"Daisy, I like this chair. We should it buy it for home."
"Daisy, when we are home, will you make me those potato pancakes?"
And at night, "Daisy, the walls of our home are brick. You can scream as loud as you want."
When the week has passed and we get our keys, Daisy presents me with a keychain. It has two keys—one for my Ducati and one for our home. The movers have come to deliver the bed. It is a massive wooden thing.
"I think you could sleep a family in it." Daisy muses as the four delivery men struggle to carry the mattress into our third-floor loft.
I hope that means she is interested in a family with me.
That night, we sit on the floor with candles all around us. None of the furniture Daisy and I have ordered will be here until the following day. The one overhead light is too bright. There is much to fix in this building. It will give me something to do.
"I bought this building," I confess to Daisy.
"Did you?" She laughs with delight. Her eyes are dancing. Maybe it is just the candlelight. Nonetheless, she looks lovely. I can barely taste the takeout Chinese we are eating. It could be nothing more than fiery peppers, and I wouldn't care. All I can do is stare at her.
Later, I lay her down upon the bed and love her sweetly. Her cries of pleasure fill the loft as I sink between her legs and love her, first with my tongue and then with my cock. As we lie sweaty and breathless in the aftermath, I wonder at the marvel my life has become. And then I allow sleep to overtake me, and there, in my dreams, I take Daisy again and again and again.
DAISY
Nick's last hit is done.
I caress his chest as he comes to bed that night. We are in our new, enormous bed in our apartment. Our apartment building, I correct myself. I have no idea what we will do with all these apartments, but I like the idea of it. Perhaps we will set aside an apartment for my father, in case he wants to live closer to us and sell the farm. He can even bring his new dog with him. Perhaps we'll set aside an apartment for Regan.
Just in case.
It's been months, and there has been no further word from Daniel about Regan. We only know that she's safe, but she hasn't returned home. I feel so guilty for my poor, beautiful friend whose only crime was that she had been my roommate. She doesn't deserve whatever fate has befallen her, and it keeps me up at night, worrying about her.
I don't tell Nick that I have nightmares about Regan. I suspect he knows this. My Nick has enough to worry about. There are some nights that he feels me out by telling me stories, determined to find the one that will turn me away. Tonight was one such night. "Did I ever tell you," he said to me over takeout, "about the German priest I did a job on in Berlin?"
He told me about him over dinner. The priest was a pedophile and laundering money out of the coffers of the church. He'd come to the attention of someone higher up in Russian mob circles, one of the rare Catholics in the system. He'd gone down almost immediately, though Nick tells me the man begged for his life the entire time.
Nick did not spare it.
I listened to the story without comment, knowing why Nick feels compelled to tell me these awful things about his past. I know he thinks he's not worthy of my love. I know this, and I never judge.
Nick was made into a creature of the Bratva system, a cold, emotionless killer who murders for money and thinks nothing of it.
Or so he'd have me believe. But my Nick, my Nikolai—he is not cold. He is not emotionless. And he thinks of his victims as he lies down to sleep next to me.
I can feel the tension in his big body as he pulls me against him in the darkness. It's nights like this, when he holds me so, so close, that I know he's tormented inside.
And it's on nights like this that I can show him just how much I care.
My hand strokes over his chest, over the motto there. Death is a mercy. "Do you still believe this?" I ask him.
His hand brushes over mine, caressing it, and then he presses my palm against his heart. "I think, for first time in my life, I am not sure."
This is an answer that pleases me. Nick has lived with absolutes for so long that I enjoy his uncertainty. It means his worldview is changing. It means that he's not entirely the creature that they made him to be.
I slide my hand out from his and caress his nipple, teasing the peak. I want to play with his body. "Are you tired?" I ask, and there is a husky tremor in my voice that has nothing to do with sleepiness.
His chuckle in the dark is soft. "Why do you ask?"
"I was thinking we could try out our new bed." I bite my lip and slide my hand down the flat planes of his stomach toward his cock. God, I love sex with Nick. It's always a mixture of rough intensity and infinite gentleness, and each time, it's like the first all over again.
"You are not tired?"
He's always so concerned about me. Like I am some fragile flower. Today was an exhausting day because of the move into our apartment, but I feel invigorated now that we are here, in our bed.
We are starting our new life together.
I want to start it right. So I slide my hand to his c*ck and caress the bulge there. He's already erect. My Nick needs no more than a hint of encouragement, and he's ready for sex. It makes me feel incredibly desirable to know that I can bring him to an intense erection with little more than a word or two. "I'm not tired," I tell him, and I add, "It seems like you're not very tired, either."
And I lean in and nip gently at the skin on his chest.
He groans, holding me closer to him. I know he loves it when I touch him. I move my mouth over his pectoral, kissing at the skin there, and then I graze my lips over his nipple.
I feel his body jolt in response, and then he's flipping me onto my back in the bed, taking control. "If my Daisy wants pleasure," he says, and his voice is a low, thickly accented thrum, "I will give it to her."
Excitement flares through me, and I wiggle with anticipation under him. I'm disappointed that it's so dark in the new apartment. I want to see his lean, tattooed body looming over mine. My hands reach for him, and I trail them along his skin even as he moves over me and begins to hike my sleep-shirt up over my torso. A second later, cool air kisses my br**sts, and then his mouth is on them, hot and hungry.
I gasp at the sensation of his teeth scraping at my n**ples, followed by his tongue as he soothes away the sting. Nick loves my br**sts, though they're not impressive by any means. He loves everything about me. He tongues my n**ples into hard peaks, leaving me gasping and moaning his name. My nails dig into his shoulders because I know he loves that—hints of roughness mixed with the tenderness.
"My Daisy," he groans, and he begins to kiss a trail down my belly. "Beautiful, precious, wondrous Daisy. I will never tire of your taste."
His sexy words make my pulse flutter hard, and my legs part in anticipation of what comes next.
Nick slides further down, until I can feel his hot breath on the vee of my sex. This is one of his favorite things—to lick my p**sy until I have at least one orgasm, sometimes two. Sometimes more. One night, he wanted to see how many times he could make me come, and he licked me until I was so tender that the merest flick of his tongue sent orgasmic shockwaves through my body. I walked funny for the next day.
He was very pleased with himself, then. He likes to make me mindless with passion. Like it is a reward.
I don't want endless hours of sexual teasing tonight, though. I want Nick inside me, his flesh pushing into mine. I want that rough, wild joining of our bodies, and I want it now. So I dig my nails in harder to let him know I am impatient.
"Mmm," he says in that husky voice. "Are you wet for me, dasha? I think I must taste and find out."
Surely he knows how wet I am right now? I can feel the slickness between my thighs as I squirm with anticipation, his breath heating me between my legs. But then his mouth dips, and I feel his tongue stroke against my clit.
All the breath shudders out of me. A sound escapes me, high and keening. I'll never get used to the sensation. Never.
Nor do I want to. It feels more intense, more magical every time.
Nick murmurs something in Russian, and then he's licking me harder, swiping his tongue from cl*t down to my cunt. He licks and sucks at my flesh until I am whimpering with need, the orgasm building in intensity. It's never quiet, easy, routine sex with Nick. It's always fireworks and explosions. I love that he's able to tease me so easily, and that he takes such pleasure in it.
My h*ps raise as his mouth works me toward my first orgasm of the night. I arch into his mouth as he sucks on my clit, reaching for that pleasure. My fingers dig in to his scalp as I hold his head there, in just the right spot. "Oh, Nikolai," I rasp. "Oh, yes! Nikolai!"
He loves it when I say his full name. I hear his feral growl and then he tongues me even more swiftly, with even more intensity.
I shatter, just as he intends, and I'm crying out his name as I cli**x from his mouth alone.
Then he's moving over me, his big body sliding over mine. I feel him fit his h*ps between my own, feel the press of his c*ck against my sex. I'm so ready for him that even though I just came, I want more. When his mouth presses to mine, I greedily suck on the tongue that slides between my lips, letting him know just how hungry I am for him.
"My Daisy," he says, his lips moving against my mouth. Then he sinks in to the hilt, spearing himself within me.
I gasp at the pleasure that radiates from his c*ck buried deep inside me, and I wrap my arms around his neck. I hold him close as he pumps furiously between my legs, bringing me to another shattering orgasm in mere minutes.
His follows close behind, and I hear him groan my name as he comes. I feel him quake, feel his come inside me. There are no condoms separating us; I'm on the pill…for now. When we're ready, we'll move forward, and I'll be Daisy Anders, wife to Nick Anders. And we'll have children. But for now, I must go slow with my Nick. He's so new to being loved at all that I want to enjoy this time between just us.
Nick collapses on top of me, his weight delicious, skin sticky with sweat. I stroke and pet his skin, knowing that he loves nothing more than being touched after sex. I wrap my legs around his and cling to him, like a spider monkey, because I love the weight of his body pressing into my own.
He rolls onto his side, but I don't let go; I simply burrow closer to him. "I love you, Nikolai." I say this every day, but I think he needs to hear it as often as possible.
His arms tighten around me. "Daisy," he murmurs. "My sweet, wonderful Daisy. I love you more than life itself." His hand smooths my hair, and I nuzzle his neck. I love this cuddling after sex. I'm so glad Nick isn't one of those men that rolls over and goes to sleep.
Tonight, though, he's pensive. He continues to stroke my hair for long minutes, silent. Eventually, though, he asks, "Do you regret your life with me, Daisy? With my stained hands? It is because of me you have killed a man. I have taken your innocence in all ways." He sounds sad.
"Never," I tell him fiercely. It is the truth. "It is because of you that I am free, Nick. That my father is free from fear." I lean in and kiss his beloved mouth. "It is because of you that I love and am loved in return."
"You are too good, my Daisy." His voice is thick with emotion. "How did I ever find myself so lucky as to have one such as you in my life?"