The Deadliest Sin Series Complete Collection, page 127
I shake my head, his cock still buried in my throat, and something dark flashes in his eyes.
“Fucking hell…” He pushes his hips forward, driving himself even deeper. “Breathe through your nose, kotyonok.”
Taking his advice, I inhale through my nose as he pushes more, the head of his cock hitting the back of my throat. I angle my head up more, allowing him to ease even farther down, and swallow.
“Jesus, fuck!”
He jerks on my hair and grits his jaw, then slowly pulls his hips back, drawing his cock from my mouth, glistening with my saliva. I swallow a few times, taking several deep breathes, and he presses his thumb across my lips.
“I'm going to come down your throat, and you're gonna swallow all of it. Understand?”
I nod.
“Good. Open.”
He pushes his dick past my lips, and I glide my tongue along the underside of his length, swirling it as I go. A little choking sound falls from his mouth, and his hips begin to move, thrusting and forcing himself down my throat as I work him over with my tongue.
His movements become erratic, his hips bucking, the head of his cock hitting that soft spot deep down.
Heat pools between my legs even as I fight my gag reflex, not wanting to fail at this, not wanting to fail him. I swallow, letting my throat close around him, and suck as hard as I can until he finally barks out something in Russian and hot spurts of cum hit the back of my throat.
I swallow the best I can.
Salty yet sweet.
A flavor I didn't know I could love so much.
Finally, his hips still, and I open my eyes and look up at Valerian Kamenev. His cheeks slightly flushed. His chest moving up and down rapidly. He pulls one hand from my hair and reaches to his waistband for something.
The gun comes into my line of vision, his lips starting to curl into a smirk. “That was fucking magnificent, kotyonok.” He points the barrel at my forehead, his cock still buried down my throat, my lips stretched around him. “What would your brothers think if they could see you now, Sofia Rose?”
Gluttony is an emotional escape, a sign something is eating us.
- Peter De Vries
VALERIAN
Sofia stares up at me, the fear darkening her eyes and hardening my cock even more in her mouth. She swallows thickly around me. The rippling of her throat against my throbbing flesh and the tightening of her lips around me makes me bite back a groan even as I clench the grip on my gun with my right hand.
“Scared, kotyonok?”
She doesn’t answer, but a single tear sneaks from the corner of her eye.
I brush it away with my thumb and grin at her. “You should be.” Leaning down slightly, I bring my face and the gun closer to her. “Did you really think I wouldn’t recognize you?” Twisting a strand of her blond hair around my finger, I tug on it sharply, making her lips tighten on my length abruptly. “Did you think this dye job and all the makeup would conceal your identity?”
The moment she appeared outside the club that night, standing in too-high heels in the middle of the alley, debating with herself whether she should attempt to come in or not, I recognized her on the surveillance camera. Even after almost dying with Galen, my heart still pounding in my chest, knowing the bomb that could have killed us rested in the backroom of the club, the heavy eyeliner, thick mascara, and hair color couldn’t conceal the woman beneath it all—the girl, really.
Because even though she’s an adult and was raised by two men who are just as ruthless and cold as I am, her innocence shines in her terrified gaze.
I slowly pull my hard cock from her throat so she can answer me. “As much as I truly enjoy the feeling of your mouth on me, kotyonok, it’s time you spoke up and offered me an explanation for what the fuck you’re doing here.”
Given her prowess with computers, there isn’t a doubt in my mind she was trying to get to something stored in mine that she couldn’t retrieve from the outside. It was likely the very reason she came here in the first place.
I use the gun to nudge the pile of papers to the side, revealing a small, black drive plugged into the USB port.
Sofia’s glassy eyes dart over to the damning item, and the swollen lips that just wrapped around my cock quiver. Her hands pressed against my bare thighs curl until her nails dig into my skin. “I didn’t think you’d recognize me.”
I smirk at her and use the barrel of my gun to brush the hair off her cheek. “I could never forget this face…”
“But…” Her mouth opens and closes a few times like she’s trying to choose her words carefully. “But we never even met.”
Rose never would have let their baby sister close enough to me for that to happen, and even though it was only a few moments from across the meeting space packed with the heads of all the major players in Chicago, my eyes immediately went to her the moment she entered with Cutter’s group.
I shake my head. “Not formally, no, but believe me, kotyonok, I noticed you the moment you walked into that room. Even surrounded by all the animosity of the five families and their crews, I couldn’t take my eyes off you.” I glide my fingertips across her soft cheek. “You were so pure, so soft, while everyone else in that room was so hardened by the lives we live. I could see why Rose kept you locked away and hidden from all of us for so long.”
Something flashes in her eyes, an anger the depth of which I haven't seen before from the young woman who has remained so in control of her emotions around me. “My brothers never wanted me to be part of this life. They never wanted me to have any life.”
She said as much the other night—that they sheltered her and kept her wrapped in the veil of the church where Felipe hid. Given who her brothers are and how she must have grown up, it certainly makes sense that they’d do anything to keep her protected in a way that would seem crushing to Sofia, a woman who clearly has wants, needs, desires, and goals.
Grazing my thumb softly over her quivering lips, my cock twitches. “When you said that the other night, I knew exactly what you needed.”
What happened in the playroom proved I was right.
Sofia has never been in control of her own life, has always had her brothers running it and making demands of her. When she disappeared after Cutter’s raid on Rose’s compound, everyone assumed she was hiding until she thought it was safe to return, but that wasn’t the case at all.
She was hiding from them.
The only question is why.
What is your end game, Sofia?
I glance at the computer and motion toward the drive with the thing that could end her life with the simple twitch of my finger against the trigger. “Tell me, Sofia, why are you here? I can guess, but I'd rather hear it out of your sweet mouth.”
She shifts on her knees in front of me, and her eyes dart to my weapon and the evidence of her attempted espionage. “I can't tell you that.”
Even staring down death at the hands of one of her family’s enemies, Sofia has more sass than is good for her.
I nudge her lips with the barrel of my gun. “It's cute that you think you have a choice in the matter, Sofia, but the moment you stepped into Gluttony, you entered my world. I'm in control here unless we’re in one of the playrooms and your safe word means something. If you think for one moment that I'm going to let you walk out of here without finding out what you're up to, then you're far more naïve than I thought.”
Confusion furrows her soft brow. “If you've known who I was this whole time, why didn’t you just kill me? Why don't you just kill me now?”
I lean down and press my lips to the top of her head, into the silky dyed hair that couldn’t conceal her identity. The light flowery scent that always seems to hang around her invades my breath. “Because playing with you is so much more fun—”
The door to the office flies open, and Sofia and I both whip our heads in that direction.
Dmitri’s gaze darts between me and Sofia on her knees in front of me, my pants down and my hard cock still poised near her mouth. “I'm sorry, pakhan. We have a problem.”
“Fucking handle it.” The words said through my clenched jaw carry all the malice I hold for him in this moment. “Close the door, and don’t interrupt me again.”
My men can’t know who Sofia is. They’ll never understand why I let her walk in here and pretend to be someone else. Why I’ve given her access to the club and me.
They don’t need to know.
They just need to obey orders—like the one I gave them to stay the fuck out of my office when I’m with her.
Dmitri shifts uneasily, glancing over his shoulder down the hallway back to the main club. “This needs your personal attention.”
“The world better be fucking burning down.”
“It kind of is, pakhan.”
“Shit.” I set my gun on the desk, tuck my cock back into my pants, and take Sofia's face between my palms. “Don't fucking move an inch while I’m gone.”
It will be painful for her to remain on her knees on the hard concrete floor, but it’s exactly what she needs to understand the magnitude of her situation.
I grab my gun, slip it back into the holster at my hip, and approach Dmitri at the door.
He glances over at Sofia kneeling behind the desk. “You're just going to leave her there like that?”
“Trust me, she's getting off easy.”
There's a reason she lied about who she is, a reason she's here, and something tells me it's more than just breaking into my computer for information. As soon as I deal with whatever fire I need to put out, I'm going to find out what that reason is.
Pausing next to Dmitri, I glance over my shoulder at her before locking eyes with him. “Get Ivan to stand at the door and keep an eye on her. I don't want her to move a fucking inch.”
Dmitri swallows thickly. “I would if I could.”
“What do you mean?”
“Ivan is currently occupied.”
“Doing what?”
His gaze darts toward Sofia again, and then he leans closer to me so she can’t hear him. “Cutter Jackson has a gun to Ivan’s forehead through the slot in the front door of the club.”
“Fucking hell.” I take one last look at the woman who could be the key to unraveling all of this. “We’ll continue our conversation when I return, kotyonok.”
If I don’t end up pumped full of lead first.
VALERIAN
Storming through the still and empty club, I make my way past Connie’s hostess stand to where Yuri, Nikon, and Grigory wait near the door that leads out to the alley. Ivan stands with the barrel of what appears to be a Glock pressed against the middle of his forehead. Its barrel juts through the slit in the heavy metal that’s supposed to protect us and prevent incidents like this from ever happening.
Fucking Cutter…
Ilya stands directly behind Ivan, gun drawn and pointed at the small hole where Ivan’s life hangs in the balance. He glances my way as I approach.
I incline my head behind me. “Go back to my office and keep an eye on Julia.”
His eyes widen slightly, and his mouth opens, perhaps about to argue over leaving his friend while he has a gun pressed to his head or maybe because the woman on her knees bested him—the evidence of which still mars his face. I lock my gaze with his, silently warning him against argument, and without complaint, he whirls and hustles past the other men and Dmitri and toward my office.
He and I will have a talk later about how easily he was taken down by a woman less than half his size, but there are more important issues to deal with right now.
I squeeze Ivan’s shoulder and slowly urge him back from the threat. “Well, Mr. Jackson”—I push Ivan off to the side fully, putting my own forehead into the spot Ivan’s once occupied, the barrel pushed to the skin—“it seems you've come to make a statement.” I raise an eyebrow at him, staring at the reflective sunglasses he wears in an attempt to conceal the gnarly scars that mar the entire right side of his face. “But all you had to do is call if you wanted to chat.”
He scowls at me, the scar across his cheek twisting down with his lips, making him appear even more deadly, and leans forward slightly, pressing the gun against me even harder. “You never would have let me in.”
I smirk at him, unmoved by his unnecessary show of force. “Likely true but putting a gun to my man's head isn't the way to build any sort of goodwill with me, either.”
Cutter issues a low growl, likely meant as some type of warning. “Open the fucking door.”
Chuckling, I shake my head, the gun moving with it. “Why should I, Mr. Jackson? As it stands now, you can get off one shot before Dmitri pushes my body out of the way and slides this thing closed, ensuring the safety of the rest of my men. One death instead of what will undoubtedly be far more should I let you and your men in.”
He takes a half step closer until his chest is almost pressed against the door. “You would sacrifice yourself for your men?”
“You wouldn't?”
Cutter mutters a curse under his breath and glances behind him in the alley. Someone dressed in dark clothing moves next to him, and Valentina Marconi pushes him aside, knocking his hand and the gun down from the window.
As far as I'm aware, it's the first time the Donna of the Italian family has been seen by anyone since she gave birth to Cutter’s child. If she's here personally, instead of only speaking through her boyfriend, the guard dog, something big is going down.
“Smettila, Cutter.” She glares at him in reproach, her reproach evident even in the dim lighting of the alley. “We need to speak with him without spitting venom.”
He mumbles something back at her in Italian, holsters his weapon, and steps back, crossing his arms over his barrel chest with an annoyed huff. Cutter Jackson doesn’t like being told what to do or having to answer to the woman he loves and comply with her commands when his nature begs him to take control.
Valentina squares her slender shoulders, locking her amber gaze with mine through the slit in the metal door. “We need to talk, Valerian. It's important.”
Undoubtedly.
I would have taken a bullet from Cutter’s gun to ensure the rest of my men stay safe because I don't trust that man not to come in here, shooting indiscriminately, just to prove whatever point he thinks he needs to, but Valentina is a different story.
She's the reason and the restraint in their Bonnie and Clyde relationship—the only thing keeping him from completely eliminating every one of the Marconi rivals in a very bloody way.
And everyone in this city knows it.
If she wants a conversation, I need to let her have it.
I offer her a friendly smile. “All you had to do was ask, Valentina.” As I flip the lock with a loud clank and drag the heavy metal door open to permit them entry, Dmitri offers me a concerned look. “Do come in.”
Valentina moves to step inside, but Cutter pushes her out of the way to enter first, his shoulders tense, chest puffed out in a completely obvious display.
He leans toward me, those nasty scars bright pink and twisted near my face. “You even think of fucking touching her and I'll kill you in the most painful way I can devise.”
I hold up my hands, palms out, and shake my head. “I'm not the one putting a gun to people's heads.”
Valentina steps in, her heels clicking on concrete floors, and pats Cutter on the shoulder. “I think he got the message, amore mio.” She turns toward me. “Is there somewhere we can talk”—she glances toward Dmitri, Aleksei, and my other men now standing behind me—“privately.”
Normally, I would bring her into my office, but given who waits there for me, that would be incredibly unwise at the moment. Cutter’s men have worked with Sofia in the past, and he would recognize her in an instant. The ensuing drama would be best avoided at all costs—especially because I don’t have the answer to the ultimate question of why she’s here yet.
“Of course.” I swing out my arm to indicate they should walk forward and slowly fall in line next to her and behind Cutter. “Let’s go to the bar.”
Once we enter the main club, I hold up a hand to stop Dmitri and the rest of the men from following. “Podozhdi, stoy toot, Dmitri.”
Concern flashes in Dmitri’s eyes, but I shake my head.
This isn't the time for a power struggle.
All eyes remain locked on Valentina and Cutter, who make their way across the empty room and stop in front of the central hub of the club. I follow slowly, watching the unusual couple’s body language in an attempt to determine the motivation behind this impromptu meeting, and move behind the bar, motioning to the long line of liquor bottles.
“A drink?”
Cutter sneers. “It's 11:30 in the morning.”
I raise a brow at him. “Your point?’
Valentina offers a half smile. “We'll politely decline.”
“Your loss.” I shrug and grab a bottle of vodka for myself, pouring a double into a crystal tumbler. “So, Ms. Marconi, to what do I owe the pleasure of this friendly visit?” Their timing couldn’t have been worse—both for my cock and my attempts to gain the information I seek from Sofia. “You haven't been around very much lately. You've been missing all the fun.”
Her lips harden into a thin line. “I've heard plenty about the fun everyone's been experiencing, and that's precisely why we're here to talk.”
“Dmitri already provided me the information your friend, Preacher, found”—I glance at Cutter—“and it appears as though there are more unanswered questions. So, what is there to talk about?”
Cutter stiffens next to her, taking a second to turn and focus on my men before replying.
Valentina leans forward slightly, lowering her voice. “The information I didn't send you. The information that might help us unravel this entire mystery.”
VALERIAN
I take a sip of my vodka and examine the woman standing at the bar in front of me. Her swift rise to power and removal of her cousin from his position threw everyone for a loop, but she filled her father's shoes well.
