Used by the Russian Mafia Boss: A Bad Boy Mafia Romance (22 page)

“Funny you should phrase it like that,” he said with a smirk.

Emily crossed her arms. “Sergei was right.”

“Pardon?”

“You do have an arrogant smirk.”

The smile disappeared. “I would ask you how business is going, but I attended the quarterly meeting last night so I already know the answer.”

“Which is odd, because
business
has never been better.” Emily couldn’t help but be a little boastful. “Our profit margins are through the roof.”

“Yes, but your brother’s sales are dismal.” Ivan walked about her office, a smug expression on his face. “In fact, I don’t know if you realize how precarious his position with the organization is.”

“And I’m sure you’re just the person to tell me.” Emily could see where this was going. Well, sort of. She still didn’t understand what Ivan thought he was going to do about it.

“Look, Em.” He put his hands flat on her desk and leaned over until he was practically in her face. “I know Sergei has been padding his income.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Emily stepped back. She needed some space. He smelled too good and looked too good, and this was way too important not to keep her head firmly on straight. “Sergei’s business is just fine.”

“Emily, come on.” Ivan stood up and laughed. “I know this territory. It runs parallel to mine. There is no way it would have supported the kind of income he was claiming that he made during the last quarter.”

“Oh?” Emily was bluffing and she knew that Ivan could tell.

“Yes, Emily. Your brother is stealing from your legitimate businesses and pretending he’s selling more product.” Ivan looked as though he actually pitied them. It was humiliating. “I can perfectly well understand why he’d do it, but there is a point where even the bosses are going to grow suspicious.”

Emily decided to dispense with the crap. “So you’re proposing what, exactly?”

***

Ivan gazed at the proud tilt of Emily’s chin and tried to remind himself that he was over her. The only problem was that she was so damn pretty. Not only that, but Emily Volkov was the real deal. The woman was brilliant, had a great mind for business, and she was loyal to a fault. Which was why he was going to get what he wanted.

“Emily,” Ivan said as he took a stroll around her roomy office. “My business interests are getting large enough that I really need to hire an assistant to take care of the particulars of my day-to-day operations.”

“So hire one,” Emily told him. Her expression was utterly composed.

Ivan smiled, suddenly distracted by the memory of her long, blond hair falling around her shoulders. He remembered the way she would tilt her head when he kissed her. And then he forced himself to recall the moment she’d turned her back on him after her brother had declared Ivan to be beneath them.

“That’s the thing, Emily,” Ivan drawled. “Hiring some random individual won’t afford me the great pleasure of watching your brother choke on his disdain when he realizes that you’re not only working for me, but warming my bed.”

“Excuse me?” She put her hands on her hips. “Did you hit your head or something?”

“It’s pretty simple,” Ivan told her. “You come and work for me as my live-in personal assistant. You’re going to service
all
of my needs.” He raked her up and down, his gaze lingering on the curve of her hips and breasts. “Or I’m going to tell the organization what your brother has been doing.”

He saw the smooth column of her throat move as she swallowed. “You wouldn’t.”

“Watch me,” Ivan retorted. “That smug son of a bitch sent me packing because he didn’t think some upstart Russian orphan with no hereditary claims to the organization was good enough for his sister. Now I’m going to show him exactly what that upstart can do.” Ivan gave a careless shrug. “With the side benefit of forcing him to stop wasting the edges of my turf with his substandard business practices. Seriously, Em. Your brother doesn’t know shit about making it in the drug trade.”

There was a big part of Ivan that expected Emily to send him packing. She was a smart girl. Surely she wouldn’t just fall for his scheme without trying to find another way out for her idiot brother, Sergei.

“And if I agree to the portion of this scheme that includes my employment,” she began slowly, “why would I ever agree to sleep with you?”

Ivan closed the distance between them in two strides. He gazed down at her, noting the dilation of her pupils and her ragged breathing. “Emily,” he murmured. “You’re not going to agree. You’re going to beg me.”

She swallowed and he watched her try to get control of her breathing. “I wouldn’t.”

“You won’t be able to help yourself,” he whispered. Lowering his head, he let his cheek brush up against hers. “You’ve had a crush on me since the moment you first laid eyes on me. Admit it.”

“That doesn’t mean it’s still true,” she protested.

“Oh Emily.” Ivan felt his own body begin to respond and tamped it down forcefully. He was in control of his urges, unlike his prey. “How you lie to yourself, don’t you?”

She pulled away from him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Ivan scoffed, reaching out and grabbing her by the upper arms. He pulled her into his embrace and kissed her as though he intended to take her breath away completely. She melted against him. He felt her lips part as she surrendered completely. Her little sigh of excitement thrilled him in a way that had never been equaled by any other lover.

He pulled back just enough to speak against her lips. “Your body remembers my touch, Emily. Secretly you crave me. I know you do.”

“That doesn’t mean I’ll give in,” she said weakly.

“Yes,” he predicted. “You will.”

“I haven’t even agreed to this stupid scheme.” She seemed to be attempting to put some mental distance between them, but he wasn’t having it.

“You will,” Ivan told her. “You’ll agree because you know that I’m right. You know that the organization will sanction your brother for the lies he’s been feeding them. You know their anger will be swift and severe. You know Sergei cannot handle that. And you will take care of him as you always do.”

“You’re a snake,” she whispered. “To know all of this and use it against me is despicable.”

Ivan backed off, giving her a careless shrug. He needed her to see him as completely unaffected by her charms. Deep down, he knew he might still be vulnerable to her, if only because he still found her so very beautiful. But he was beyond those days when he was ruled by that sort of passion. He was a man grown now. A man who knew what he wanted and how to wield the sort of power that would get him what he wanted.

“It’s your choice, really,” Ivan told Emily. “You can let Sergei pay the price of his own stupidity. Or you can do what you’ve always done and mitigate his punishment. Surely a few weeks or months with me is worth Sergei’s possible death.”

“Months?” she whispered. He saw her mulling it over in her mind, but he already knew her answer. “Fine. I’ll work for you. But I’m not promising a damn thing when it comes to warming your bed.”

 “You’ll change your mind,” he told her. “Women always do.”

Chapter Three

“No!” Sergei shouted. “I absolutely forbid it.”

He was pacing energetically back and forth in front of Emily’s desk as she put her personal items in a box and prepared to leave her office for…well for a while. Emily glared at her brother. “You can’t
forbid
it, Sergei! Especially not when your idiotic decisions are the reason I have to go.”

“Excuse me?” He looked affronted. “That is such crap!”

“No!” Emily put a framed photograph of her and their parents in the box. “Actually what is crap is the fact that you took legitimate, legal income and laundered it backwards. Backwards, Sergei! You wanted so badly to look like a mafia badass that you fucked us over to make that happen! If you had just been honest with the organization, we wouldn’t be in this predicament.”

“That’s not true,” he argued.

Emily continued sarcastically, “How awful that we might have to make millions of dollars every single year in a legitimate way that leaves us with plenty to pay our portion to the organization and still maintain our own lifestyles! Yes. That’s just awful!”

“It’s not what Papa would have wanted!” Sergei argued. “He would have wanted us to carry on in the same way our family has been going since we emigrated from Moscow!”

“Seriously?” Emily shook her head and muttered something uncomplimentary in Russian. “Because I feel like that’s not at all accurate. Papa would have been proud of how big the umbrella corporation has gotten. We still
own
the housing industry in the city, Sergei. Think about it. How many contracting jobs get done without a cut going to the organization? Almost none! How is that not enough for you?”

“Enough for me?” Sergei pointed at Emily. “Tell me this isn’t because you’ve still got a damn crush on that jackass. Tell me you’re not going to wind up throwing yourself at his feet and begging for his forgiveness for some bullshit past wrong.”

“I’m not!” she protested, but even Emily could hear the note of uncertainty in her voice. “It’s not that simple anymore, Sergei. He doesn’t want me like that. He wants to punish me, I think. And you.”

“Well it’s working,” Sergei said bitterly. “The humiliation of having my sister as some sort of personal assistant slash concubine to that bastard orphan is something I never thought I would have to endure.”

“Oh because this is all about
you
,” Emily snarled. “How silly of me to forget that everything that happens is about you. I mean, this is
for
you. So why wouldn’t you think that you’re the center of the universe?”

“Would you knock it off?” Sergei shouted. “I’m upset on your behalf. Do you even get that?”

“Then maybe you should take a good hard look at your business practices while I’m gone. Then when I finally get the chance to come back, we can talk about how we’re going to avoid having this ever happen again.” Emily gazed at her brother. “You cannot spend your whole life trying to be enough.”

“You’ve got it all wrong, Emily!” Sergei told her angrily. “You’re not doing this for me. You’re doing it for yourself, because you’re in love with him.”

“Yeah because the best thing I can do is go give myself to a guy who would rather just use me as some sort of revenge tactic against my brother. That’s the best man I can find,” Emily said sadly. “I’m just so glad you’ve got such faith in my value as a woman. Maybe I should just let you wallow in your own mess.”

“Emily, wait.”

“No.” She was done with this conversation, and right now, she was done with her brother. “I’m gone.”

She picked up her box and marched out of her office. Her path took her right by Carrie, and her assistant frowned as she realized that Emily was leaving for the day.

“Ms. Volkov?” Carrie called. “Are you gone for the day?”

Emily called back over her shoulder, “More like the quarter.”

“Wait. What?” Carrie sounded truly alarmed.

“Just cancel all my appointments until further notice. And make my brother, Sergei, responsible for the reports and all the rest of what I usually do.” Emily actually felt a jolt of satisfaction at being able to deliver that order.

Carrie’s jaw dropped open. “Mr. Sergei? Ms. Volkov, are you sure?”

“Of course not, but it’s his company. If he wants to run it into the ground, I suppose he’ll just have to figure it out as he goes.” Emily didn’t pause any longer. She kept walking.

By the time she hit the elevator she was feeling rather faint. It wasn’t that she was less resolved to do what she had agreed to do. More like she was wondering whether or not she was strong enough for the task to come.

Emily strode right through the front doors of the building and out to the sidewalk. The cool afternoon air felt good on her flaming face. She inhaled deeply and let the breath out slow. That was about the time she noticed the limo sitting at the curb. She stopped walking just as the back door opened and a gentleman got out.

“Hello, Emily,” Ivan Dedov said in a voice as smooth as whiskey. “I was wondering when I would see you.”

“You’ve just been…waiting out here?” Emily fumbled for words. “Why?”

“I don’t have a building with my name smeared all across it for the world to see where I do business,” Ivan explained. “I figured it would be only polite to show you in person where it is you’re going to be working.”

Emily tried to swallow, but her mouth felt full of cotton. This was unexpected. This was Ivan being charming and charismatic. She knew then that she was in trouble.

***

Ivan managed not to laugh at the expression of surprise on Emily’s face. Obviously she had expected him to be as inexperienced and uncouth as he had been eight years ago. Fortunately, he had learned a few things in that time.

Emily got into the limo and Ivan joined her in the back seat. He flared his nostrils, catching a hint of her vanilla spice scent. It was strange how that sort of thing could stay with a man for years. He could also tell that she was nervous, despite her resolve not to show it.

Ivan straightened the collar of his dress shirt and then turned one of his cufflinks right side up. “How did your brother take the news that you’re coming to work for me?”

“About as well as could be imagined.” She gave him a sideways glance that suggested she thought it was rude to ask.

“Good,” Ivan snorted. “Perhaps that will begin the process of taking Sergei down a few pegs.”

“Why is that so important to you?” She turned in her seat, pegging him with an earnest stare that actually gave him the urge to squirm. “What does it really matter? You’re successful, right? Isn’t that enough?”

He turned away, staring out the window as the driver headed toward the building Ivan had purchased several years ago to be the center of his operations.

Why
was
this so important to him?

“You don’t even have an answer, do you?” The derisive note in her voice made him angry.

“Careful, Emily,” he growled. “You’re going to give away the fact that you care.”