He crossed to me, clamping my nape with his hand. The feverish look in his eyes should’ve unnerved me.

Yet I never felt threatened for an instant. “Do you deny that, Ruso?”

“I don’t. I knew I was fucked from the moment I first got close to you.” He tightened his grip on me. “I saw you had freckles on your nose and your eyes were the color of new pennies. You smelled like pleasure itself.”

I exhaled a breath.

He dropped his hand. “So I’ll keep you as I please, until I can shake this.” Because of course he would shake it. “If you think you have me by the balls, you’re mistaken.”

In the haughtiest voice I could manage, I said, “I’ve got a monopoly on me—I control the supply of something you demand. So actually, I do have you by the balls! Oh, querido, the weight of them in my palm is making my hand tired.”

“I will be done with you,” Sevastyan vowed. “Just give it time.”

CHAPTER 18

After our fight, I turned up the radio on the deck and hit the pool in my bathing suit—or rather, my thong.

I’d found it in a little hotel bag, freshly laundered. The silk had a solid front on it and could pass for a bathing-suit bottom. No top? I’d pretend I was European.

For over an hour¸ I swam laps. Without my daily grind of running, scrubbing floors, and sprinting for buses across town, I had way too much energy.

Plus rule number four—I couldn’t allow myself to get soft. Rebooting in a new city was always tough. I’d be ready.

Unfortunately, I was still turned on, which meant that my nipples were hard. Without a bathing-suit top, water streamed over them, making me even hornier and more keyed up. A vicious cycle.

“Keeping your figure for all your sugar daddies,” Sevastyan observed as he strolled onto the pool deck. He wore a crisp charcoal-gray suit and an expression that said: I command all I survey. “Admirable.” He turned down the stereo volume with the waterproof remote.

“Who knows when you’ll be done with me?” I treaded water. “You might toss me back to my daddies this very day, into their frenzied, pawing clutches.”

His jaw clenched, that muscle ticking. Jealous, Ruso? “I’m leaving, won’t be back until after dinner.”

“What am I supposed to do all day?”

“Contemplate the many things I could’ve done for your punishment.”

“Is gulag an option? Maybe the place where they kept Pussy Riot? Sir, I’d like to be transferred to gulag, please.”

Ignoring that, he said, “Will you go against my command and touch yourself when I’m gone?”

Would I masturbate? As primed as I was from this morning’s cataclysmic oral sex, not to mention the belt all night? And then with nothing to do to distract me?

Hell yes.

There was that wicked gleam in his eyes. And there went my heart racing from the thrill. We both knew I’d get myself off, but he thought I was about to lie, to avoid the belt.

Though chastity had maddened me, I already kind of . . . craved it again. I craved the carnal excitement in his eyes when he’d locked me in—and when he’d freed me.

It might torment me, but I believed it would torment him too. I suspected the Russian would obsess all day about the woman he “owned,” about the lover he’d left trapped and yearning in chastity.

His first lover.

That leather lead would circle this powerful man’s neck—as if I’d placed a collar on him. The metal key would sear his chest.

With that in mind, I lifted my chin and said, “I plan to spend the day leisurely finger-fucking myself.”

Máximo shockeado. His fists clenched, his nostrils flared, his eyes . . . delighted.

I’d just made the Russian a very happy man.

“You little witch!”

“You fucking devil!”

When Sevastyan returned just two hours later, we collided in our haste to grapple each other, kissing, both of us snatching at his clothes.

Before he’d left, he’d added a short, fat dildo to the strap of my belt. It didn’t go deep enough to get me off, just far enough to make me crazed.

Against my lips, he bit out, “Couldn’t think of anything but this.”

“You didn’t warn me what that dildo would do to me!”

“Cut my bloody meetings short.” His accent was thicker than I’d ever heard it. He kicked his shoes off. When he yanked at his socks, I almost strangled him with his tie.

“I rolled on your bed in agony, trying to come from pinching my nipples.”

He groaned as he sucked my bottom lip. “I nearly jerked off in a bathroom stall.”

“I humped your pillow for a solid hour.”

“Fuck!” With his shirt over his head, he ordered, “Get my goddamned pants off!” I yanked them down his legs. When I saw the wet circle on his gray boxer briefs, I shivered, tugging them down too.

Naked, he grabbed the key and reached for my shaking body. Once he’d unlocked me, he eased the dildo from inside me, then tossed the belt to the bed. My fingers flew to my aching pussy; his did too. We met gazes, both stunned at how wet and swollen I was.

He raised a shaking hand to his mouth. As he licked his fingers, his cock pulsed, bobbing on its own, straining for my flared lips. Moisture slicked the head. I reached for him, rubbing it with my thumb.

“Witch.” His fingers returned for a second helping.

“Devil,” I gasped, panting for him.