“You won’t.” He said it abruptly. “No one talks sense into a man who takes a contract out on them. We’ll be careful. At the bakery and here. I want you to move in with me here. Your house is nice, but it’s small and I can’t protect us as well there.”

She opened her mouth to protest so he leaned in and kissed her again. When he lifted his head his gaze moved over her face, drinking her in. “She’s so close to rising, Evangeline. I can feel her every time I kiss you. My male gets close to the surface. Can you feel her?”

She nodded. “She makes me itch. It comes in waves, although while you were . . .” She trailed off.

“Making love to you.” He wasn’t about to say fucking. He hadn’t fucked her. Even when he did, when he made it all about wild, he knew he would touch her with love, that it would always be about making love to her.

She nodded. “She left me alone with you. I appreciated that. I wanted it to be just us the first time.”

“It was. My male left us alone as well.”

“And it was perfect. Really, Fyodor, I loved every single thin’ you did.” That flush slid up her neck and into her face, turning her skin a rose color. “And the things you said to me. It was hot. Dirty maybe, but hot.”

“I intend to do dirty things to you. I thought you might want to know what you were getting into.” He brought her palm back to his mouth, teeth scraping gently.

“Where did you go tonight?”

“I had to take care of business. It didn’t take long. I was anxious to get back to you.”

“I don’ know about movin’ in yet, Fyodor. When you aren’t here, I get nervous. I could spend a few nights here but then when you have business I can head home.”

“Not. Going. To. Happen.” He punctuated each word with a scrape of his teeth and then he bit down harder in the center of the mark he’d put on her palm. He ignored her yelp as she jerked her hand away from him and glared at him.

“If you insist on being at your house, I’ll be staying there as well. I want you in my bed. I want to wake up to you. Go to sleep to you. Wake up in the middle of the night and take you however I want. I was serious about your body belonging to me. Mine belongs to you. When you want something, anything, I want to be there. And, malyutka, the next time you reach for your little toy, I’d better be with you. When you pack your things, make certain you pack that as well.”

“You have a thing about bitin’.”