Page 35 of Bratva Menace

It was easy to see the win didn’t matter to him as much as it did her, but that he was going to try his damndest to win it for her.

Drea took a deep, concentrated breath before getting to her feet. She cracked her neck left, then right, and shook out her body like a boxer preparing to start a fight.

“You can do this, Drea. You can do this. Let’s go. Let’s fucking go.”

Everyone snickered at her antics. She walked up to the coffee table and plucked a card from the stack.

They could not, in fact, do it. Turned out, Aleksandr and Drea were worse at Pictionary than Illayana and I were.

And it was absolutely hilarious to watch.

We played games for hours, going well into the night. UNO. Jenga. Monopoly—which resulted in Illayana flipping the table because she was losing. Nikolai and Tatiana tapped out first, heading off to bed sometime around 10 p.m. Father and Autumn followed an hour or so later. Then Drea and Aleksandr.

Illayana and I were the last ones standing.

We were finished playing games. Seven screaming matches and two fist fights were more than enough. We sat in comfortable silence, the odd crackle from the fireplace being the only sound to cut through the room.

Neither one of us felt the need to leave yet. I suspected it was because we both knew it would probably be our last opportunity to see each other for a while, since I was leaving for Russia the next day.

A thousand thoughts ran through my mind at once, and I lost myself to the silence. To the contentment. To the thoughts taking me over.

To one person.

To. One. Fucking. Person.

My eyes were locked on my phone—or, more specifically, my screensaver.

Yes, it was of her. My stalker. My little shadow.

No, I didn’t change it, because why the fuck would I? Not only was it the hottest thing I’d ever seen in my life, it was also ballsy as hell of her to sit on my bed while I was only feet away and pose for a photo virtually naked.

I traced my gaze over those sensual, luscious curves. The rounds of her breasts. The long, slender column of her neck. She knew exactly what she was doing, posing in that position, covering her nipples but also showing just enough to give me a little preview of what to expect. Teasing the absolute shit out of me⁠—

“Lukyan!”

I flicked my eyes up from my phone to land on Illayana. She was sitting on the floor, back leaning against the chair behind her.

“Huh?”

“I’ve been trying to get your attention for ages. What’s so riveting on your phone that you’ve been able to flat-out ignore me for the last three minutes?” she asked, her tone light and playful.

It wasn’t a what. More of a who.

My stalker had been running through my mind all goddamn day, and I’d tried everything I could to kick her out of it. I tried preoccupying not only my mind, but my body, investing all my energy into the tag team match.

That didn’t work.

Then, I’d tried putting all my focus into the games at family night.

Didn’t work either.

Nothing did.

She was goddamn certifiable…and I fucking loved it. Her brand of crazy and impulsiveness should have been a giant red flag.

It wasn’t.

It turned me on.