Keep: The Wedding: Romanian Mob Chronicles by Kaye Blue Read Free Book Online

“It’s nothing,” she said.
    I shook my head at her. “Speak, Fawn,” I said.
    For a moment, she looked stricken, almost as afraid as she had the very first time I’d seen her. A fleeting regret, something I didn’t know well and only really experienced with her, came over me. I never wanted to see her like that, and especially not because of something I had done.
    But I ignored that feeling. She needed to trust me, and this was a part of that process. So I stayed quiet, watched her, and as I did, I saw her literally stiffen her upper lip and meet my eyes. I was heartened when I saw that any shadow of fear that might have been there was gone.
    “I want to get married,” she said.
    I frowned, but then straightened my expression when I saw her reaction. I prided myself on my intelligence, my ability to predict the sometimes unpredictable. But Fawn, as she so often had, had thrown everything I’d thought I’d known away.
    An error on my part, really. I hadn’t been expecting her to say that, but I should have. She’d hinted she wanted as much in her own gentle way, so her desire was no surprise. That she’d so boldly stated it was. It made me happy beyond thought that she trusted me enough to speak freely, to tell me what she desired. It also saddened me beyond thought that I would have to disappoint her.
    I pulled out of her, missing her instantly, but needing the focus that I hoped distance might bring.
    “Has Esther been filling your head with ideas?” I asked.
    I kept my gaze on her but lay beside her. She glanced at me, then turned so her back was to me. Still, I hadn’t missed the displeasure in her expression and saw it even now in the tight bunch of her shoulders, shoulders that had been loose with pleasure only moments ago.
    “I know my own mind, Vasile. I don’t need Esther to fill my head with anything.”
    Her words were clipped, and I didn’t miss the hurt in them, so I turned her to face me, ready to soothe her feelings as best I could so we could get on with our evening.
    The Fawn that greeted me when she finally met my eyes was one I seldom saw. Had never seen, in fact. She glared at me, as pissed off as I had ever seen her.
    “Fawn,” I started, as I reached for her face, ready to put an end to this conversation. The sooner she got this out of her head, the better. It was my job to protect her, even from the silly, impossible thoughts that might sometimes fill her head.
    I stroked her cheek and moved forward to kiss her. She stiffened and turned her head, glaring harder at me.
    “You don’t have anything to say. You’re just going to ignore that?” she asked.
    I stayed silent. What could I say? She wouldn’t listen to me if I tried to speak reason to her, so I’d say nothing. She’d come to her senses eventually.
    That didn’t seem to be happening, though, and as the seconds passed, her anger increased beyond anything I had seen.
    “You know what? Never mind,” she said.
    She rolled away from me and stood and stomped away without looking back at me. My gaze was drawn to the sway of her hips and ass as she moved, and my cock, which had softened, was again hard. She was pissed, but that didn’t lessen my desire at all, nor did the fact that she would rather punch me than fuck me. It was as it always was with her. I’d never been able to control my reaction to Fawn, and I doubted it would ever change.
    Instinct told me to go after her, make her see reason, but instead I lay back against the mattress, deciding I would wait. The sheets were soft, and a pale purple color that I had pretended to disapprove of. I didn’t give a fuck about sheets, but having Fawn work to convince me was worth putting up false resistance. Warmth spread in my chest, and I felt my lips turning up in a smile.
    Something so mundane, something that would have escaped my notice only a few years ago, had my heart full to bursting. She’d made my life real, made it about more than business, more than being