What the hell?
This was the third hug of the day, for crying out loud. Nik hugged me this morning, and I had to push his ass away. He smelled like honeysuckle, and it was torture. I knew he had just come from Kinsley.
Then when Sebastian hugged me, I thought he was trying to be an ass, and maybe Nik told him to do it. Like a hug was going to make things better, damn them.
“Um, you okay, Marcel?” I asked, feeling off-balance. None of us were afraid of affection nor weirded out by an “I love you.” But being connected to Marcel in the way I was, his uncertainty, his worry, could be felt in his embrace.
“That was from me,” he said, letting me go. I clapped him on the back.
“Thanks. I’m good, though, you know. I’m not going to hurt myself or anything,” I muttered, trying to reassure him.
Grabbing me once more, but this time in a bear hug, he held me tight. Marcel had been putting in extra time at the gym, and it showed. The fierceness in which he held me spoke of something different—something constricting.
“She loves you, fuckface,” he exclaimed with one more squeeze. Then planted a sloppy kiss on my cheek.
“What the fuck, man?” I said, wiping it away as he chuckled.
“That was from Kinsley. Love you, Brother.” He grinned with a touch of arrogance and then walked out of the room.
It made sense now, the hugs. She rallied my own brothers against me, the little shit. Shaking my head, I turned my thoughts toward the news Nik had given us earlier about the potentially arranged marriage. My gut twisted as I thought about her grandfather being behind her abduction and training.
From word on the ground in Russia, we knew there was a fair amount of skin trade going on in Stepan Fedorov’s organization. His own grandson was known to be evil, and people were hard pressed to find anything good about him. I wondered at the cruelty of Kinsley’s family.
Why do something like that to your own living blood? Why tear her away from a loving family, torture her, and then align her with the devil?
The thought of her sweet demeanor being trampled into the ground, of her fieriness being beaten out of her, angered me all over again. The waste of her passionate nature on a man who would never treasure her the way I did left me feeling empty. If the Romanovs had their way, she’d be a slave whore to the Fedorovs. What I wouldn’t give to be locked in a room alone with him or her uncle. As anger pumped through my veins, I stormed to the garage.
“Boss, you need to go somewhere?” Marcus asked, popping out of the office.
“No, I need to clear my head. I’m going to take my bike out.”
He leveled a worried expression my way but said, “Sounds good.”
I prayed he wasn’t going to try to hug me too. Sighing, I couldn’t stop thinking about Kinsley. The grip she had over me was infuriating, and I was fucking clueless about how to fight it. I snapped the helmet into place, the familiar click grounding me more than it should have.
The world dulled to a low hum inside the shell, everything else fading but the thrum of anticipation crawling beneath my skin. I swung my leg over the bike, gripping the bars like an old habit. One twist of the throttle, and she roared to life. The feel of my bike did wonders for my mood.
Riding gave me the ability to just be. It was the easiest form of a steady adrenaline release I could find. But it was the aftermath that I longed for this evening. With each twist of the wrist and lean of my body, I let go. I focused on the road under me and sought peace.
With no set place in mind, I rode aimlessly, or so I thought. Imagine my surprise when I pulled my bike up to the guard gate at my parents’. I had no idea when I’d made a mental turn and found my way here. My body still hummed from the ride, and all the endorphins released had me feeling like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
“Good evening, Master Ivan. I’ll buzz you on in,” Oliver, the guard gate, greeted me.
I needed to see her, make sure she was okay. Nightmares were always hard on her, and I used that as an excuse to try to rationalize my behavior. She was being stubborn; she didn’t have to be alone. Alek and Nik could have easily readjusted our schedule. But her adamant statement about leaving the third night open made that impossible. A part of me loved her even more for it.
Walking inside, I found my father laughing outside the media room. He motioned me closer, and I ambled over, not sure what was going on. I paused in the doorway, the sound of offbeat laughter pulling me in. Surprise would be an understatement. I wasn’t sure what I expected to find, but this was not it.
There the two of them were, twirling across the media room floor like it was a damn stage. Champagne flutes half-empty. Faces flushed. Joy written all over them. They were a mess. A beautiful, ridiculous mess.
I should’ve walked away. But all I could do was stand there, letting the sight of Kinsley spinning barefoot undo me a little more.
“You missed the most comical ‘Genie in a Bottle’performance. Your mother taught Kinsley the original dance from the video. Oh god, I wish I would have recorded it,” my father said, laughing as he watched them dissolve into a fit of giggles.
“Mother has had quite a bit to drink.” I chuckled.
Right then, Kinsley spoke up. “Okay, my turn to teach you a dance.”
I bit the inside of my cheek as she showed my mother how to do some viral dance from social media. And unlike my father, I actually pulled out my phone and recorded it. The guys would never believe me in a million years. I studied my little love in her element and broke into a soft laugh, shaking my head in amusement.
