He had terribly big hands. Big enough to cradle my head and snap my neck in a single movement. His fingers were square, his nails trimmed neatly, and his palm was rough against mine.
His other hand came up, sliding down my back, guiding me away from the crowd. His tall body shielded me from dozens of prying eyes and swirling whispers as he led me out into the hall. Behind him, I heard Lucien talking, but my brain had shut out everything save Viktor’s hands on my body.
“Come with me,” he said, pulling my coat from the rack in the hall and resting it on my shoulders.
I let him usher me through the door, still too shocked and drunk to fight him. At the bottom of the steps was a black SUV. He pulled the back door open and lifted me inside, sliding in behind me. I crawled to the far corner, pulling my coat around my body and keeping my gaze on him. He sat opposite me, adjusting his long legs in the aisle between us, and met my gaze with equal determination.
I clenched my fingers inside my coat pockets. Beneath my jacket, my slinky, revealing dress showed more than a trace of my breasts. Now that I was sitting before the stranger who would become my husband, I wished I’d worn something that covered my body. I snuck a peak at him to see if he was looking at the triangle of bare skin beneath my collarbones.
He wasn’t, but he was watching me, his eyes narrowed and his mouth set. There was an unnerving aura about him, a kind of controlled primal edge to the way he raked his eyes over me. Outwardly, he was tempered, polite, but as I gazed back at him in the dim car, I realized there was something untamed and a little dark about this man. Like a shadow lurking at his edges, tucked away in the corner of his eyes.
“Can I have a drink?” I asked.
He shook his head.
Reality crashed down around me, sinking in with each painful moment. The thing I dreaded had happened and I desperately wanted a drink. Or a cigarette, even though I abhorred them. Anything to take the edge off. I’d never had the guts to try real drugs, but right now, in the car with my future husband, I wished I was thoroughly high.
Hopefully I could get something into my veins on our wedding night. At least then I wouldn’t have to look up at those calculating eyes as he pushed himself into me, taking my body for the sole purpose of forging an alliance. Making me little more than a consolation prize between two powerful men.
A shiver went through me as my eyes fell on his hands, wondering if he was gentle or rough with them.
The car ride seemed to go on and on into the night. The shock of seeing my cousin stand over the murdered body of Carlo Romano was beginning to wear off, replaced by a numbness that seeped to my bones. Perhaps it was fitting that my husband was taking me away to Russia because I didn’t feel as I would ever be warm again. I shivered and pulled my coat even closer.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
I turned to the window, concealing the poisonous expression in my eyes. My mouth was dry and I didn’t trust my voice not to waver, so I just nodded. There was no way I was letting this man witness the tears that were currently balled up in the middle of my throat. Although now that I mulled over my tears, I wasn’t sure if they were from rage, fear, or sadness.
He cracked his knuckles absently and ran his palm over his mouth. There was a faint trace of light brown stubble over his jaw. I studied him and he met my gaze directly, a hint of wariness in his eyes. He was like an animal, a handsome wolf or a wildcat, that had seen far too much to let its guard down.
“How old are you?” I asked, unashamed. After all, I should know these things about him if I was expected to be his wife. To share his last name and his bed.
“Forty-four.”
That surprised me. He looked younger than mid-forties.
He cocked his head to the other side, still gazing at me. I glanced down, a little intimidated, but not willing to let him know, and studied his interlaced fingers. They were masculine, a little worn at the square tips, and there was a scar across his right knuckles. Like he’d hit someone and shredded the skin down to the bone a long time ago. I had the unexpected urge to run my finger over the marred flesh, to feel the way the scar tissue knotted and curved.
“When is your birthday?” he asked.
“Last month. I’m twenty-four,” I said, struggling to keep the nerves out of my voice. I wasn’t going to let this man see me crumble.
My throat squeezed and I tore my eyes from him, fixing them out the darkened window. It was after midnight, some hazy hour of the early morning, and snow whirled around the car as we sped down the highway. Judging from the signs flying by, we were heading out of the city. Probably to the nearest airport and then on to Russia. There was a tightness, a sharp hollow, in my chest at the thought.
“Where are we going?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer.
He settled further back into his seat, flipping his wrist to check his watch. “South Carolina.”
A ripple of surprise and hope went through me. “We’re not going to Russia?”
“No.”
“Why are we going to South Carolina?”
He studied me again, this time his pale gaze uncomfortably intense. “You certainly have a lot of questions.”
Annoyance flared like a stubborn flame I just couldn’t put out. “I deserve to know where we’re going.”
“Do you?”