In two seconds flat, I’d crushed my lips against hers.

It was my very first kiss.

11

ZOYA

It was working. I was getting through to him. What I wanted was going according to plan. Or it had been, until hearing how broken he was turned all my planning to dust.

I had let him touch me. I had given in to his every whim. As I hung from the shackles, I decided to let him have me in any way he had wanted. To weaken his resolve.

I had not expected my resolve to weaken to this extent, too.

I’d found myself a slave to his touch, moaning and surrendering to the pleasure he was wringing from my flesh.

When he returned from the chamber, something in him was different. He appeared defeated. His proud hulking shoulders were low and slumped.

When he’d come back for me, uncuffing me from the shackles, bringing me to a real bed he’d pulled from the wall, then holding me in his arms, his eyes had found a new state—compassionate.

My head ached as I wondered if this was yet another trick, but something in my gut told me it was real. I had broken through his high wall.

He was gentle yet firm. When he brought himself to pleasure in tandem with my own, I knew something was different. The air had charged with static, and there was something new in his touch—tenderness and exploration—that had calmed and soothed my heated blood.

Valentin. His name was Valentin. Such a beautiful name for one so brutal and scarred. For one so vicious. Yet, even though it was dangerous, I felt compelled to reveal my true name.

I knew there was a better man deep inside. Irrationally, I wanted him to know my true name. Because the next time he brought me to pleasure, I wanted it to be my name that rolled from his soft lips.

And then he kissed me.

His lips were soft but firm as they pressed against mine. My heart fired like a cannon as his hard chest grazed mine, every part of my body alight with life and sensation.

Our lips at first were still and afraid, but Valentin slowly parted his lips and began caressing them against mine. I moaned as I tasted his dark spice scent on my lips. Spurred on by my groan, his large hands wrapped into my hair, forcing me closer to him still. Valentin paused, his warm breath filling my mouth, until my hands threaded behind his head and our lips fused. His mouth was hot as we explored, then, to my surprise, his tongue pushed between the seam of my lips, meeting and immediately dueling with my own.

Valentin groaned, his rumbling chest causing my breasts to ache. He kissed and kissed my mouth until my lips felt swollen and tender.

Withdrawing his tongue, Valentin broke from the kiss, his blue eyes bright once again. He hovered above me, his lips just as reddened as my own. My hand left the nape of his neck, and I brought it to my mouth. I ran my fingertip over my overly sensitive lips, then mirrored the action against Valentin’s.

He watched me, his breathing heavy and strained, when I whispered, “You have stolen my first kiss.” A flurry of feelings swarmed in my stomach. Loss and pain warring with delight and lust.

I didn’t know what to feel, I didn’t know whether to feel happiness or betrayal, until Valentin threaded his fingers between mine and countered in a hushed voice, “And you have stolen mine.”

My eyes widened at this simple confession. Valentin inched closer, his nose running down my cheek and along to the nape of my neck. My eyes fluttered to a close at the feel of his dominating frame pressing over mine. Then he whispered, “I have lived eighteen years not as my own. I have had no choices, no free will. I have tortured, and I have been tortured in return. I have given pain, and I have had pain thrust upon me.” He paused, then added, “I have been fucked, and I have been forced to fuck until I could barely stand. But I have never given a kiss, nor had a kiss given to me.”

I didn’t know why, perhaps the sad cadence to his rough voice, but my eyes pricked with tears. None fell, but my throat clogged and an ache constricted my chest. Sighing deeply, Valentin raised his head and confessed, “I have never before been free to choose.” He paused; then, with a deep flush to the apples of his cheeks, he added, “But I chose to share my very first kiss with you.”

I had nothing to say in response. I was sure no words from me could be worthy to match his confession. Draping my arms around his neck, I drew him close. At first his taut and stiff body refused the contact, but with a sigh Valentin’s huge body pressed against mine, his arms lifting over my head to cage me in.

I let my eyes drift to view the pulley hanging from the ceiling, directly above the bed, as I held my enemy—my torturer—in my arms. His body was too big, his skin and demeanor too rough, yet I felt strangely safe.

I had thought this man a monster, heavily scarred and violently cruel. Thought him an evil and unfeeling torturer from hell. My eyes tightly shut as my mind drifted back to a story my grandmama would tell, of the folktale monster that lived in the woods behind our Tbilisi estate. A monster so big and so fierce, it was told to children that once captured they would never escape. I remembered sitting on my grandmama’s knee as she told me the tale and asking why the monster wanted to hurt people.

“Because he is a monster,” my grandmama said. “He just likes to hurt people. There is no rhyme or reason.”

“But why?” I asked.

“Why what?” Grandmama replied in confusion.

I folded my arms across my chest. “There has to be a reason. Nobody, not even the biggest and scariest of monsters, hurts people for fun. Something must have happened to make him so mad.”

My grandmama shook her head, smiling, and pressed a kiss on my head. “You are thinking too much, my love.”

“No,” I argued. “He must have been hurt, too.” My eyes widened. “Did the people hurt him first? Did they not like him because he was different? Maybe that’s why he’s so mad. Maybe someone hurt him first and he just wants to be loved.”

Grandmama stared at me and, hugging me to her chest, said, “I love the way you think, my love, but sometimes, people who are bad are simply bad.”

“I don’t believe that,” I whispered into Grandmama’s shoulder, “monsters are just looking for love, too. I know it deep down inside.…”

“Kotyonok, why are you crying?” Valentin’s voice pulled me from my memory. I blinked when his face was blurred. A thumb wiped at my cheeks, and it was then I realized I was crying. I wiped at my eyes with my hands, only to see Valentin staring down. My memory came slamming back when I looked up at this Russian monster—his scar, his tattoos, his metal collar—my stomach dropped.

What had happened to him to make him this way? Like the monster of Tbilisi, had he too been hurt and never loved?

“Where have you come from?” I found myself asking, my quest for understanding trumping self-preservation.

Valentin’s eyes narrowed, and he froze as my hand lifted to run along the metal collar. My eyes focused on the seam at the side of collar, the small lock that kept the collar in place.

“Hell,” Valentin whispered almost inaudibly, “held by the Wraiths of evil.”

My lungs constricted at the pain threaded in his voice, his words too cryptic for me to understand. Placing my hand on his face, I tilted his head until his gaze fell upon me. Swallowing, I said, “I am surprised I have not seen you before.” Lines marred Valentin’s forehead and his face showed nothing but confusion. Pulling his head down closer to mine, I finished, “I am surprised I have not seen you before, since I too have been a resident of hell for quite some time.”

Valentin’s face lost its tension, and my heart swelled when he whispered, “Zoya.” He pressed the sweetest kisses to my mouth. My name on his lips sounded like heaven. It sounded utterly divine.

Valentin shifted over my body, his thick thighs parting my legs. My heart pounded like a chorus of drums at the determined look on his face.

A sweeping heat enveloped my body, as I suspected what was coming next. Just as Valentin inched his mouth toward mine, a hissing sound echoed through the silent room.

In seconds, the veins in Valentin’s neck corded so tightly I feared they would break. His body froze, eerily still. Then I saw the collar contracting around his neck.

“No,” Valentin cried. He launched himself from my body. Icicles of fear spiked in my veins as he jumped to his feet, his large hands gripping the sides of his neck tightly. Another hiss sounded from the collar, the sound now sinister to my ears. Valentin’s fingers fought at the collar, but his fingertips failed.