5

“Oh, like you wouldn’t believe,” I confirm without opening my eyes. “The man’s got muscles that would put Hercules to shame. Once I’m done exploring, my hand drifts lower and grabs his cock.”

“It’s big?”

“Huge. I’m worried he won’t fit, but he grabs me by the hips and drags me down onto him. I take him whole.”

My body is warm and my breathing is labored. I should stop, but we’re so close to the finale.

“I ride him hard, and he encourages me, whispering everything we still have yet to try in my ear.”

“And do you cross the finish line?” Hope presses.

“Twice. No, three times, before he explodes inside me. We’re just getting started, though,” I decide, eyes fluttering open. “I’m not done with him yet.”

Hope is smiling down at her phone, typing up a storm. “I bet not.”

Something pings in my head. A vague realization that something is amiss. “What are you doing?”

“Just sending off a little message,” she says, all breezy and nonchalant.

That’s when my gaze drops to Samuil’s business card perched on her right thigh.

Oh.

My.

God.

“Hope…” My voice is strangled. “What did you just do?”

There’s a familiar little whoosh, the telltale sound of a message being sent, and then Hope flips her phone around so I can see the screen…

Including the audio file she just sent.

She gives me a guilt-free shrug. “When Samuil makes your fantasy a reality, you can thank me later. I accept cash or check.”

3

SAMUIL

“I’ve got some bad news.”

When Myles utters those four little words, my first instinct is to imagine smashing his face with a hockey puck. Not enough to kill him. Just enough to shut him up. It’s becoming a familiar fantasy these days, because all my head of security seems to bring me lately is an endless parade of fuckery.

Myles has been more of a brother to me than my actual brother since our Dartmouth hockey days. But right now, all I see is another messenger I want to shoot.

He must sense my murderous thoughts, because he smooths a hand over his crew cut like he’s protecting his skull. “It’s about Lev Danovic.”

“Let me take a wild fucking guess.” I lean back in my chair, leather creaking beneath my weight, preparing to play a fun little game I call What The Fuck Else Can Go Wrong? “Since Danovic is the Litvinov Group’s biggest client, and you look like someone pissed in your protein shake, I’m betting those Andropov snakes are trying to steal my golden goose.”

“Ding ding ding.” Myles’s grimace tells me everything I need to know. “You win.”

Like fuck I do.

Lev Danovic isn’t just any client. He’s a Moscow oil titan with his fingers in every major pie from Russia to the States. The man single-handedly helped make me Chicago’s youngest billionaire. Losing him would be like losing a limb. A very profitable limb.

“According to my sources,” Myles continues, “he’s already taken two meetings with an Andropov rep. And...” He winces like the next words physically pain him. “... he’s accepted a third.”

Suddenly, the air in my top-floor office feels thin. If it were any other company trying to poach Danovic, I’d almost welcome the challenge.

But the Andropov Group isn’t just any rival.

They’re enemy number one.

These fuckers have been gunning for my destruction since before I had anything worth destroying. They fight dirty, they fight mean, and they never stop coming.

Fine by me. I wrote the book on fighting dirty.

But these motherfuckers are deluding themselves if they think they’ll take so much as a single scrap off my table.

“So he’s actually considering jumping ship.”

“We can’t be sure⁠—”

“Cut the bullshit, Myles,” I snap, ice coating every syllable. “Nobody takes three meetings unless they’re shopping for a new sugar daddy. Who’s their rep?”

Myles drums his fingers against his bouncing knee, a surefire sign that he has more unpleasant news to impart.

“I guess I should’ve led with this part, because it’s the actual bad news. The Lev thing was more of a setup to the punchline.”

“Myles… get to the fucking point.”

He sighs, reaching into his jacket. “Looks like they’ve got new talent on the payroll.” He slides a glossy photo across my desk.

I stare down at the grainy image.

And my blood curdles.

“Katerina.” Even her name on my tongue makes me sick to my fucking stomach. “Of course. It figures the bitch would continue finding new ways to ruin my life even after the divorce. She couldn’t destroy me from within, so she’s taking the scenic route to stick the knife in my back.”

“About that...” Myles pulls more photos from his jacket, spreading them across my desk.

I pick up the photo closest to me, another fuzzy image of my ex-wife, but this time, she’s sprawled across the ugly, wrought iron table of her rooftop garden…

With her legs wrapped around my brother’s head.

“Charming.” I toss the image back to the desktop with a wrinkled sneer. “But I don’t know why you think I care. Their sordid little soap opera lost its shock value a long time ago. As far as I’m concerned, they deserve each other. I say we leave them to it.”

“Or,” Myles suggests, “we hang them by their own rope. This shit is ammo, Sam. We can use it.”

I arch a brow. “Oh?”