Married By Christmas

He’d dropped forty million just so she didn’t have to go out!

But she’d realized he’d been right. For weeks she’d been unable to contemplate being out in public, to see even strangers on the streets. The idea of meeting any of his acquaintances and interacting with them made her break out in cold sweat.

She had, however, insisted he go out alone. He’d refused. He’d locked himself up with her, so that he even worked across from her in the same room, or in the room he’d made into the nerve center of his cyber tech empire, running one of the major tentacles of Black Castle Enterprises right next to her favorite living room. Apart from the fleeting presence of Fyodor and his team of guards and hired help, Ivan had had no one for company but her.

He assured her he was a loner, with the only company he’d ever had in his life Dr. Balducci and his other partners. Even them he saw only sporadically since they were all so busy with their businesses and now with their families. And he insisted he didn’t want anyone else’s company but hers anyway.

But even if none of his assurances were to make her feel better, he couldn’t enjoy being cooped up in the same place for that long, not even if it was acres wide. But her efforts to get him to go out met with dismal failure. He wouldn’t budge from her side.

But for the past couple of weeks, she’d been feeling much better, regaining the desire to actually walk the streets and see people, and yesterday she had actually done it. He’d taken her on a tour of Moscow. She’d been predictable and chosen to start with the famous attractions.

The whole morning yesterday had been spent visiting the Krasnaya Ploshchad, or Red Square, followed by the nearby and stunningly beautiful St. Basil’s Cathedral, which exemplified Russian architecture. The two landmarks, now starting to get covered in snow, seemed to embody everything she’d ever imagined as Russian. The land she was born in but had never returned to, until now.

Today, it was the Kremlin’s turn, where he’d made them jump queues and enter places no tourist was allowed, all through the five palaces, four cathedrals and the enclosing Kremlin Wall and Towers.

“Having a man of your influence for a guide obviously has its perks,” she’d told him.

A teasing look had lit up his face as he’d winked at her. “You haven’t seen anything yet.”

She’d wondered what more there could possibly be as he’d taken them through a heavily guarded wing and into a massive, imposingly ornate office. It had only been when she’d found a man surrounded by half a dozen hulking bodyguards advancing eagerly to greet them that she’d realized what he’d meant, how accurate his words had been.

She really didn’t remember everything that had happened in the time they’d spent in that man’s company. A normal side effect, she was sure, of finding herself face-to-face with the President of the Russian Federation!

The meeting, an impromptu one that could only have been planned at most the day before, lasted for half an hour. During the surreal time, both men had made her the focus of attention and conversation, with the president himself pouring her tea and asking her all kinds of courteous questions.

Then Ivan had said he was taking her to dinner and the president had stood up at once, asking Ivan for an extended one-on-one meeting. Instead of jumping to ask when, Ivan had actually given him an inconclusive answer.

Still stunned from that, and from the whole momentous event, she’d let Ivan sweep her out of the palace complex. Only now, when they’d been in his car for at least ten minutes, did she finally get over her shock enough to speak. She turned to him.

“Seriously? ‘I’ll see when I can clear a morning for you’? That’s what you say when the second-most powerful man on earth asks you for a personal meeting?”

Keeping his eyes on the road as he negotiated Moscow’s downtown traffic, he gave that lopsided smile that had been coming easier to him and that twisted everything inside her. “It’s the only answer I had to give him.”

“You direct your sprawling business empire from home these days, and you have the most efficient system humanly possible in place anyway. You can certainly ‘clear a morning’ at once for the President of the Russian Federation when he asks you to.”

At a traffic light he slid her one of those heated glances that brought her blood to an instant boil. “It’s not only my business empire I have to take into account while clearing mornings.”

“Seriously?” Her exclamation was almost a squeak this time. “You might have incurred the wrath of one of history’s most powerful and dangerous men on my account?”

His lips spread wider at her burst of incredulous anxiety. “I’m too valuable to incur anyone’s wrath. I’m also too dangerous that no one, not even him, would act on it even if I do.”

Her heart drummed in rising apprehension. “C’mon, Ivan. Even you shouldn’t risk putting that to the test, certainly not so you can babysit me. When will you believe I can spend time on my own and bring your obsession with watching me under control? For God’s sake, I’m healed, fully, totally. Inside and out. And you have me ensconced in this fortress of yours with enough black ops guards to thwart a military invasion.”

His gaze lengthened as he seemed to realize that her mortification was real. Then, putting the car in motion again when the light turned green, he pushed the hands-free button on the wheel.

In seconds the call connected and a voice she’d always recognize now emanated from the surround-sound system, answering in that heavily accented English. The president!

“Mr. Konstantinov, so good to hear from you again so soon.”

Ivan’s eyes briefly landed on her in an intimate caress. “You have Ms. Shepherd to thank for that, Mr. President. She convinced me I could leave her side and come to meet you whenever you wish. You understand that with her recuperating from major surgery, her well-being comes first to me.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’ll be only too happy to receive you whenever Ms. Shepherdova can spare your vigilant services.”

Then with no closing words, both men hung up almost at the same moment.

Ivan turned those incredible emerald eyes to her, that indulgence that always filled them choking her up yet again. “Happy now?”

All tension drained from her body in a rush, making her slump back in the plush leather seat of his Rolls-Royce. “If you call feeling as if I’ve dodged a bullet happy, then yeah.”

The smile froze over his magnificent face. “It really worried you that much?”

“Hello? I had a dozen scenarios scrambling my mind and in every one of them you were targeted for any level of disciplinary action!”

A frown crept over his face. “I wouldn’t have arranged that meeting in the first place if I thought it would upset you. I wanted it to be a surprise you’d remember fondly.”

“And boy, will I.” At his darkening expression, she rushed on. “I will remember it in the best way, up until you offhandedly disregarded his request. Then it turned memorable for all the scary reasons.”

At his stymied expression, she realized this was a serious enough event she could use to settle the issue he’d been dodging since they’d come here at last.

Turning fully to him, she placed her hand over his arm, found his muscles bunched to the consistency of rock. “Want to know what upsets me? It’s that you keep tailoring your every breath to what you think is best for me. That you won’t believe me when I tell you what that is.”

His jaw hardened, yet he made no response as he brought the car to a stop in front of what he’d told her on the way out of the Kremlin was one of Moscow’s premier gourmet restaurants.

Before he got out to help her out, leaving the car to one of the guards who followed them everywhere at a discreet distance, he turned to her briefly. In the fleeting moments their eyes met, there was acknowledgment that he understood what she’d meant.

That he hadn’t taken her yet.

Over the last ten weeks he’d exposed her to all kinds of intimacy and pleasure, brought her to dizzying heights in every way, except for the way she craved. He hadn’t made love to her, hadn’t claimed her, fully. By now she wondered if he ever would.

After she’d lost count of the times she’d begged him to take her, she’d stopped counting, and begging. She’d accepted from the start that being with him would be on his terms, that she needed him so completely, she’d take whatever he gave. Because at the time she’d made the decision, and even now, nothing at all from him wasn’t an option.

But now that the ominous ten-week milestone was here, his continuing resistance to act on his desire only made her suspect if it even existed. That this wasn’t all some kind of debt he’d pledged to himself to pay, to her and to Alex. That would certainly explain his obsession with “healing her.”

Yes, she had seen evidence of his desire, felt it, but now she wondered if it wasn’t just the normal reaction of a virile male to an aroused female. Maybe, he thought making love to her that way came with too high a price, that of complicating his exit when he needed to walk away again. Maybe his desire wasn’t strong enough for him to pay that price. Every day that passed made her a little readier to accept this explanation.

Feeling his mood had plunged as deeply as hers, she let him lead her into the restaurant in silence. The moment they entered, a tall, thin blond man, the maître d’ presumably, came rushing toward them. A smile of eagerness broke through what looked like permanent disdain as he greeted Ivan.

As he led them inside at once, bypassing everyone who crowded the entrance waiting to be seated, every head turned to look at them. It was clear that most, if not all of the diners recognized Ivan, giving her a taste of what it meant to be in the company of a celebrity and under the microscope of public scrutiny.

Before they could be taken to the most exclusive table in the establishment that the maître d’ had promised, half a dozen men and women stood up from a table in their path. Ivan stiffened as he saluted them without stopping, but they surrounded them, gushing in excitement over him and looking curiously at her.

Turned out they were waiting for Ivan to consider investing in their start-up. Having his ear in person was like a windfall they were ready to prostrate themselves for.

Realizing Ivan wouldn’t give it to them, she turned to him and murmured for his ears only, “Apart from the president, it would be nice to meet live Russians who aren’t your reverent employees.”

His breath heated her neck as he whispered back, “You’ll find those who wish for my favor are even worse sycophants than those already on my payroll.”

But true to his ongoing quest to grant her every wish, he accepted the group’s eager invitation to sit at their table.

Taking the plunge, she sat across the table for eight from Ivan, so that she could talk to others for a change. Not that there was much talking at first. It seemed the others were at a loss what to do with Ivan now that they’d gotten his attention. It was clear they’d expected him to turn down their invitation, had probably hoped at most for an invitation to call him directly. Now that he shockingly sat among them, they were as clearly overwhelmed by the godlike brooding entity who dominated the whole restaurant.

They grew more flustered when they ventured to speak, doing it in Russian, only to have Ivan answer in English. They tried to accommodate him, but none of them could hold more than a basic conversation in English. For some reason, Ivan never spoke Russian to her except in endearments though he knew she was fluent. She’d left Russia at only two, but her parents and Alex had continued to teach her. Wanting to put the others at ease, she spoke up in Russian, inviting everyone, starting with Ivan, to follow suit.

After that, to her surprise, being among a group of people, strangers but young and spirited, turned out to be far easier than she expected. It was an even nicer surprise to find herself falling back into the ease of her previously sociable self.

And all the time, she felt Ivan’s gaze on her, even as he interacted with everyone, letting them court his favor but generally taking control of the gathering. And though he did it all smoothly, masterfully, every time one of the men had an aside with her, she felt a spike in the heat of his focus on her.

Basking in what she chose to label as jealousy, something she hadn’t felt from Ivan before, she turned to the guy on her right. The man she was introduced to as Mikhail Popov was around her age with boyish blond good looks. He had been the funniest throughout dinner, and the easiest to read. His expression mixed blatant admiration of her with extreme awe and maybe a little envy of Ivan. More than a little tipsy now, he’d tapped her forearm to catch her attention. She turned to him and he stared at her blankly as if he’d forgotten what he’d wanted to say already.

Suddenly he blinked, then exclaimed, “Ah, yes. I heard that Mr. Konstantinov bought a mansion fit for a czar. Does it really have nine bedroom suites, two wine cellars and two indoor pools, not to mention thirty acres of gardens and grounds and a twenty-car garage?”

Anastasia smiled at his slurred, list-like question. “I haven’t actually counted the suites, or the maximum occupancy of the garage, but that sounds about right.”

Mikhail sat back in his chair, looking stupefied. “Now that’s putting his money to good use, getting a place large enough to accommodate all of his mistresses at once.”

His words fell on her like a kick, hitting her where she’d been shot, cut open and put back together. Not even the bullets or the post-operative wound had hurt that much.

To suppress her reaction, she turned blindly to yet another man who drew her attention on her other side. She didn’t really hear what that other man said, didn’t know what she said in answer, her stomach churning harder as she felt the intensity of Ivan’s gaze flare up. She had no doubt he’d noticed her condition.

Then without preamble, he stood up and threw down his napkin, silencing everyone at the table at once, not to mention almost the whole restaurant.

He beckoned to the maître d’, who came running, muttered instructions about settling everyone’s bill. He walked around the table to her and her heart thudded at the barely leashed wrath in his predatory approach. For a moment she dreaded being alone with him. Yet to resist would probably cause a bigger scene than the one already unfolding, so she rose silently to her feet.

She wasn’t sure if she managed an acceptable goodbye to their stunned and apprehensive companions, but she doubted they even noticed. They were too busy shivering at the malevolent glare Ivan turned on Mikhail. Ivan had noticed the blond man had been the one to upset her, and seemed to be calculating appropriate retribution. The poor drunk man probably had no idea what he’d said wrong, and most likely wouldn’t even remember saying it at all when he sobered up.

Grabbing Ivan’s arm, she tried to rush him away. She could have sooner moved a concrete pillar. As her nerves screamed in dread that he’d escalate right here and now, it seemed her mortification got to him. He suddenly turned his gaze to her, his eyes probing, solicitous. Taking advantage of his distraction, she tugged at him again and this time he let her steer him toward the entrance, where their coats and car were brought over.

The moment they were in the car, he insisted on knowing what Mikhail had said to upset her so much, but she managed to dodge his questions all the way back to his mansion.

Once inside, she tried to rush up to her suite, the one he didn’t share. Whatever intimacies he’d been drowning her in, he’d always ended up leaving her to sleep alone.

As she started climbing the marble stairway to the upper level, he caught her hand.

“If you don’t tell me what the man said, I’ll have to go back and get it out of him myself.”

She turned on him, her heart twisting in alarm, her voice sharpening. “You leave that poor guy alone.”

“Not if he said something that disturbed you so much. Your face contorted as if what he said caused you physical pain.”

How could he read her so accurately? And not at all at the same time?

It was she who gripped his hand now, needing to abort his aggression. “Promise me you won’t go near him. Mikhail would probably drop dead of fright if you walked up to him and gave him one of those terrifying stares of yours.”

“Tell me what he said!”

Wincing at his thundering demand, she let go of his hand as if it burned her. “He said nothing, okay? I just felt nauseous all of a sudden. It seems I didn’t notice how much I ate while I was talking to so many people.”

The muscles in his formidable jaw bunched, worked. “So that’s the story you’re coming up with to protect him. Now tell me the truth.” When she only stared at him defiantly, he exhaled forcibly. “I promise I won’t do anything to him if you tell me.”

Hating to repeat Mikhail’s words, furious with Ivan for trying to force her to, she stood her ground, took a challenging pose. “You’ll promise you won’t do anything to him regardless. And I don’t have to tell you anything I don’t want to.”

Unable to chart his reaction, this man who expected obedience as his right, a moment passed in charged silence, as their gazes clashed.

Then, finally, she felt the tension gradually leave his tightly coiled body, the vicious fire in his eyes abating, until they were again the pools of cool emerald she now knew hid fathomless, roiling depths.

Finally conceding that she’d won, he sighed. “I won’t do anything. And you never have to tell me anything you don’t want to. But I’m asking you to please tell me. I can’t bear knowing something hurt you, and I don’t know what it is, how I can erase it, how I can stop it from hurting you ever again.”

Reaching for her hands again, he pulled at her stiff body, brought her flush against him, letting her feel every inch of his hard perfection. Immediately the body he’d serviced and pleasured for ten long weeks wept for his ownership.

But because he hadn’t really owned it yet, and with Mikhail’s comment giving her fresh reasons why he hadn’t, this time she resisted the need to succumb to him. The desire she’d been giving in to, willingly, breathlessly, since that day he’d taken her to her own bed, suddenly felt pathetic. She’d let it blind her to something that had always plagued their relationship, the prior one and this one, that she basically knew nothing about him. That nothing about the way he behaved with her made any sense. That with him, she couldn’t form an opinion of the past, chart the present or predict the future.

But ever since he’d pulled her back from the brink of death, she’d accepted not knowing, had even told herself she didn’t care to know so that she didn’t have to make a decision or take a stand. But it ended now.

But Ivan’s burning lips and hands were roaming her flesh, igniting her every inch against her best effort to resist. Before she could attempt to push away, he swallowed her protests, those hard yet lush lips mastering hers, his powerful tongue driving inside her mouth, filling her with the need to surrender again, to beg for him again.

But she couldn’t do this again. Not if it meant a return to the status quo he’d imposed. Of him being so close, yet farther than the stars.

With an act of will she hadn’t thought herself capable of, she tore her lips away from his sensual onslaught, pushed out of his embrace. It took him so much by surprise that he let her go so abruptly, making her stagger back.

After lunging forward to steady her, Ivan let her go. He looked down at her as if she’d slapped him.

Though she hated having to do this, after everything he’d done for her, she hardened her resolve. This was as much for him as for her. It was unfair to him if she continued taking advantage of his uncontrollable need to protect and indulge her. Not when it seemed to be at the expense of his own needs and life. He’d put everything on hold to be there for her, as he’d promised he would the moment she’d come out of anesthesia.

By now she knew he’d keep his word forever. As long as he believed she needed him he’d stay with her, be there for her in every way he could think of.

Except the way she really wanted and needed.

His inability to be with her fully, intimately, forced her to face one possibility. That this was all for her, and there was nothing in it for him. And she couldn’t do that to either of them.

Swallowing the rising tide of misery, she whispered, “I—I do want to tell you something.”

His face lit up with a surge of eager supplication. “You know you can tell me anything.”

“Can I?” Not finding the right words to say what stormed in her mind, she gave a nervous laugh. “I do tell you a lot of things, then you do what you unilaterally see fit anyway.”

He started to protest, then stopped. There was no denying that he’d been overriding her. All for her own good in his opinion, but he’d done it nonetheless.

“But I am thankful you did it.” She held up her hand to stop his usual protest. “And yes, you have to take my thanks. But it just has to stop, Ivan. You can’t go on like this.”

“I can, if you let me.” Then, as if he heard his own words, he backpedaled. “But I promise I will pull back as much and as far as will make you comfortable.”

“You’re still making this all about me.”

“It is all about you.”

“No, it isn’t, Ivan. There are two of us here. I suffered an ordeal, and you helped me through it. You were the only one I wanted help from. But time passed and my needs have changed and I no longer need that kind of help.”

All light in his gaze was extinguished, making the ache she felt perpetually in her right side throb harder.

“Is this what you wanted to say to me? That you no longer want to be here?”

Her insides knotted tighter at the bleakness in his eyes, his voice. “I no longer want what you think is best for me. I want you to start considering yourself again.”

“I am very much considering myself.”

“No, you’re not. And it’s enough, Ivan. You’ve gone way beyond what I dreamed anyone could do for me. Now it’s time for you to be with those you really want to be with.”

His hands clenched at his sides, his whole body tensing. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Y-you know what I mean.”

Suddenly something scary unfurled in the depths of his gaze. “This is about what Popov said to you, isn’t it?” When her gaze wavered, unable to bear the brunt of his incensed one, he rasped, “Hell, Anastasia, just tell me what he said.” When she hesitated, his eyes grew beseeching. “It was clearly about me and I have the right to know what it is, if only to tell you my side of it, whatever it is. I already promised you I wouldn’t retaliate.”

Knowing there was no way she could still hold out now that he’d put it that way, she reluctantly, haltingly told him.

“It was silly to react that way, but it did remind me that this artificial bubble you’ve created for me has nothing to do with your real life. You’ve interrupted it to come to my rescue, to stay by my side. But you now have to go back to your...”

She faltered as that terrifying thing in his eyes expanded, like a dragon unfolding its wings and preparing to spew fire.

It was more frightening that he sounded totally calm when he said, “That miserable piece of scum. I’ll make him pay for that.”

That had her pouncing on him, grabbing his arms in alarm. “No, Ivan, you promised.”

His face looked again as demonic as it had when he’d been defending her and Alex, vanquishing their attackers. He gently unhooked her spastic fingers from his flesh, pulled away. “If I’d suspected he’d told you anything like that, I wouldn’t have promised to spare him. This changes everything.”

“No, Ivan, just let him be. It’s not like he was trying to stir up trouble. What he said was the vodka talking. But then it’s only expected for a man like you to have—” unable to say the word mistresses again, she just shrugged, her shoulders so taut they almost cramped “—you know.”