Owned by the Mob Boss: A Dark Mafia Romance (Ivanovich Bratva) Nicole Fox (year 7 reading list .txt) 📖

a little shocked at first. I mean, jeez, dressing like a runway model every day? But I’ve gotta say I’m getting used to it.”

Ashley narrows her eyes. “Erik has been choosing your clothes, Camille.”

“What?” I laugh. “Since when is he a fashionista?”

She shrugs. “There’s more to him than meets the eye. I can tell you that from experience.”

Again, that unbidden suspicion rises.

She’s not talking like an employee. But then, I’m an ‘employee’ too.

Perhaps he bought Ashley the same way he bought me? This could just be what he does: buy women, use them, and then cart them off to some quiet corner of his mansion to be reassigned, like taking a horse to the glue factory.

“Oh,” I mutter into the too-long silence.

“How are things with you two?” she asks.

I shake my head, knowing I can’t untangle this Chinese knot of emotion into an easily understood answer.

On the one hand I hate him; on the other hand, I know that I don’t hate him, not really. And on the third hand, all I can think about is how he makes me feel when his pleasure-filled growls move like whispers over my skin.

Then there’s the fourth hand: the gentleman he was with Mom, and how easily he handled Rob. Giving him a job? That was a miracle out of left field. A kindness that I know damn well my shithead brother didn’t exactly earn on merit.

“That complicated, huh?” Ashley interjects.

I laugh. “Am I really that obvious?”

“No.” She stands, clearing away the dishes. “I am just used to people being confused by Erik.”

Before I can ask what she means by that flagrantly vague comment, she disappears into the kitchen.

I go upstairs and drop into bed, but I am restless, unable to sleep. I end up rolling over and grabbing my cell phone.

Bethany answers almost right away. “Hey,” she says. “I didn’t expect to hear from you.”

“Well, I’m dying of boredom so I thought I’d offer an ceasefire on the bitchiness.”

She laughs. “Sounds good to me. Are you studying?”

“Should I feel guilty that my answer is no?”

She laughs again. “Not unless I should feel guilty that I’m having a very intense date with a glass of Pinot. Not with your man tonight?”

“Who said I had one?”

I can hear her shrug. “I just assumed. Am I wrong?”

“No, it’s just, you know … complicated, I guess …” I pause. How much can I reveal?

“Well? Don’t keep me in suspense. I’m perpetually single, so I’m always thankful for some vicarious living.”

“He’s a proprietor,” I say. “And he’s … Oh Jesus, Bethany. He’s so intense that sometimes I feel like I’ve died and gone to some fucked-up heaven, but a heaven where the angels are ripped and dominating and sexier than the devil. And then other times it’s like he’s trying to win a biggest jerk in the world competition.”

Feeling, real feeling enters my voice.

“Maybe I’m falling in love with him,” I laugh. “Or maybe I’m just trying to work up the courage to run screaming for the hills. I don’t even know. Sorry, I didn’t mean to overshare. Jeez. Don’t mind me, I’ll be inserting my foot directly into my mouth.”

I guess that’s a by-product of not having girlfriends for so long. I need to rein this shit in.

“Oh, don’t be silly,” she says. “It sounds like you’re on quite the roller coaster.”

“Yeah, that’s one way to put it.”

“How did you meet?”

“At an art auction,” I say quickly. It’s not untrue, I suppose. Good enough as an excuse, anyhow. “What about you? Apart from your beloved glass of red, you up to much this evening?”

“Just going over some notes for tomorrow,” she says.

“The joys of atrial fibrillation,” I giggle.

“Oh no, this is for the self-defense class I teach down at the rec center.”

“Really?” I gasp.

“What, don’t wanna be friends now that you know I can kick your ass?”

“No, I just didn’t … what sort of class is it?”

“MMA,” she answers. “Kickboxing, wrestling, a little jujitsu, as well as some Krav Maga stuff. If some prick in a dark alley decides he wants to try some shit, he better not be too attached to his testicles.”

“Is that your tagline?”

“One of them.”

We laugh together as the conversation moves onto our nursing studies, talking for half an hour as I pretend I’m not waiting up for Erik.

When I finally hang up, and Erik is still not home, I collapse into a deep sleep, filled with vivid dreams.

Erik stars in all of them.

12

Erik

“Do you know what I want most in life?” the woman sighs, jiggling up and down in her low-cut dress. An attempt to draw my attention, no doubt.

It is a scene I am familiar with: the girls who hang around the Bratva throw themselves at me, hoping … for what?

Power? Love? Money?

“Fun!” she cries, leaning across the table to touch Oleg on the hand, but eyeing me in an attempt at seduction.

Perhaps she wants to make me jealous. If that’s the case, she is playing a losing game.

Even sitting in the dais of the Red Ruble, with women swirling, liquor pouring, and the music pumping, my thoughts are consumed with Camille. Her brother overstepped the mark by asking me for money, but that only serves to remind me that Camille has never done the same.

She is a woman of her word, content with what we agreed upon. Nothing more, nothing less.

“Isn’t that the whole point of life?” the facile woman giggles.

“Not thirsty, boss?” Oleg grins, gesturing at the bottle of vodka.

I incline my head. “Go ahead, Oleg. You pour.”

A look passes across his face, watching me watch the room. It’s split down the middle, for a man with eyes to see it: Fyodor’s loyalists crowd around near the booths, sitting almost like they’re at church, quiet and well-behaved. My men pull women into their laps and toss back their drinks as Bratva soldiers should.

I am glad when Oleg takes the woman away, leaving me to return to fantasies of Camille. But these are not just