Vlad
“How long are you keeping me locked up in here?” Alessia straddles me in bed the next morning and my brain scrambles.
I grip her hips and yank her pussy over my thickening cock. She gets wet immediately, grinding down. Her youthful breasts brush my chest.
“Hmm?” she prompts.
Oh what? Right, there was a question.
“Until I believe you’ve learned your lesson.” I palm her ass, squeezing the ripe flesh until my cock’s so thick it hurts.
Alessia sits back. “I won’t run away again.” Her tone is serious, the teasing quality gone. It has the ring of a promise.
I tug her hips over mine again, but she grabs my wrists to stop me.
“I mean it, Vlad. You have my word. I don’t know if that means anything in the bratva, but in my Family, it does.”
I’m not inclined to believe a woman’s promise ever, whether she’s Italian or Russian, but I don’t say that.
“Why would I believe you, zaika?”
“I heard what you said yesterday. You could’ve taken a life for a life. My brother’s. But you didn’t. You’re just taking this time from me. I’m willing to honor that exchange.”
Ah, Alessia. Ever giving. Ever sweet.
I reach up and grasp her nape, pull her face down to mine and kiss her hard. “One condition.” I roll our bodies so I’m on top now.
“What’s that?” Her cheeks glow with color, eyes are bright.
“You’re mine in this bed now. No more refusing me. I want you, I take you. Understand?”
“But I don’t have to beg?”
I laugh. It’s unreal how this woman can make me laugh. “You will beg, zaika,” I tease. “But you don’t have to.” I climb off to get a condom. “Don’t move.”
She stays.
I grab her hips and pull her to the center of the bed. “You are a perfect woman, you know that?”
“Am I?” Delight shines on her face. She’s so expressive. So lovely.
“Da. Beautiful.” I kiss the flat plane of her belly. “Kind.” Another kiss. “Funny.” I part her legs and flick my tongue over her clit.
She shrieks and tries to close her legs.
“Uh uh. Keep these legs open or I’ll spank that pretty ass of yours again.”
Her inner thighs tremble, but she keeps them open, arching and releasing her pelvis as I trace the inside of her labia with my tongue. I torture her until her moans grow high-pitched and desperate, and then I shift up and roll on a condom.
“Mine,” I growl as I shove into her.
She doesn’t deny it. In fact, she wraps those long legs around my back and pulls me in deep.
Alessia
“Why are you nervous, Alessia?” Vlad’s watching me closely. He just showed the doctor out the front door and now he stands in the doorway. He brought the doctor in to examine me and take my blood work.
The doctor seemed nervous to be here, like Vlad is some kind of dignitary or something. I guess bratva is well-respected here. Or maybe he guesses I’m a prisoner and is afraid I’m going to appeal to him for help.
Of course he couldn’t know how sexually satisfied this prisoner happens to be.
I pick at a fingernail. My hands are clammy and I have a knot in my solar plexus. It’s been eight months since the stage 3 kidney failure diagnosis, and I’ve managed to keep it hidden from the people who love me. It’s like, if no one knows, it’s not real.
But maybe this doctor won’t find it. Depends on what tests he runs on the blood. “What is he checking for?” I try to sound casual.
I must fail because Vlad’s eyes narrow. “What do you know he will find?”
Busted.
I draw a circle with my toe on the living room rug. Mika’s listening from his post on the sofa.
“Does this have to do with why you think you can’t have children?”
I look up sharply, wondering how he figured that one out.
He shrugs. “Doctor said diabetes shouldn’t prevent it, it’s just riskier.”
I’m cold and sweaty all at once.
“Just tell me, Alessia.” There’s a pleading quality to Vlad’s voice I haven’t heard before. Only then do I realize he’s a little pale. “Is it cancer?”
Mika puts down his tablet to listen, eyes wide.
Cancer is everyone’s biggest fear. That word alone produces fear in the least emotional of people.
“Kidney failure,” I say quickly, since he’s already gone to the worst. Or what he perceives as the worst.
His brow furrows. “Fuck. A result of the diabetes?”
I nod. “I’m at stage three. Stage four is when you have to do dialysis.”
“This is why you’re short of breath?”
“Yes.”
He rubs his forehead. “Is it.. it’s not-”
“It’s not terminal, no. The next step would be dialysis and finding a donor match for a kidney transplant. But I’m not there yet.”
Vlad seizes on that. “Kidney transplant. Da. You don’t have to wait for dialysis for this. We’ll find you one now.”
“No.” I shake my head vehemently. “I’m not ready for that. My family… I haven’t even told them yet.”
Vlad considers me for a moment, absorbing this. “Why not?”
“I’m just not… ready.”
“You don’t want to deal with it. Don’t want it to be real.”
Relief that he understands sweeps through me. “Yes. Exactly.” I’ve been so freaked out about the whole thing. About dealing with my family’s emotions around it. Having to stand strong against their fears. Their overprotectiveness. And then there’s facing the whole kidney transplant thing. Getting on a donor list. Searching for a match. What if we don’t find one? My whole life could become consumed by broken hopes and bitter dreams.
Vlad comes over to the couch and sits beside me, then pulls me onto his lap. “You’re not alone, zaika. This can be handled. I’ll handle it, okay? We’ll find a match and do the surgery and your life will improve. You can have those babies you want so badly. Go on longer walks.”
My eyes sting. I wrap my hand over the top of one of his and squeeze. “I’m not ready,” I whisper.
He nods. “I’ll take care of it. You’ll be ready when it’s time,” he promises.
I want to believe him. Vlad is the sort of man who gets impossible things done. Like kidnapping a mafia princess and taking her to Russia. Making her fall in love with him.
And I’m relieved at his unemotional response-so different from how my Sicilian family would’ve reacted. Or at least how I projected they would react.
And maybe finding a donor will be easier in Russia than in the U. S. Lord knows, the corruption here goes far and wide. Maybe Vlad can offer big money to a donor here. Or pull strings to get me to the top of a list. There might be advantages to being in this country. To having Vlad in my corner.
I turn and lean into him, tucking my face into his neck. He continues to hold me, stroking my back and massaging my scalp.
I know this isn’t a fairy tale. Vlad isn’t my prince. He’s definitely no knight in shining armor. But if he thinks he can fix me, maybe he can. I let some of the fear that’s been gnawing at me since the diagnosis ebb.
I’ll let him shield me from the fears I’ve been running from for a little while longer…