Unprotected with the Mob Boss: A Dark Mafia Romance (Alekseiev Bratva) Fox, Nicole (best chinese ebook reader .TXT) 📖

she says. “And what Ilya needed was someone who was willing to accept the messy parts of his life. He couldn’t give it up and I wasn’t going to force him to choose between me and those messy things. You have something inside you that you need. It could just be companionship. But you need someone who is willing to fulfill that need and someone whose need can be fulfilled by you.”

“You know I don’t have a choice in this,” I say. She finishes my hair.

“Let’s do your makeup now,” she says. She opens her various makeup sets and starts applying foundation. Initially, I think she’s just going to ignore what I said. We sit in awkward silence for a while as she works.

But when she’s nearly finished, she looks me in the eye.

“Do you think, if you had a choice, you’d never return here?” she asks.

She doesn’t wait for my answer as she starts putting away her makeup kits.

“I can’t wait for Lev to see you. He’s going to fall on his knees and worship you.”

I laugh bitterly. “Maybe you don’t know him that well after all,” I grumble.

Sophie winks with a weird kind of all-knowing confidence. “You’d be surprised.”

After she’s done packing her things, she helps me down the stairs. I’m not used to the heels, but after walking down the hallway and getting tips from Sophie, it becomes a bit easier. Sophie enters the den first.

“Lev, are you ready to see your date?” she asks.

He makes some noise that could be a no or a yes.

“Allison, come in,” Sophie calls to me.

I step inside. Lev is by the home bar, drinking from a glass. He must have showered in the downstairs bathroom and changed while I was getting ready. His hair is combed back and he’s wearing a dark gray suit, fitted to show the sharp lines of his torso and the width of his shoulders. His hand is shoved into his pocket, with a diamond-encrusted watch winking from his wrist. The black shirt underneath the suit jacket is the perfect complement to his skin. It takes everything I have not to pounce on him and run my tongue along his jawline, to undo the buttons of his shirt one by one and let my fingers explore what’s beneath …

He looks so damn good that I finally understand why Julia goes out of her way to pursue certain men. Lev turns male beauty into a religion that I’d put my faith in.

He turns to look at me. His green eyes soften suddenly from their usual severity. The tension that seems to encompass his body leaves him. It’s like someone sucked the air from the room.

“Oh.”

* * *

The Tide & Shore Hotel sits on a hill, the driveway curling around it and splitting to lead either to the parking lot or the beach. As Lev and I walk up to it, his hand skims against my back. The dress I’m wearing is black and backless. It ties together behind my neck, with lace that covers my shoulders and extends past my knees. There’s a black skirt underneath it, but it only reaches partway down my thighs. If I had been going to the gala solely to support my father, I’d have chosen something more conservative, but knowing I’d be by Lev’s side the whole night, I selected something to hold his attention. It must be working; Lev has kept his hand on some part of me ever since we got into his car.

In the lobby of the hotel, an older man wearing a dress uniform is standing behind a table covered with a white cloth. He checks the licenses of two people at the table against the clipboard in his hand before smiling at both of them.

“Welcome, Mr. and Mrs. Sadler. Thank you for honoring our men in blue. The red tables are for our donors. Please enjoy the music and the hors d’oeuvres before the dinner starts.”

Lev’s hand grazes against my ass as we step up to the table and he pulls his wallet out of his back pocket. The man smiles at us.

“Welcome to the Great Blue Foundation gala. May I see your IDs?” the man asks.

As I fumble with my new clutch, Lev gives the man his driver’s license. The man glances at it. He stiffens. His eyes shift back and forth between the license and Lev. Lev keeps his eyes locked on him, his expression passive. It reminds me of when we first met and I thought he was apathetic about everything.

The man hands the license back to Lev, careful not to let their fingers touch. He stares at Lev for another second before turning to me.

“Ma’am?” the man says. I offer my license. He barely looks at it before his eyebrows shoot up. “Oh, Miss Harrington. I apologize, but you’re not on the list. Does your father know—”

“She’s my plus one,” Lev interrupts.

The man frowns, glancing between the two of us.

“I see,” he says. “Well, welcome, Miss Harrington. Please enjoy the hors d’oeuvres before the dinner starts.”

He hands me back my license. Lev’s hand drifts to the small of my back. I lean toward him, our bodies bumping together, as he pushes open one of the doors to the ballroom. He steps aside to let me in, then follows behind me. His fingertips briefly touch my hips before he slips his arm around my waist. In the wake of his touch is a light, simmering tingle dancing on my skin—just like always.

At least a hundred people are spread out in the ballroom. Two lines of tables are on either side of the room while the center is empty except for a marble dance floor and a bar in between two massive speakers at the front of the room. On the right, the tables are covered with blue cloth and have vases filled with bluebells. White stars flicker on the cloth from the table lamps. On the left, it’s the same setup,