“I’m serious. I’m concerned. You’re no good to me a wreck.”
/> He slides me onto him. Holy fuck, this feels so fucking good. “Do I feel like a wreck?”
“Mmm...no, you feel amazing. Maybe I should look into going on the pill if it means we can keep doing this.” I moan. “I know it’s just day one, but I think taking a vacation agrees with you.”
“I believe it’s more about your body agreeing with me.”
No goofy smile, dork. I swallow hard and lick his lips. Huh, nothing about the birth control even though he liked being without a condom almost more than I do. Once he pulled out a period tracker and we calculated the odds were basically nil on me getting pregnant, he asked if he could go without a condom until my period came. Since I loved how he felt the first time without it, I agreed happily. He’s so happy, this is a conversation we can have later. “Have you really not taken a vacation in more than eight years? Like what do you do?”
“You saw up close what I do. I’ve taken an afternoon here and there, usually when I was here in England on business and I would pop over here to Manchester. I took a holiday once. After working my ass off for eighteen hours a day, I celebrated with a week in Australia. With the whole time difference, I managed to miss out on a deal that would have netted me almost forty million.”
“Oh no, forty million. Poor Ivan! However did you recover from the pain of losing out on all that money?”
“I waited until the difference of forty million didn’t mean shit. I didn’t like the idea of you spending the next two weeks stressed between work during the day and all these family dinners and whatnot. That and keeping my hands off you in front of Tim was more of a pain than I wanted to put up with. It isn’t fair to put him through that.”
“Poor Tim. Once you find someone else the man deserves some time off.”
“I’m already planning on it,” he assures me.
“You know, you try to hide it, but you’re really sweet and thoughtful and kind.” I’ve found out some secrets he’s been keeping. I want to ask him but decide they aren’t bad secrets, so it won’t hurt if he keeps them.
He goes still. “How did you find out about the foundation?”
What foundation? That’s not what I was thinking about. I’m a bad, sneaky person. “I have my ways.”
He rolls his eyes. “It’s not a big deal.”
“How is it not a big deal?” Please don’t let him be mad if he figures out I didn’t know.
“Because it’s what you should do when you have more money than ninety-nine percent of the planet. There had been a moment of guilt as I spoke with Dmitri a few years ago when I ended the year at the level of billionaire. There was a high I had not experienced before.”
Sighing, he shakes his head. “Dmitri yanked me down with a casual savagery, going for the throat without blinking an eye. Reminding me of where I had started, bone-achingly hungry, grubby, from a council estate, only able to achieve what I had through the kindness of a man who saw the potential in me. Now I would be able to repay that kindness, wouldn’t I? In the next breath, he gave me a card for a charitable foundation he had created. I had no idea. It did not have his name on it and he had never mentioned it before.”
Ivan runs a finger along the frown on my forehead. “The bastard made it all clear, what was the use of having all that money if it just sat in a bank account? While I do have the condo in Chicago and I never sold my condo in New York City, besides this home here in Manchester that my mum and sisters live in, I haven’t a single desire to buy real estate for anything beyond its purpose. The casual spending of money has never been something I allowed myself to do.
“Of course there was the usual spending on clothes and accessories of the best quality, a private plane, and a car, they were made with studied value in mind. The only place in my life I spent money without careful consideration was when it came to my sisters, their education, their birthday requests, their vacations—their needs were met without thought. After going without even basic necessities growing up, I would deny them nothing. Dmitri made the case if I had to give it to them, then surely, I could help others in the way they so desperately needed.”
Now I feel even more special, Ivan spending so freely when it came to me meant much more than he let on.
“So before the week was out I set plans in motion to create my own charitable foundation. I chose to base it in Manchester to help not only those in Manchester, but throughout the United Kingdom. Despite the benefits system in the UK, there are millions of people who fall through the cracks, ending up homeless or relegated to grotty bedsits, and even more who go hungry. Digging deeper into how best to put the money to work, the numbers and reality were almost overwhelming. It was a humbling experience.”
A small shrug. “Like Dmitri, I kept my name off the foundation and kept away from it in public. Only Connor knows of it and handles any communication from it to me. The money comes from my personal account, and the lone director of the foundation is the only person who knows where the funding comes from. Every month when the two million leaves my account, there is a different kind of satisfaction. Knowing it is going to help others, that I am able to do so, is a completely different high. In all this time no one besides Connor and Dmitri knew of it. How the hell did you find out?”
Two million dollars a month, holy crap. I blush. “I didn’t. You just told me. I was talking about sneaking out to spend the night with Connor after Sara’s chemo treatment.”
Ivan’s eyes go wide, then he throws back his head and laughs. The timer goes off—we have an hour before we need to be downstairs. “You sneaky witch. Come on, we need to get ready.”
“We have time for once more,” I whisper against the skin of his neck.
“Just once,” he says as his hands tighten on my hips.
***
Ivan
The evening has not even begun and I want it over with. Being in a room full of people does not appeal during any given day. When I could be spending it alone with Christina, I resent the fuck out of it. Then I remember Gemma’s pleas to be nice to her new almost in-laws; the least I could do was not make her situation any worse. I check the time, wondering how much longer Christina will take.
When I look up she’s standing in front of me, and fuck all, I don’t want to share her with another soul. The dress is silk, a glowing burnt orange that clings to every curve. The wrap style crosses over her chest, a bit lower than I prefer, but at least it comes down to her ankles. All I can think of is ripping her out of it.