind of in a hurry.”

I rose and stooped, snatching a creased V-necked T-shirt with disdain. “They all need pressing, unless you want to look like you slept in every single item in here.”

He laughed, throwing an arm around my waist and pulling me into his solid front. “Is it strange that I’m getting turned on from you talking about ironing my clothes?” He buried his nose in my hair.

“Hey, I didn’t offer,” I told him, reaching behind me and unravelling the towel that hung low on his hips. “Get dressed, Prince.”

He slapped my ass, making me squeal. “Don’t call me that,” he growled, his mouth against the back of my neck. “Mm. Apples.”

“Don’t,” I whispered, although the air felt charged with sexual electricity now. “We have to go down for breakfast.”

“And we will,” was Nikolai’s husky response as he fisted my hair in his hand, away from his twister of a tongue.

I jerked myself away and landed on the bed, breathing heavily. “My parents are very…particular about meals at the table,” I explained, playing with the hem of my T-shirt. “If we take way too long, they’ll… Well, they’re not stupid. They’ll know we’re having sex upstairs.” I sighed heavily. “Plus my brother’s home for some kind of mid-term break. This will be awkward.”

Nikolai was pulling on clothes as I spoke and I studiously kept my gaze on the cream wall behind him.

“We’ve already had sex upstairs,” Nikolai helpfully pointed out with a smouldering stare.

I threw him a glower. “Which shouldn’t have happened. It’s disrespectful.” I felt my face soften with the memory. “Not that I wouldn’t do it again.”

He laughed, looking too delectable in a not-too-rumpled lime-green T-shirt and low-riding black jeans. He settled beside me and laced his black Converse. “Did I mention that your stepmother is a little…strange?” he said conversationally, rising to all his impressive six-foot-something height.

“Strange?” I followed suit, still amazed that Prince Nikolai Alvonich was actually standing in the house I’d more or less grown up in; that he had actually said the B-word and I hadn’t freaked out.

Oh, fuck.

It was right then that I remembered what time I’d stumbled into the house and who’d met me at the front door: Rory the night-time writer. I usually called Sav up whenever I was drunk but since I’d been ignoring her calls since I’d come home, that was out of the question. Mikhail, my second closest friend, was literally related to the problem and besides, he was on honeymoon in Brazil.

“I might or might not have described your dick to her last night,” I mumbled, allowing Nikolai to take my hand in his and lead me out the door. “In graphic, HD detail.”

He cut a sharp look at me. “What?”

“I was drunk, OK? All kinds of things came out my mouth last night, including my plea for you to come.” I cleared my throat. “Rory and I might or might not have gotten into an argument about Prince Alberts versus apadravya piercings.”

Nikolai froze mid-step. Heat crept up his neck and stained his shadowed cheeks. God, he was adorable when he blushed. If I ignored his five o’clock shadow, staggering height and extreme sex appeal, he could’ve passed off as a kid.

“You discussed my dick piercing with your mother?” he said in an incredulous voice, his eyes wide with mortification. “Ophelia.” My name came through clenched teeth.

God, this was going to be a freaking day like no other. Rory and I were close but not that close. In fact, I shuddered to think what else I’d said to her –that Nikolai was my Exalted Bringer of Orgasms? Or that I loved the way he looked at me as if I were an oasis in a desert? The humiliating possibilities were endless. It took me under five seconds to remember, and I instantly wished the ground would open up and swallow me. Unfortunately, I wasn’t one of those people that got shitfaced and conveniently forgot every embarrassing thing that happened under the influence.

The L-word might or might not have been thrown around last night, coupled with a debate about love at first sight and other fairytale bullshit Rory believed in and I didn’t.

“Did you go into length and girth as well?” Nikolai muttered sarcastically, his dark brows slashed into a frown. “Did you draw a diagram from memory?”

Despite myself, I let out a laugh, instantly stifling it when Nikolai’s scowl deepened. We were standing on the landing having this surreal conversation and Nikolai was practically hyperventilating.

“Baby, don’t worry,” I told him in a singsong voice, squeezing his hand reassuringly, “about a thing. ’Cause every little thing is gonna be all right.” I cocked my head to one side. “Well, in your case, big thing.”

Nikolai’s lips twitched. “You have a horrible singing voice,” he said serenely, leaning in to peck my nose, “and an even worse sense of humour. I love them both.”

It was with those words that I dragged him downstairs and towards the dining room. Loud laughter filtered out the room and stopped when my parents got a look at us standing in the doorway. Calvin, who usually came down in cotton PJs, had actually dressed up, probably against his will.

Dad pointedly stared at our linked hands. “So,” he casually began, “not entirely a roll in the hay?”

“Dad!” I hissed, at the same time Rory said, “Dev!”

“Well, I guess this is better than GTA,” Calvin said animatedly, shovelling cornflakes into his mouth as his eyes swivelled back and forth from Dad to us as if he were watching a tennis match. “Hey, I’m Calvin, by the way,” he told Nikolai, receiving a greeting in return.

“Thank you for opening up your home to me on such short notice,” Nikolai said politely, pointedly avoiding eye contact with Rory, who grinned back at him. He pulled open my chair opposite her and sat down beside me once I’d settled.

“That’s no problem,” Rory said cheerfully. “You’re Mikhail’s uncle. He’s a good kid. You’re also Fee’s friend.”

I cleared my throat. “Actually, he’s my boyfriend,” I declared. Had I ever said that word to my parents? No. “The, um, bacon smells good. You’re such a great cook, Ror.”

“Your what?” This incredulous demand came from my dad.

I forced myself to meet his disapproving stare. “Nikolai’s my boyfriend. Is there a problem with your twenty-four-year-old daughter dating, Dad?”

Rory laughed, clapping her hands together. “God, you haven’t brought a man home since… well, since high school! This is exciting.”

“Exciting?” Calvin sputtered. “O brings a dude home and that’s exciting?” He grunted.“You know what’s exciting, Mom? The fact that I’m maintaining good grades and captain of the junior basketball team. That’s exciting, if not pretty damn awesome.”

“And we’re proud of you, sweetheart, but I only heard about O’s dude yesterday and –”

“I’m sure you wouldn’t stop being her boyfriend if you stayed all the way in Ruslavia,” Dad said loudly, his menacing hazel eyes fixed on Nikolai. “What exactly are you doing here? ”

I shot my father the dirtiest look I could muster at the tone of his voice but Nikolai placed his hand on my thigh, squeezing gently. The gesture was supposed to be soothing through my jeans, but it was ultimately intimate, affectionate.

“I missed your daughter,” he replied, nodding his head at Rory’s innate offer of coffee. “Thank you.”

I loved my father; I really did. But when he got like this, overprotective and difficult, I always considered shutting him out from my life. Screw our full-disclosure pact.

“You missed her after, what, a one-night stand? Which wasn’t even at night. Which was in a fucking barn, of all places.”

“Devin Lateef Shaw!” Rory exclaimed, slapping my father’s shoulder, hard. “Will you behave?”

“Thanks for the mental image, Father,” Calvin grumbled. “Why don’t you tell us what the weather was like on that day, too?”

“I’m behaving!” Dad protested, raising his hands in surrender. “I just find this hard to wrap my head around.” He gave me an assessing stare. “I thought you were smarter than this, gorgeous.”

I gripped the edge of the tabletop, seething. I was going to say something I was going to regret; I just knew it. Nikolai’s hand on my thigh squeezed once more and I exhaled, quelling my anger.

“I don’t need anyone to tell me how crazy this seems. I know,” I said softly. “But don’t tell me that you and Ror were sane when you first got together.”

Rory gave me a soft look before turning her reverential gaze to her husband. “We were quite mad, weren’t we? Especially you!”

“I think I’m going to barf,” Calvin muttered. “If anybody loves me, gouge my eyeballs out and shove them in my ears.”

“Shut it, Squirt,” I said automatically.

“You're the one who’s turned a great breakfast into an episode of Jerry Springer,” he countered.

“And how’s this going to work out? Long distance?” Dad’s eyes shifted to Nikolai. “I liked you, Nikolai, but that was before you deflowered my little girl in front of some horses.”

I choked on the little coffee that I’d managed to sip. “Deflowered?” I sputtered, feeling heat stain my cheeks yet again. “If you thought I was a virgin before –”

Rory interrupted with a flustered, “Fee, sweetheart, I don’t think –”

“For fuck’s sake, Dad!” Calvin moaned. I felt bad for him. There was no way I wanted to hear about his sexual exploits, either.

“Calvin Shaw! Watch your filthy mouth,” Rory screeched, her creamy skin becoming crimson. “We have company.”

“I don’t think this is the time or place to discuss my relationship with Ophelia, Mr. Shaw.” Nikolai’s voice suddenly cut into the air. It was deep, self-assured and successfully calmed my father down.

“Fine,” Dad conceded after a long moment of silence had elapsed. “After breakfast, I’ll show you the beach.”

“Why does that sound like a threat?” I said under my breath, loud enough for only Nikolai to hear.

He chuckled, and for a long while, we were focused on eating. Only the sound of cutlery scraping against plates filled the air.

Until Rory serenely asked, “So, Nikolai, what do you think about male piercings?”

***

Tonight, Quincy’s was full of loud chatter and the incessant squeals of excitement of little kids. On a good day, the restaurant was filled with murmuring couples. Tonight was all about families.

“Sorry about this,” I told Nikolai, struggling to be heard over the noise.

A slow smile spread across his face. He slid around our booth until we were side by side, our thighs touching.

“We don’t have to shout,” he said into my ear, “if we sit close, kitten.”

I shivered. The cool air and high ceilings inside had nothing to do with it. “No touching.”

Nikolai chuckled, low in his throat. “I agree,” he said, still keeping our thighs in contact. He sat back, surveying the place. The packed eating booths. The bustling wait staff. The oven, in full view of the diners, and the bar out in front. “I like it,” he pronounced. “It’s…charming.”

I eyed him. “You’ve never been to a family eating place?”

“No. I used to be too poor to eat in a place like this,” he said pensively. “Now I’m too rich.”

I laughed. “I guess royals are too good for hamburgers and rambunctious kids.”

“Not me,” Nikolai said softly, his laughing eyes trained on a pair of five- or six-year-olds breaking free from their parents and scampering across the red-brick floor. His cornflower blue eyes turned to me. “If you don’t want me too touch you, why are you wearing such a sexy fucking dress?”

It was as if his eyes were searing through the black lace of my knee-length dress. A blush stole across my face. That same heat burned between my legs.

“Don’t think this is any easier for me, buddy.” I yearned to touch him, to stroke him. To run my fingers across the whiskers on his face. To yank the onyx curls on his head.

I had never craved physical contact with any man the way I craved it with Nikolai Alvonich. He frazzled my brain, scrambled my thought processes – and I loved it.

“I am so going to fuck you senseless,” he casually informed me, sending heat directly to my throbbing clit. He tore his eyes from me. “On the phone, you said your mother’s in hospital?”

Hospital? Rory? What the hell’s he talking about?

Frazzled. Scrambled.

I shook my head and squeezed my thighs together, trying to quell the aching between my legs. “I don’t want to discuss Natalya.” One day I would have to make peace with her, if only for my own peace of mind, but it wasn’t going to be anytime soon. She was a drama queen and overdosing on prescription drugs was something she’d done to get me to go see her.

Nikolai was regarding me, his eyes assessing. “Maybe another time,” he conceded, looping a lock of my hair around his index finger and tugging. Instead of in my scalp, I felt the sharp jolt of pain in my crotch. “Tell me what you plan on doing now that Chasing Ghosts is through,” he said, swiftly changing the subject.

“I don’t…know.”

Saying the words out loud made it ten times scarier. I didn’t know what I wanted to do. Acting? I’d called my agent the minute I came home with my father and she had no news for me. Modelling? It was way too shallow and I knew my dad would freak. Law school again? I’d dropped out for a reason… Fortunately, the sight of a bread basket and various spreads appearing on our table gave pause to my inner freak-out. I looked up at the waitress, who towered over us with pen and pad in hand.

“Evening, folks,” she said brightly, her eyes sliding appreciatively to Nikolai. “What can I get you to drink?”

“Coors, please,” I said, receiving a look from Nikolai. He obviously hadn’t expected me to order a beer. Well, I needed it. Desperately.

“And you, sir?” The blonde woman was eating him up as if he were on Quincy’s menu.

“He’ll have the same, thanks,” I snapped, startling her into hurrying away.

Nikolai’s hand landed on my bare knee as he leaned into me. “I like that you're a jealous feline,” he murmured into my ear. “You have no idea how much I want to fuck you right upon this table.”

“Even with kids around?” I panted, instantly swallowed into the perverse fantasy.

“I wouldn’t be thinking straight, pussycat,” he replied, his tongue flickering to capture my earlobe, diamond stud and all. “I’d pay for therapy later.”

I let out a strained laugh. “Nikolai…stop.”

“I can’t,” he rasped, his hand sliding up, up, up…

“Are you ready to order?” a voice said from above us.

I blinked repeatedly, my eyes focusing on the beer bottles on the table. The blonde was tapping her foot impatiently as Nikolai slowly detached himself from me.

“I’ve got this,” said Nikolai, opening the leather-bound menu and giving it a cursory glance as if he ate here regularly and knew it by heart. “We’ll have your Texan-style hamburger and fries. With extra hot sauce.”

“Great choice,” she told him excitedly, as if he’d just told her that he had a big D. Great choice to be well-endowed, sir. Great choice you made, choosing such awesome big-dick genes…

Whoa, I thought, watching her sashay away. Where’s all this stupid jealousy coming from?

It took me a minute to realise that Nikolai was leaning on his elbow on the table watching me in amusement, the bottle of Coors in his hand.

“What?”

He shook his head, a curl flying across his forehead. “Nothing. Nothing that wouldn’t scare you, that is.”

I sighed. “Nothing you say could scare me.”

And that was freaking true.

So he asked me to tell him my “deepest, darkest secrets” and I obliged. It was easy to talk to him, to bare my soul, so to speak. Just as it was easy for him to tell me. Heads close together, we talked. By the time the food came, our beers were finished and Nikolai asked for water.

“You’re kidding me, Prince,” I said, dipping a French fry into a dollop of ketchup before eating it. “You’d pick Carrie over Misery?” Once it was established that we were both huge Stephen King fans, Nikolai played the Ebert to my Roeper.

“How many times do I have to tell you not to call me that, kotik?” Nikolai ran a ketchup-tipped fry across my lower lip. My tongue flickered out to lick it away. “Please don’t let me see your tongue,” he said quietly. “You can’t say Kathy Bates didn’t creep you the fuck out. Rock beats scissors. Misery beats Carrie.”

“Well…”

“I’m your number one fan,” Nikolai quipped in a false falsetto, sounding nothing like Kathy.

He dipped ketchup on my lip again but this time, before I could get rid of it, his mouth descended on mine. My eyes fluttered closed and my fingers fisted his T-shirt. Nikolai slid a hand around the back of my neck, slowly swiping his tongue across the seam of my lips. Moaning, I opened for him and his tongue slid inside, briefly teasing.

He pulled away, his eyes dark, electricity sparking inside them. “Fuck, baby. No touching,” he said hoarsely, returning his attention to the towering hamburger on his plate.

I was breathing heavily, heart racing, blood bubbling in my veins. All from a little brush of his tongue against mine. All from the way his lips uttered a simple endearment. I reached out and gulped down the glass of water the waitress had set on the table.

The rest of our dinner passed in much of the same way – jokes and arguments, sexual innuendo and teasing touches – until we were among the last to leave. Nikolai settled the bill with his VISA, despite how much I asked him to at least consider going Dutch.

Outside, Nikolai took my hand in his. I was beginning to understand that he enjoyed doing that, which was absolutely fine by me. I had never been into the hand-holding, lovey-dovey thing with boyfriends but with Nikolai, anything to get us closer was more than acceptable. Necessary.

“This must have been an incredible place to grow up in,” Nikolai observed, leading me to the kerb where Lev was parked.

“It was,” I admitted, remembering how I’d met Savita. “But I didn’t know that until Rory blew into town.”

He chuckled, opening the backseat door of the Mercedes and guiding me inside.“Yeah. Devin said as much. Back when he liked me.”

Nikolai was sitting beside me, his hand on my knee.

“What did you two talk about after breakfast?” I asked, unable to keep the wariness out of my voice. I really didn’t want to know. My father had thought Nikolai had deflowered me. Either he was deliberately naïve or he simply wanted an excuse to disapprove of Nikolai.

“Numerous things,” he whispered in response, his fingers tracing a path up the inside of my thigh. My eyes shifted to Lev sitting in front. His eyes were on the road as he drove and it was dark.

“Like what?” I said on an exhale. Nikolai had just found that I wasn’t wearing any panties.

“Are you trying to torture me, kitten?” he demanded, dipping his index finger deep inside me.

I moaned, bowing my back away from the seat. Fire heated my insides, scorched my skin. Soon I couldn’t say anything, much less worry about what threats my father had made, because Nikolai slid another finger inside me. Stroking. Curling. Fucking. And slowly, skilfully bringing me to a sharp, painfully intense orgasm.

***

Naked, he was moving between my legs, his mouth like an inferno on my cunt. His breath was hot against my clit, setting it alight and unapologetic. My flesh was swollen from his stubble, from his assault. Even in the pale glow of the moon, I could see what kind of erotic image we made on the beach. I moaned, cried his name.

“So good,” he was groaning. His hands were on my hips, holding me down against the velvety blanket beneath me. “You taste so fucking good, Ophelia.” He licked. Set his tongue on the stiff nodule of my clitoris. Raised his head. “So good, baby. Does it feel good?”

His voice was hoarse, his breathing ragged. I had never heard anything so…feral.

“Yes,” I hissed, dragging my nails against the blanket and pushing my hips up to meet him. “Dammit, Nikolai,” I exclaimed, squeezing my eyes shut. “Please. Please fuck me.”

He slid a finger inside me, swirling it around beneath his tongue, stretching me. I was soaking, wet from my orgasm in the car, wet from the momentous build-up to this one. He slipped another finger inside me.

“I need you to come for me, baby,” he rasped, his hungry voice still audible over the crash of the waves before me. His fingers were quick, as frantic as his tongue had been. “I need to watch you come.”

He needed me to come. Not wanted; needed.

Fireworks exploded behind my closed eyelids and I clamped my legs together, keeping Nikolai down. Sensation spiked in my veins, heated my blood. I came, screaming his name. Eyes still shut, I felt him gently prise my legs apart; felt him move over me.

“Look at me, Ophelia,” he commanded, his breath fanning my mouth. He pushed damp tendrils of my hair out of my face.

I looked up at him through heavy lids, breathing heavily.

“Good, baby,” he murmured, kissing the tip of my nose. “Keep your eyes on me while I enter you.”

“Okay,” I breathed. His erection was pressed against the damp inside of my thighs.

Eyes locked, we groaned together as he ran the head of his cock up and down the slick folds of my opening. The feel of the top of his barbell against my swollen clit made me buck against him, made me dig my nails into the rippling muscles of his back.

“I can’t wait any longer,” he whispered, his gaze still unwavering.

“Please,” I rasped, tilting my pelvis beneath him, spreading my legs even wider.

His hand was between us, guiding his cock into me. In one push he was inside, dragging himself out of me after a second.

I moaned, skating my hands down his back and gripping his ass. He thrust into me again, so hard, so deep. I cried his name, breaking apart underneath his smouldering blue-eyed gaze.

“You feel so good,” he said softly, drawing out of me before pushing in. “You feel so good, squeezing me with your tight cunt, kitten.”

I wanted so desperately to close my eyes, to give myself over to the sensations he was causing, but the moment my eyes started drifting closed, he whispered for me to keep them open. He suddenly moved onto his knees, grabbing my legs and pulling me down towards him.

“I wish you could see what I see,” he said roughly, his large body illuminated by the moon. He slid into me, his eyes fixed on the crude place where we joined. “My cock sliding into your beautiful pink cunt. You’re so wet, baby. I can see your juices shimmering in the light. Such a fucking pretty sight.”

He was deeper now; oh-so-wonderfully deep. It felt like I could feel him in every inch of my body.

“That feels so…so good,” I cried out, jolting against him when he reached down and cupped my breasts, fiddling with my beaded nipples. “Oh, Kolya, fuck.”

Stroke after stroke, dirty word after dirty word, the torture continued. I needed to come. Needed to let it go. Needed to admit that I would never, ever feel like this with anyone but him.

“Yes, baby,” Nikolai said roughly, his hands firmly planted on my bucking hips as our flesh pounded together. “You’re so beautiful. Beautiful when you come. Beautiful when you fuck me.”

I blinked away the sweat that was trickling into my eyes. I didn’t want to miss the sight of him exploding inside me, scorching my insides with his semen. I didn’t want to miss the almost tortured look on his beautiful face.

When it finally came – when he finally came – I let go as well. His roar of completion sent goosebumps skittering down my spine and the only thing that was left was for me to say his name, to give him the only thing he really needed from me.

“Nikolai, Nikolai,” I chanted, revelling in the aftershocks of my orgasm. I quaked. Nikolai held me.

And then he was on me, our sticky bodies still joined.

He rolled over and I was pressed against his heaving chest. Post-coital bliss took a lot longer to dissipate with Nikolai than it was supposed to. But I was still acutely aware that if my parents or my brother decided to take a midnight walk and came outside, they would find Nikolai and me in this incredibly compromising position. In any event, sex on the beach was a lot more inviting than sex under my parents’ roof. Again.

“About how the minute I saw Ophelia, I wanted to know her.”

Nikolai’s voice broke into the silent night. I raised my head, quirking an eyebrow down at him.

“What?” I asked, stroking his bristly cheek.

“You wanted to know what your father and I discussed, didn’t you?”

“You said that to my dad?”

“I did, carefully leaving out the part about your high school graduation,” he said. I could hear the laughter in his voice.

“What did he say?” I genuinely wanted to know. I mean, he hadn’t been hostile when I’d told him that Nikolai and I were going to dinner, but he hadn’t been Mr. Happy, either.

“He asked me if I meant know in the biblical sense.”

“Oh, God.”

“That’s what I said,” Nikolai laughed, threading his fingers through my hair. “He doesn’t beat around the bush, your father.” He paused. “I let him know that I don’t care where his daughter is – Miami, Ruslavia, Mars, here – as long as I get to be with her. As long as I get to be the man she chooses.”

“Nikolai,” I began, racking my brain for something to say.

“I told him that I worship the ground his daughter walks on and that I can’t help it,” he continued. “I told him that she’s worth more than a roll in the hay, that she probably deserves a man that knows her inside and out. But that I deserve to be that man.”

I cupped his face in my hands. “What did he say when you were done?”

“That he would break my kneecaps if I switched religions,” he said pensively. “You know, because I kind of worship you? Devin’s funny, I’ll give him that. Afterwards, he took me to the garage behind the house and showed me the car he’s restoring for Calvin.” His brow furrowed. “You managed to fuck up a Camaro?”

“Hey, we were talking about me, not my poor Ruby, rest her soul.”

Laughing, he shifted us and now he was hovering over me, his cock growing inside me. “I love you, Ophelia,” he whispered, so low I almost had to read his lips. “I’ve only said those words to one other woman – my mother. I don’t want to lose you but you have to believe –”

“I love you, too,” I softly interjected.

And I did. It was more than sex, more than a stupid list that I hadn’t thought was stupid until I met this man. It was the way I couldn’t imagine living without his arms around me, without his husky laughter in my ears. It was the way we could talk about anything, the way he listened with open adoration.

All thoughts of long distance, of how I was confused about my career, of how whirlwind this would inevitably seem to people, of the implications of dating a prince… All thoughts of these complications were irrelevant.

I was in love with this man. He was in love with me.

“Nikolai? Say something.” I realised that he’d been silent for a long time.

“Tell me again, pussycat,” he said, his voice broken. “Please.”

“I fucking love you, stalker.”

Nikolai laughed, the vibrations of his body echoing in mine. God help me, I was wet again.

His forearms bracketed my sides. “Didn’t you know?” he said huskily, eyes boring into mine. “I’m your number one fan, sweetheart.”

And then he began to move.