Free Her Russian Beast: 50 Loving States, New Mexico by Theodora Taylor Page B
Authors: Theodora Taylor
orgasm he’d given her tickled.
“Oh, God, Beast, you know how to make a girl happy in the morning,” he remembered her saying the first (but definitely not the last) time he’d taken her like that.
And she had been happy. So happy with the life he’d provided her. At least for a little while. But then things had…changed. That first August…and then gotten worse after that.
The only place him and me work right is in bed.
Bair spilled into his hand, lust and rage swirling in an eddy of confused emotion as he threw back his head and gave into the release.
Only to come down to an overwhelming shame.
She wanted nothing to do with him, he remembered then. Had left him without so much as a goodbye. And now she was trying to take her name back.
She’d apparently either left or been let go of by her last lover. And now she was in the wind.
But not for long, he vowed to himself.
Darkness swelled inside his chest as he tucked himself back into his pants. No, this wouldn’t be like his brother and Eva. There would be no happily ever after for him and the girl who so thoroughly destroyed him six years ago.
Only revenge.
4
“ S ORRY , sweet thing. As nice as you look, I’m going to need to see two forms of ID.”
Thel scrunched her face at the man on the other side of the glass counter. “But that’s a passport,” she pointed out. “I can get a job with just a passport.”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” he said, scratching his belly. “But either way, I don’t like making fifteen-thou cash deals with just a passport to go on. Especially one that’s expired. So unless you can cough up another form of ID, the deal’s off.”
Ugh! Thel wished she could just tell him exactly where he could take his cash deal and put it. He was ripping her off anyway. She knew it and he knew it. Only paying her $15,000 for a ring that had felt like an oversized boulder on her hand for the few weeks she’d worn it.
“You officially belong to me now, Siren,” Bair had said when he tossed the leather box to her the morning after their wedding. “And no Rustanov would let his wife leave his house without a ring on her hand.”
Just from the weight of the thing alone, she was sure it had to cost a lot more than the $15,000 the pawn shop guy had agreed to give her for it. And now this guy was asking for more ID? Her fingers itched to take back the ring lying between them on the counter. To scoop it up and walk away. Maybe she could find another way to get the money Willa needed. There had to be another way.
“C’mon just a driver’s license or something,” the ratty pawn shop owner said, as if reading her mind. “Anything. You don’t want to have to do this all over again with another guy.”
No, no she didn’t. She thought of her sister, Willa, waiting in the car. Desperate to leave their life in Greenlee County behind to get away from Sawyer Grant, the Navy SEAL who’d been making her life miserable since he moved back to town. Willa had dropped out of medical school and helped take care of her after Thel got her diagnosis. She’d stood strong by Thel’s side for the years it took to defeat that terrible disease.
As wrong as it felt to sell the ring she’d held on to for all these years, it felt even more wrong to not put her sister first now that she needed her. It was the least she could do for Willa, Thel thought to herself.
Still, her stomach turned a couple of times as she opened her purse and pulled out her driver’s license.
Now it was the pawn shop guy’s turn to scrunch up his face. “This is a whole different name—Thel-ex-ai-oh-pee Okee-ah-nos—what the hell kind of name is that?”
Thel threw the man an annoyed look. She didn’t blame the guy for butchering her name. She wasn’t even sure she was saying her name right, since her Greek father had, according to her mother, “swam off somewhere beyond the North Carolina sea,” after finding out his girlfriend was pregnant.
But it was
“Oh, God, Beast, you know how to make a girl happy in the morning,” he remembered her saying the first (but definitely not the last) time he’d taken her like that.
And she had been happy. So happy with the life he’d provided her. At least for a little while. But then things had…changed. That first August…and then gotten worse after that.
The only place him and me work right is in bed.
Bair spilled into his hand, lust and rage swirling in an eddy of confused emotion as he threw back his head and gave into the release.
Only to come down to an overwhelming shame.
She wanted nothing to do with him, he remembered then. Had left him without so much as a goodbye. And now she was trying to take her name back.
She’d apparently either left or been let go of by her last lover. And now she was in the wind.
But not for long, he vowed to himself.
Darkness swelled inside his chest as he tucked himself back into his pants. No, this wouldn’t be like his brother and Eva. There would be no happily ever after for him and the girl who so thoroughly destroyed him six years ago.
Only revenge.
4
“ S ORRY , sweet thing. As nice as you look, I’m going to need to see two forms of ID.”
Thel scrunched her face at the man on the other side of the glass counter. “But that’s a passport,” she pointed out. “I can get a job with just a passport.”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” he said, scratching his belly. “But either way, I don’t like making fifteen-thou cash deals with just a passport to go on. Especially one that’s expired. So unless you can cough up another form of ID, the deal’s off.”
Ugh! Thel wished she could just tell him exactly where he could take his cash deal and put it. He was ripping her off anyway. She knew it and he knew it. Only paying her $15,000 for a ring that had felt like an oversized boulder on her hand for the few weeks she’d worn it.
“You officially belong to me now, Siren,” Bair had said when he tossed the leather box to her the morning after their wedding. “And no Rustanov would let his wife leave his house without a ring on her hand.”
Just from the weight of the thing alone, she was sure it had to cost a lot more than the $15,000 the pawn shop guy had agreed to give her for it. And now this guy was asking for more ID? Her fingers itched to take back the ring lying between them on the counter. To scoop it up and walk away. Maybe she could find another way to get the money Willa needed. There had to be another way.
“C’mon just a driver’s license or something,” the ratty pawn shop owner said, as if reading her mind. “Anything. You don’t want to have to do this all over again with another guy.”
No, no she didn’t. She thought of her sister, Willa, waiting in the car. Desperate to leave their life in Greenlee County behind to get away from Sawyer Grant, the Navy SEAL who’d been making her life miserable since he moved back to town. Willa had dropped out of medical school and helped take care of her after Thel got her diagnosis. She’d stood strong by Thel’s side for the years it took to defeat that terrible disease.
As wrong as it felt to sell the ring she’d held on to for all these years, it felt even more wrong to not put her sister first now that she needed her. It was the least she could do for Willa, Thel thought to herself.
Still, her stomach turned a couple of times as she opened her purse and pulled out her driver’s license.
Now it was the pawn shop guy’s turn to scrunch up his face. “This is a whole different name—Thel-ex-ai-oh-pee Okee-ah-nos—what the hell kind of name is that?”
Thel threw the man an annoyed look. She didn’t blame the guy for butchering her name. She wasn’t even sure she was saying her name right, since her Greek father had, according to her mother, “swam off somewhere beyond the North Carolina sea,” after finding out his girlfriend was pregnant.
But it was