“He will be raised for leadership from the day he is born. He will know what is required of him. I will make a man of him, the sort of man he must be if he is to lead.” He pauses. “There is something else.”
He slides his hand through my hair, his fingertips sending zigzagging waves over my scalp and down the back of my neck. Pins-and-needles multiplied by a thousand.
His eyes have never been more intense as he leans in.
“What?” I whisper.
“He will not be able to take his place until he is eighteen. That means, if I were to die—”
“Erik.” I clutch onto his free hand, tracing his knuckles. “Don’t say that.”
“If I were to die,” he presses on, “you would become the leader of the Bratva, as the heir’s mother. You would be a queen, Camille, until our son came of age.”
He smooths his hand down over my shoulders, tickles dancing down my arms. He takes my hand and kisses the palm and then up my arm all the way to my neck.
“Do you like the sound of that?” he asks.
I nuzzle my head against him.
“A queen,” I echo.
I would have either laughed or told him to stop living in a fucking dreamland before, but now I’m thinking I quite like the sound of that. No more kowtowing to pervert doctors? No more grubbing for change just to keep Mom safe? No more feeling powerless and weak all the damn time?
Sign me the hell up.
“But wait.” I lean back, studying him. “This all assumes that our son will want to lead the Bratva. What if he grows up and decides he wants to be a painter, an architect? Hell, a plumber? What then? Will you force him? Or push him away?”
“No,” he says at once, a fierce note entering his voice. “Family comes first. You have taught me that, Camille. Don’t worry.” He kisses me tenderly on the cheek. “He will always be our son, no matter what.”
I give his nose a tweak.
“Don’t forget the contract. You’re getting a little too romantic.”
He kisses me deeply, but it is not the hungry, hurried kiss of the early Erik. It is more like he is exploring me. We start with little pecks and brushes of our lips and then I open my mouth and breathe in the feel of him, the smell of him, the fucking essence of him.
I never wanted to care for this man, but now it all comes crashing down.
I feel like a different person.
“But wait,” he says, laughing as he breaks it off. “I would not want to violate the—”
I interrupt him with another kiss.
He runs his hands down my body, grazing my breasts, my nipples getting hard and tingly.
“Show me some romance.” I bite his earlobe, kiss his neck. “Just a little.”
I lie on Erik’s four-poster as he lights the candles, shooting me wry smiles as the light flickers in his eyes.
Soon, we are surrounded by little pockets of warm yellow light, the scent of vanilla and honey filling the air. Erik prowls to the bed and slides his hand slowly up from my ankles to my knee, and then up to my thigh.
“Nothing that is not required to make a child,” he whispers, his hand disappearing up the hem of my dress. “Nothing romantic, like telling you I love you.”
His fingertip brushes my underwear.
“I love you.”
He massages my sex with soft movements, drawing out the aching pleasure.
“I fucking love you, Camille.”
“I love you too. Don’t stop, Erik.”
He peels my underwear down my legs. Tossing them to the floor, he kneels at the edge of the bed and pulls me toward him.
Oh God, is he going to …
He puts his head under the hem of my dress and brings his mouth to my sex. I reach down and grab a bunch of his hair in wild lust. Anything to anchor me. If I don’t hold on, I might ascend right through the ceiling with the heat rising in me.
He kisses up and down my lips, teasing my clit.
My legs start to twitch and I hear my moans filling the room, rising higher and higher into the air. It is an entirely new feeling.
But I want more. I want him to suck on my clit, to slide his tongue inside of me. I want him to consume my fucking pussy. Oh Jesus, I just want him so bad.
“Erik, touch me,” I whisper. “I can’t take it anymore.”
I inhale sharply when his tongue strokes across my clit. He moves around it in circular motions, and then pulls me toward him. He opens his mouth wide and takes in all of me, his tongue going to war on my clit, my lips, my everything.
“Faster,” I moan. “Oh fuck, faster, faster!”
He flicks his tongue up and down, making me feel swollen, about to burst. His hands dig deeply into my thighs, but I don’t feel that. All I know is the roughness of his tongue, the wetness of his mouth mixing with the wetness of me.
I grab his head with both my hands and pull him into me.
“Right there, baby!” I scream. “Yes, yes, yes.”
I guide him to where I need him, driving my hips down so that there’s as little space between his mouth and my pussy as possible. It’s like I’m falling into him, and I can’t think of anywhere else I’d rather collapse.
“Ah—ah …”
My throat constricts as the heat blossoms from the end of his tongue, engulfing my clit and then spreading down my thighs like boiling oil. I curl my toes and throw my head back, clawing at the sheets. I’m writhing so much I almost fall off the bed, but Erik holds me in place.
I sit up, breath coming fast, and then slide off the bed and fall to my knees.
“I want you,” I whisper, tugging at his belt.
His manhood is
