THE GATEKEEPER

But in the end, I couldn't quite choke it out. Especially when I realized she didn't need me adding another layer of trauma to what was already a difficult day.

Now, nothing satisfies me more than seeing her make herself at home in my kitchen. It's not that I think a woman belongs in the kitchen. I didn't grow up with a mother at home. I never had that sort of ideal.

But I like the way she seems comfortable here. Like she belongs here.

When the cookies have cooled, we sit at the table and dip them into milk.

"How much older was Anya?" I ask.

"Four years. She was like a mother to me in many ways."

"Did you have a mother?"

"Our mother was a ghost of a person. She worked very hard for very little pay. Our dad was a deadbeat, so I think she was just sort of checked out emotionally. Almost like a zombie. She did help us out with Mika after he was born. Babies have a way of bringing out qualities you didn't know you had."

Her eyes fill with tears.

"Mika is well." Ravil forwarded me the photo of the teen. He is still discussing with the boy's adopted father if they even want contact with Kira. "Kira, he may not want or need your presence in his life anymore. Are you prepared for that?" She stares at me. Her light blue eyes are wide, causing some of the water in them to spill. She sucks in a sobbing breath and holds it then lets it out slowly. "Yes," she nods. "I guess if he's happy, I'm happy. I've been so worried about him. I guess I thought he needed to be rescued."

"You were so brave to come here all by yourself to rescue him. In a foreign country, with no help. Going undercover into a bratva stronghold. Very brave."

She lets out a watery laugh. "But I screwed up completely."

I raise my brows. "Did you?"

We stare at each other across the table. I want her to feel what I do. That our explosive encounter was a gift. Something meant to be. She will get the result she desired-the information about her nephew, but she also gets this. The intangible connection forged between the two of us.

The one I want to keep forging until it's as thick as a rope and stronger than iron.

"Didn't I?" she asks, her voice softer than feathers.

I shake my head slowly.

She gets up abruptly from her chair. Considering she's my prisoner and her hands are unfettered, I take note when she launches herself at me with vicious intent.

But it's to kiss me. To straddle my lap and sweep her tongue between my lips. She tastes of powdered sugar and sweetness.

I grip her hips and yank her over my lap, needing that warm core rubbing over my swelling cock. My hands slide up inside her sweater, cupping her breast over her bra.

She unbuttons my shirt then loses patience and tries to rip it open. When she's unsuccessful, I chuckle and do it myself, sending the buttons in a spray around us.

I yank off her sweater, unhook her bra. She removes my undershirt and works open my belt buckle, all the while moving her lips across mine in a frenzy.

I stand, picking her up with me. Her legs wrap around my waist, and we continue to kiss as I carry her to the bedroom. I lay her gently in the center of the bed and unbutton her jeans as I toe off my boots. She kicks off her boots and lifts her hips for me to pull off her jeans and panties. I shove down my jeans and step out of them. Her hands are all over me, stroking along my shoulders and up my neck, pulling me down to her. She wraps those long, lean legs around my back and uses them to draw my hips down to hers.

I grab a condom from the bedside table. She takes it from me and rips it open. We are working in perfect collaboration now. Our goals perfectly aligned. Our need for each other equally desperate. Wanting to make sure she's ready to take me, I kiss down her neck to her breast and pull one nipple into my mouth.

She's impatient, though, and she reaches from my cock. I kneel up so she can roll the condom over my erection. She pulls me to her entrance. Guides me in.

I sink into her heat like I'm coming home. Like it's where I belong. Like nothing will ever keep me from claiming this perfect pussy as my own. Forever.

"I want you," Kira moans.

"You have me." I devour her mouth with a kiss, plunging my tongue inside to fuck her with matching thrusts.

She rocks her hips to keep time with mine, meeting me, taking me deeper, riding me on the downswing.

She is everything. Moonlight. And winter water. Snowflakes swirling in tiny eddies at the beginning of a storm. She is beauty and light and darkness and death all at once.

With each thrust I'm baptized in her energy. Her divinity. Her essence that becomes something erratic and wild.

I try to keep it, to hold it. I chase it down the path, knowing I will never fully possess it yet desperate to keep trying. To die trying.

"Kira," I choke. I'm in a state of religious ecstasy. I'm worshiping at the altar of love. Of alchemy. I need her to make me whole again. To make me anew. Someone else, worthy of holding her, of keeping her forever.

She seems to be right there with me. The way she claws my arms. The frantic cries that come from her lips. Like she needs this more than she needs her own breath or blood.

"Yes." She cries out in English then in Russian. "Da. Da-da-da-da-da. Da!"