The Bratva’s Locked Up Love by Jagger Cole

19

Quinn

I never neededsilk sheets on a princess bed. I never wanted candlelight or soft, sultry music playing lightly in the background.

And I realize now, all I did need was him.

All I wanted or needed was the right man to come along and crash into me, like he has. I always told myself it was that I didn’t have the time—that I had more important things to do than worry about sex.

I told myself it wasn’t important, like my studying and work was. I told myself it was probably overrated. That it was a time waster for people who had nothing better to do.

I was wrong, across the board. It was just that I was waiting without knowing I was waiting for man I hadn’t met yet.

Maksim stays inside of me as he lifts me in his arms. He kisses me as we move across the room to the couch. I laugh inside, realizing there was a softer, bed-like piece of furniture right here. But I wouldn’t change my desktop tryst with him for all the couches or beds in the world.

On the small couch, he slowly withdraws from me. His brow caves in worry when I wince.

“I hurt you,” he growls, his voice edged and full of self-loathing.

But I lean into him and kiss him softly as I shake my head. “You didn’t. It’s just… new.”

I’m sore, but it’s not a bad sore. It’s a sore I want to keep close to me and never forget. I slide onto his lap, my legs together side-saddle over his. He gathers me in his arms and nuzzles my neck with a tenderness you’d never expect from a man who looks like him.

Or a man who fucks like him.

“Quinn,” he growls quietly. “You deserved to have better for your first—”

“I deserved to have what I wanted for my first,” I whisper back. “And I wanted you.” I grin. “Plus, truth be told, I always fantasized my first time would be on an office desk in the middle of a prison riot, so…”

He rolls his eyes. But he frowns, still worried about me. I giggle as I pull him into me to kiss deeply.

“It was perfect, Maksim,” I murmur into his mouth.

He grins. Then his eyes drop to my bandages. “How do you feel?”

“Oh, fine.” My brow creases with worry as I slide my gaze over the bandages stuck to him from the last few weeks of attacks. “You?”

He shrugs. “More scars for the collection.”

I smile wryly as my eyes dance over his perfect body. It is covered with faint and not-so-faint lines and scars. Some are covered with tattoos. Others are right there, grabbing my eyes. But even with them, or maybe because of them, he is perfect.

My eyes trace over the tapestry of ink and scar-tissue covering his body. When they land on his forearms though, I pause. I reach out. My fingertips slide over scars I don’t need to ask about, even if they fill me with fear and break my heart. Because I know what they are without asking.

I shudder as I pull my hand away.

“Sorry,” I say quickly, though he’s said nothing. But when I look up, he’s smiling at me.

“Don’t be. I don’t mind telling you.” His eyes capture mine. “They’re what you think they are, Quinn,” he says quietly.

I nod as his hand finds mine, his fingers entwining with mine.

“I’ve been clean and sober for ten years now,” he growls. He frowns at the scars and then drags his eyes to mine again. “I was a disaster, when I was young. I fell down a dark hole into a pit with no way out.”

I nod, squeezing his hand. I met enough addicts and former addicts in the ER during my residency to know the cycle and the pain. To understand the self-hatred and destruction that the addition brings.

“How did you get clean?”

“My boss,” he grunts quietly. “Yuri Volkov, the head of the Volkov Bratva.” He smirks. “I tried to rob him, while high. He could have killed me like that, and the world would have forgotten every trace of me.”

“And instead he got you clean?”

He nods. “Locked me in his basement and beat the addiction out of me.”

I grin. Then I realize he’s completely serious, and my smile fades.

“Jesus,” I whisper.

He smiles thinly. “Unorthodox, maybe. But I know it’s the only way I would have ever beat the cravings.”

“I’m glad you got clean,” I murmur. I look up at him, and my heart melts when he grins down into my eyes.

“I am too,” he groans, leaning in to kiss me.

I giggle as I pull back.

“What?”

“I just realized I don’t even know your last name.”

He chuckles. “I actually don’t know yours either. I feel like a scumbag now.”

I grin. “Don’t.” I extend a hand and stiffly shake his hand.

“Doctor Quinn Coolidge, at your service.”

He grins back. “Maksim Zaitsev, at yours.”

“Nice to meet you, Mister Zaitsev.”

“Nice to meet you too, Doctor Coolidge.”