British Bratva Read online

  She'd walk out of her school gates for the final time, and never have to go back.

  Screw Sutherland, I was going to be there to meet her.

  The traffic across to Hammersmith always crawled. Driving in London was always terrible. Rush hour had extended itself to cover most of the day, peak times bleeding into each other. School rush and office workers, shift changes, then home runs and everything in reverse. Not so very different from any other major city in the world.

  I was no fan of the scooter gangs who ran riot, buzzing up like swarms of wasps, mugging people from their cars, snatching handbags from the pavement, but two wheels were definitely better than four when it came to cutting through traffic.

  My choice was a Ducati Multistrada 1200 with a red and black body and all the power in the engine I could have dreamed of. The only indulgence I allowed myself when it came to standing out was transport. When I was working, I blended in, but when I was off the clock, I had a playboy lifestyle to maintain, and that was easiest with sports cars and motorbikes that couldn't be missed.

  Protecting Elizabeth was what I wanted, and my above the board reputation could do that just as well as anything.

  Screeching through the traffic, the roar of the bike's engine between my thighs only made me more desperate to have Elizabeth there instead.

  I ran three red lights in a row, setting off a string of speed cameras as I zoomed past, leaning into the curves of the road, dodging through cars. The lights went off like paparazzi flash bulbs. I didn't care. I'd pay the fines, take the points when they came if I had to. We had friends at the DVLA who could make most things disappear.

  The only thing that mattered was showing up for Elizabeth. I wanted to see her face when she saw me standing outside. Sutherland could have been giving everything over to the national press and right then I wouldn't have given a monkey's ass.

  I made one stop at a florist by the station and picked up a dozen roses. Dark red, almost black.

  There were signs, pointing towards the exam hall, but I stayed outside the school gates, solidly immune to the questioning glances of the teachers and the tittering of the milling school girls in their uniforms. After the third group whispering behind their hands and strolling slowly past the gates, I realised I'd become an attraction.

  Their attention only irritated me.

  I was only interested in one woman here, and she outstripped every single child here.

  Eventually, the doors to the sports hall opened, and I watched a mass of chattering girls stream out, arms looped, talking a mile a minute about question six and question four. I didn't give a shit. My entire body tensed, focus as honed as it would be picking out a target, trying to find Elizabeth's face in the crowd.

  I scanned every face twice, but she wasn't there and I could feel the frustration brimming in me, when the doors opened again, and out she walked, on her own, shrugging into the straps of her backpack, head down as she slotted her headphones into her ears.

  The older girls were more obvious about their interest in me being there. I was immune to their strappy tops, tight jeans and pretty smiles. They were children and I wasn't interested at all.

  "Who are those for? You could give them to me." One of the girls said.

  "I don't think so."

  It was worth standing there so patiently when Elizabeth finally looked up. Her eyebrows darted high, surprise quickly schooled behind a look of wry amusement that I wanted to kiss off her face.

  She barely broke step as she walked right up to me and the swarm of girls parted like a wave, casting nasty, petty looks in her direction. My hackles rose, and I heard myself growl. So help me God, I would have punched the lot of them out if I thought any of them came close to touching her.

  "What are you doing here?"

  "I heard you finished your exams."

  Elizabeth looked me over with a visible sweep of her eyes and a long, solid glance towards the motorbike.

  "I did."

  "Well done." I handed her the roses and she took them, shaking her head with an undisguised laugh.

  "You know I'm going to work, right? Of course you do. You know my every move, don't you, Maxim Toropov?"

  I didn't deny it. Neither of us moved. She was weighing me up, gauging my intentions with the instincts of a person who had trained for years to handle a hostile engagement. I waited it out until her suspicions eased up.

  "You deserve better than you have."

  Her eyes narrowed and she looked away, down, shook her head. "And you're offering that, are you?"

  "Absolutely."

  She rolled her eyes, and I knew she was about to step away. "I don't think you can help me."

  "I disagree. I think we can help each other. We have a mutual problem. There's a better way to get rid of it. I prefer to be more hands on."

  "Oh really?" Her smile warmed again, and I knew I'd said the right thing. "Is that what this is? Dresses, flowers… I hope you don't think you can buy me."

  "Ms Harrington, I wouldn't dare dream of it. But I am going to kiss you now."

  Her grip on the roses shifted and she turned them stem up, letting the flowers hang down as I stepped in close to her. For a minute it looked like she was going to try to stab me with them and I raised a brow. Her eyes narrowed and her free hand reached out, settling almost automatically on the sharp cut of my hip. It was meant to go there, just like I was made to do this. I bowed my neck to rest my forehead against hers, breathing in and her breathing out.

  What came next wasn't gentlemanly at all, and there wasn't a single part of me that wanted it to be. My mouth on hers was hard and desperate, closing over her lips as I drew her in solidly against me. She let me in with the sweetest moan and I plundered her mouth with my searching tongue. She must have known deep down what I'd wanted from her since the first time I'd set eyes on her, but now I couldn't hide it. I was hard as granite up against her hips and fucking her sweet mouth with slow strokes of my tongue. I could feel her short nails against the back of my neck, holding me close, urging me on. She was bowed against me, flush to my chest, her small breasts pressed to me and her breathing heavy.

  Another thirty seconds and I wouldn't have been able to stop myself.

  I only pulled back to snarl when someone yelled "Get a room!" and I heard the shutter sound of the camera on someone's cell phone. A wolf-whistle aborted abruptly as I glared at our little audience, and half a dozen school girls suddenly remembered they had better places to be when I stomped forward, making a grab for the phone.

  "Delete this. Now."

  I didn't care that the child was quaking. The last thing I needed was my picture turning up on the internet, kissing the daughter of the man who was shortly going to go missing. Someone might recognize me, though that was doubtful given how carefully I kept my face out of the press. Whatever the motives, my employers would be less than impressed, and this was none of their business. Elizabeth was mine.

  I opened the picture out with a jab of my fingers on the screen, and deleted it with a glare, swiping through the rest to make sure there were no others.

  "It's only for the school paper!"

  "I don't care, luv."

  Elizabeth's hand on my arm drew me back and I went gladly, folding into her again as she guided my jaw back down so she could reach my lips. I felt her draw a breath in, and her eyes fluttered open, long lashes deer-like and beautiful. That smile was the prize I'd been waiting for. I couldn't wait to get her alone.

  "Are they all still looking?"

  She glanced over her shoulder and back to me. "Yes. Do you care?"

  "Not in the slightest."

  "Good."

  She stretched up on her toes as I leaned down to meet her. With the power of a wrestling move, her arms came up around my shoulders, hands around my neck, clinging on tight as my mouth closed over hers, lips firm and tongue seeking entrance. She let out a perfect moan against my lips, and her back arched under the palms of my hands, driving her body closer in ag
ainst mine.

  I never wanted to let her go and from the way she groaned when I pulled back enough to catch my breath, I knew she felt the same way.

  The heat that flared through us was undeniable. Elizabeth's fingers tightened in my hair and it was all I could do not to start stripping her clothes off right in the middle of the street.

  My balls were so heavy and so ready, and I was painfully hard inside my jeans. She was going to kill me. The imprint of my zipper could well have become a permanent feature.

  CHAPTER 8

  Elizabeth

  Maxim scooped me up in his arms as though I weighed nothing at all, and I let him lift me over his shoulder fireman style, his arms around my arse, making me want to wriggle and writhe just so he'd touch me all the more.

  I was laughing, trying to make sure my bag didn't come off and my flowers didn't get damaged. Most of all I was clinging onto him, utterly rocked by the strength of him hidden so casually underneath his t-shirt and dark jeans.

  I practically wet myself when I saw him standing there waiting for me. Someone should have called the police because, never mind him being some kind of spy for the Russian mob, it had to be illegal to stand outside an all girls' school looking like every single fantasy I'd ever had. His black leather jacket was worn soft and his hair was messed up because of the helmet he had balanced on his hip. I wasn't surprised he'd been attracting attention.

  The only thing running through my head was that he was there waiting for me. And I didn't know what the hell I was going to do about it.

  Kissing him was the most natural thing in the world. I wasn't ready for it to end, but it had to.

  He set me down on the back of his bike. I let go of him with a groan and he handed me a helmet out of the lockbox on the back. When I looked at him like he was crazy, he pushed it down onto my head.

  "I'm taking you to work."

  "You are?" I'd have sacked it off in a heartbeat, let him drag me somewhere private so I could peel his clothes off. My knickers were slick with my excitement and I was tingling all over, desperately ready for him. It physically hurt that we had to separate.

  "I am. You don't want to argue with the Russians Elizabeth."

  "You speak for all of them now, do you?"

  "Over here? Right now? You better believe it, sweetheart."

  I'd been right. Yesterday had only made me want him so much more. It had been so foolish to think otherwise. Kissing him opened the door on everything, and I didn't think I was ever going to get enough. The first time he touched me in the ring, I was his forever.

  I couldn't blame the girls at school for staring. The chemistry between us was insane. I'd never believed lust could be so strong, but there was no denying this.

  The erection he'd had rammed up hard against my belly felt huge and I couldn't wait to get acquainted with it. Would he let me put it in my mouth? I hoped so, because I was salivating thinking about getting to taste more of him.

  He climbed onto the bike in front of me, and I slipped closer, wrapping my arms around his broad chest, gripping onto the thick leather of his jacket as tight as I could. His narrow hips were between my thighs and if he'd been turned around, he would have had to be inside me because there was no room for anything else. The thought was ridiculous, given our clothes, but I didn't care. I was hot all over at the thought of him inside me, like my body knew innately that he was supposed to be there.

  I nearly came, shuddering against his back when he roared the engine to life and the rumble of the revs shot right through me like a current and I clung on even tighter.

  When he pulled away, I slipped forwards in the seat, crushed against him and I had to tense my thighs and cling on even tighter to stop from slipping off.

  He went so fast I could feel the wind rushing past us, and my heart raced with the thrill of it when he leaned us into the bends. I could have fallen in love with that motorbike. Maybe even more than I could have fallen for him.

  Every rev of the engine went right through me, lighting me up, making my clit tingle and my body crave him.

  When we pulled up into the alleyway to the side of the hotel he kissed me again, more thoroughly than I'd ever been kissed in my life, making me whimper and groan. I was wet for him, so ridiculously wet that I could feel my knickers were soaking inside my jeans.

  Maxim

  Elizabeth looked all shook up from the ride, flushed and windswept and gorgeous and pale.

  I was too hard to think straight. All I could do was grab for her and claim her mouth up against the wall of the building where she worked and Elizabeth arched into me, her heartbeat fluttering against my chest and her hands clawing at me with the same desperation I felt.

  I needed her to know that I wanted her for more than just what she had on Sutherland.

  There was only one way I could think to do that.

  There in the alleyway, she let me wriggle my hand into the front of her jeans, and she bucked against me groaning and gritting her teeth as she tried to stem the way she was moaning.

  "Oh God, I wanted this. In the ring. I wanted this so much." She kissed me back harder, pushing against my lips and I sucked her bottom lip into my mouth, pressing my teeth down into the skin until she pulled back.

  My thumb rubbed over her damp knickers, stroking her through the fabric and she let out the smallest, open mouthed gasp. I kissed along her throat as she swallowed, and she groaned again, her eyes going heavy lidded as she looked at me.

  "I haven't congratulated you yet, Sugar."

  She grabbed me by the wrist, and before I knew it, she'd dragged me in through the fire door of the hotel, and into a laundry room.

  Her roses dropped on top of a heap of blue commercial laundry sacks as I stepped wide, straddled her thighs, leaning her back against the door and she unsnapped the top button of her jeans, already wiggling them down her hips.

  I didn't touch mine. This was all about her.

  Without further warning, I dropped to my knees, burying my face in against her and letting my tongue flicker out against her swollen sex. Slowly, I trailed a circle around the hardened bud of her clit.

  Elizabeth let out a sound halfway like she was being strangled and her hands gripped my shoulders, and the short strands of my hair. She was breathless, and I intended to keep her that way.

  I let out a huff of a laugh, diving back in to sweep my broad tongue over her sweet-salty skin, delving in deep between her folds.

  She was wet and hot and perfect and I loved the taste of her, slick like the ocean. I rutted my nose in hard against her, and her whole body shimmered with pleasure, her tight walls clenching around my thrusting tongue as I pushed in more forcefully against her, making her hips buck.

  Nothing was going to make me stop until she came apart completely.

  Elizabeth

  My eyes rolled back in my head and I struggled to catch my breathing against the influx of sparks racing through my body with every talented twitch of Maxim's tongue.

  Just the thought of what he was doing with his mouth made me flush all over. It was dirty hot and I never, ever thought a tongue could feel so good, but his was perfect.

  Right when I thought I couldn't take any more, his tongue slid over me again, tracing some kind of pattern I couldn't even figure out and my whole body convulsed in slow waves that I had no control over. I didn't want any.

  This was some kind of out of body experience and I had to have more.

  Maxim was deadly. And I was too far gone to care. This was exactly where I was supposed to be and I would have let him do anything he wanted, because I wanted him too. I couldn't believe this was me.

  Not that I had all that much to go on, but God, he made me feel like the sexiest woman alive. I had no idea how I was going to get through a shift at the bar after he pulled away. I was aching to have him inside me.

  I wanted to tell everyone what a god he was. And I wanted to do that again, and again and again. I couldn't stop thinking about his cock and how ha
rd it had been inside his jeans. How large it must be to press so solidly against me, even through his clothes.

  I couldn't imagine how he'd been holding himself back and I couldn't wait for him to let himself go.

  I was a quivering, boneless wreck, slumped against the door when he finally got up off the floor. I'd lost count of how many orgasms I'd had, or how much time had past.

  His hand tangled in my hair as he pulled me in towards his mouth and when he kissed me I could taste myself on his lips and tongue. Sweaty and sweet and intimate and so impossibly sexy.

  He was still rock hard, but he didn't seem to care. Like a gentlemen, he pulled up my knickers, slowly pulled my zip up, and rebuttoned my fly and I wanted to beg him not to. I almost flung my arms around him and followed him back out to his motorcycle.

  But we both knew I couldn't do that. "Can I see you again?"

  I was his forever. Just like that.

  All I could do was nod.

  I had no idea how I was going to last without his touch. I could feel the goofy grin on my face. I was still weak in the knees. There wasn't a single part of me that could have said no.

  CHAPTER 9

  Elizabeth

  On break, I slipped into the office.

  The small room was part storage room, part everything else and the tiny desk was crowded with so much paperwork it had to be a fire hazard. The computer was stacked up on a couple of catering company catalogs, and that was what I was after.

  Cassie poked her head around the door just as I'd hit go on my Google search of Maxim Toropov and I cringed internally as the screen loaded and she leaned on the back of the computer chair to get a better look.

  "Who's that?"

  I shrugged, trying to play it casual, but the heat in my cheeks had already given me away. How could I be cool when all I could think about was what he'd done to me in the laundry room just down the hall? "Some guy I met."