Claimed

Chapter 5

ALEXIA GREEN.

Don’t touch my baby.

Don’t pretend to know what’s right for my baby.

Don’t take dresses off of me like a caveman and later pretend you are a gentleman by handing me one of your shirts.

Vicious…Christian…Grumpy pants…man with a scowl bigger than Thanos; left my room half an hour ago.

Half an hour later, I’m drenched in his scent because of the shirt I’m wearing.

What’s even worse?

My baby turned out to be a traitor.

She hasn’t stopped crying since Vicious handed her to me and left my room.

I mean I’m not blaming my little cuteness at all for liking a man as humongous and as handsome as Christian Volkov but he is a big red sign with a NO.

No to liking a man who apparently killed his last doctor and if I’m not careful, I could end up being dead too. Six feet under. Dead by the hands of a deranged man.

How ironic would that be?

From being a psycho’s girlfriend to getting kidnapped by a man who makes America’s serial killers like Ted Bundy look like frigging Sponge Bob.

“I know he has big hands, baby. Big hands that might feel warm but he is bad, you hear me, Mills?

Handsome Man is bad. He is the enemy. We are going to escape the enemy and go back to being just as two. Shh, shh, sleep for mommy. Please, sleep for mommy”

Her tiny fists reach out for me and when she cradles my hand hugging it closer to her pudgy cheeks, tears are at the brim of my eyes but I don’t cry.

I watch my baby fall asleep like everything is right in the world and I’m not in some mobster’s house.

Once I put Millie back in her crib, the urge to remove Christian’s shirt from my body is great but unless I want to die of hypothermia, I need his shirt on me.

I need his blankets, the ones on the bed to warm me up and erase the fact that I saved one of his men ‘Nico’ (The cute one with the dimples) from bleeding to death from a knife wound.

A knife wound from chopping apples? I think not.

A knife wound from slicing people up? I absolutely think that.

If I think his men are scary then Christian ‘Vicious’ Volkov is the motherfreaking devil.

***

If there was anything an orphan, a single mother, a nurse out of practice never did, was to look a gift horse in the mouth.

If life gives you muffins, then take a huge chunk of those muffins while you can, it might be the last time you taste sugar.

My morning began with Millie fed, happy and giggling in Juana’s arms.

I’m momentarily pretending that the boss isn’t in the house and that at any moment he won’t burst this little bubble of bliss I’m in right now.Text property © Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org.

Nothing makes me happier than sitting down without thinking about loan sharks knocking on my door or Millie going hungry because I haven’t eaten in a day or two.

Right now, my face is full of chocolate croissants that taste like how I’ve always imagined Paris to be.

The sun’s light flutters through the windows and for a moment, I close my eyes, my nose pierces the air and my smile stretches the corners of my mouth I almost feel guilty.

But I don’t.

Again, don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Enjoy the food while you can. Enjoy the bed at night. Get a little bit fat while I think of a plan to get away from here.

My happy parade is ruined the minute I choke on nothing but air.

No…not air.

I choke on his scent. I choke on the aura that hugs my back when I sense his presence.

The sun itself recognizes him because the light that was once hugging my skin disappears and instead all I feel is cold.

“I warned you, dear. You eat too fast and you’ll choke. Your mama doesn’t like to listen, does she?”, Juana chastises, cooing to Millie.

Embarrbottomment coats my face as I finish my croissant, pull the stool behind me and stand up to my feet which is the wrong thing to do in the first place.

Christian is standing next to me. No, scratch that.

Christian Volkov is standing next to me, his hard jaw directed at me, his golden eyes grazing every inch of me like I’m the worm from his nightmares that kept falling in his soup.

“Coffee? I can brew it for you”, Juana directs the question at Christian who dismisses her with,

“No. Leave”

Wow, someone woke up from the wrong side of the bed this morning.

Juana doesn’t hesitate, she’s about to take a turn and leave me to the beast when the said beast barks again, “Leave the child with the mother”

His words float in the air and they sear my skin raw.

Juana does as she’s told, ever so dutiful. Never once acting pissed or anything.

Once Juana is out of the vicinity and Millie is in my arms making babyish noises, I take a step back and say, “Call me your little nurse, treat me like shit…sorry baby for cussing…but give my baby respect. She has nothing to do with Rhett or me or this stupid debt. Her name is Millie, not child but Millie. Get the name right.”

His expression is bland.

The scowl on his face says ‘I shouldn’t be yapping around like I own the place’.

And his words cut my words into two.

“You are leaving with me today”

“Leaving where?”

“Does it matter?”

Freaking bottomhole.

“You are telling me we are leaving today and you are not gonna tell me where? I need info if I’m going to be treating one of your men today”

That switches off something in him.

One minute Shirtless Slightly pissed off Volkov is barking orders and the next minute his face, his body which has tattoos I hadn’t seen last night, is so close to me that if he leans forward the only thing that will stop him from claiming my lips is my baby girl who is in my arms.

“How do you think this works, Sunshine? I give you my house, my food and you spend the rest of the day here like a queen? Is that the shit Juana has been feeding you? You are here to work. You are here to follow orders. I say you jump, you ask how high. I say you walk, Lexy you freaking run. I tell you not to speak, you bite your goddamn tongue. Don’t mistake our dynamic. And I know the child’s name, I just couldn’t care less.”

His words are like an acid bath in the Himalayas. Deadly, icy, poisonous.

Gritting my teeth, forcing the bile rising in my throat, I sbottom, “Should I go on my knees and lick your boots too?”

A dark chuckle escapes him and it travels up my spine, seeps into my veins and makes everything go haywire.

This son of a gun might be the only man who chuckles like he took the world, conquered it and tossed it back to us peasants.

“I’ll never ask you to go down on your knees, sunshine. You’ll beg for it yourself.”

***

He doesn’t take me to a slaughterhouse.

He doesn’t take me to the dungeons where he kills his prisoners.

No, the man with the dark Armani suit that is enough to buy me and Millie like ten times in an auction took me here.

The floral dress feels like fluffy clouds against my body. It’s off-shoulder and gives summer vibes.

“Turn around”, Christian barks.

He is reclined against the plush upholstery, propping one leg over the other, finally gifting me a sliver of his attention.

His slacks ride up until the hem reveals his socks—black.

Just like his heart.

Instead of how normal villains pet some evil cat in their laps while devising murder, Volkov has my daughter in his arms.

And my daughter? Yap, Millie has forgotten all about this man being public enemy number one. She’s holding his thumb.

I twirl around.

I obey.

Why? Because it’s been a while since a man bought me clothes.

It’s been a while since a man reserved an entire store for me and my baby. Make that, the only man.

“I don’t like it”, he says dryly.

“I like it”, I turn around huffing.

“You like it?”

“Yeah”. I nod. Volkov smirks.

“Too bad because you are not going to show off that bottom in front of my men.”

“Excuse you?”

I like the dress because it makes me feel less fat than I was a few months ago. Not because I want to seduce his men.

“You told Nico to call you ‘Lexy’. You know how he interpreted that? Like you are easy game. Like you and he could be a thing. You show up in a dress like this and that freaker will be tripping all over just to kiss your feet”

Nico? I mean he was hot. But not hotter than…

“Maybe I want him to kiss my feet”, I lie through my teeth when in reality, it wouldn’t hurt if Volkov was the one kissing my…no, no. Enemy. He is the enemy.

“I hired a doctor, sunshine not a slut who can’t—”

I’m half listening to Volkov, my eyes glued to the man entering the store.

The man who has dresses in one of his arms and a smile on his face.

The man I recognize from a past that’s too raw and too sensitive.

My breath hitches.

My head spirals. I can’t breathe. I can’t…can’t breathe.

I need to run.

Just like that night I need to run before he touches me.

Tears well in my eyes, fear digs its sharp claws into my neck.

I don’t think. I run back to the dressing room like a scaredy cat.

I leave my daughter with two monsters.