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  Kat couldn’t allow herself to be reduced to that now-familiar puddle of need; this really was too important. “What do you want from me, Dair?” she spoke softly, aware—so very aware—of the warm, intoxicating smell of his body. That incredibly hard and muscled body she knew better than her own. “A few days, maybe a week, of more amazing sex before you fly me back to England and forget about me?”

  The sex really was incredible, Dair acknowledged with satisfaction. Off-the-charts amazing. Better than anything he had ever known before. Kat was more woman than any he had ever known before.

  “The amazing sex will do for starters—”

  “No,” Kat choked in denial. “No, it really won’t, Dair.” She ducked beneath his arm and stepped away from him. “I thank you for the offer, and I’ll always remember you made it and our time together, but I’ll only let you break my heart once in a lifetime!”

  Dair turned slowly to face her, a frown between his eyes. “When did I break your heart?”

  Tears swam in Kat’s eyes even as she smiled. “I know you were barely aware of my existence all those years ago, but I loved you. And then you just disappeared.”

  His frown grew pained. “I’ve explained why that was.” Kat had been in love with him then? She had told him it was just a teenage crush, one she had easily gotten over years ago. Hell, she had been fifteen years old to his eighteen; how the hell was he supposed to know that those dark eyes that followed him around were full of love?

  And she was wrong about him—he had been very much aware of Katya Markovic’s existence. She had been that shining light in a world of violence. Innocence and sunshine. He couldn’t claim to have spent the past fifteen years pining for her, but he had never forgotten her either. It was the reason he had agreed when Gregori had asked him to find her and bring her home, if necessary.

  This completely adult Kat was no longer innocent, of course, but Dair liked that. He liked it a lot. And she was still light and sunshine to him.

  So bite the bullet, Dair. Do it, or lose her, the best damned thing that had ever happened to him.

  He straightened his shoulders, as if still in the military. Or as if preparing for a blow. “I realized something earlier today,” his voice came out abruptly, harshly.

  Kat smiled ruefully. “The sky is blue? The world is round? Do share this epiphany!”

  “Don’t get lippy with me, Katya!” he growled in warning.

  “Why not?” she came back challengingly. “Are you going to put me over your knee and spank me again if I don’t behave, with my big brother just on the other side of that door?”

  “If I thought you deserved it I’d do it while Gregori was in the same fucking room!” he warned.

  “Then what’s stopping you?” Kat met his gaze defiantly.

  Dair gave a groan, not sure he would ever be able to spank that delicious ass again, even during love play. He loved this woman too damn much to ever want to do anything to hurt her. Maybe if Kat begged him to spank that ripe little ass…? Hell, yeah, that might work. Might work? Dair had a feeling he was never going to be able to deny this woman anything, ever again. Whatever Kat wanted from him, she could have.

  Pitiful.

  Yes—and also the best feeling he had ever known.

  “You are, Kat.” Dair stalked towards her, giving a hard grin as she instinctively stepped backwards, the backs of her knees coming into contact with the bed, causing her to stumble and fall back onto it.

  “Me?” Kat echoed, scrambling back on the bed as Dair just kept coming towards her.

  She had absolutely no idea what Dair was doing. She had just given him the perfect way out of this awkward situation, so why wasn’t he taking it?

  “You.” He stalked across the bed on all fours, just like the predator he was. “If you ask me nicely, maybe on birthdays and anniversaries, then I might be persuaded into giving that delicious ass of yours a sound spanking. Otherwise—”

  “You conceited ass!” Kat held her hands up to keep him at bay. “If you think I’m ever going to— Anniversaries?” She stilled, eyeing him warily. “What anniversaries? Are you talking about Easter? Maybe even Christmas too?” That was months away, and sounded a little too long-term in connection with Dair.

  Dair gave a shake of his head. “Weddings. Or rather, wedding,” he added firmly, directly over Kat now, his hands resting on the bed just above her shoulders, his knees on either side of her thighs, trapping her beneath him. “If you had allowed me to finish earlier, Katya Markovic, then you would already know that what I discovered earlier today is that I love you.” It was the first time, ever, that Dair had said those words, to anyone.

  And he liked saying them to Kat.

  “I love you,” he said it again, savoring it, tasting it, as he loved to savor and taste all of Kat. “And I’m no longer asking, I’m telling you that the two of us are going back to Venice, today, and I’m keeping you as my sex-slave in my palace until you learn to love me again. Understand?”

  Oh Kat understood him. Perfectly. She just couldn’t believe Dair was saying these things to her. Love? A wedding, and anniversaries? They were words she had never thought she’d hear from those chiseled and sensuous lips.

  She moistened her own lips with the tip of her tongue, instantly aware of Dair’s eyes darkening as they followed the movement. “What happens if I don’t?”

  “I told you.” His lips now nuzzled against her throat, the rasp of his tongue seeking out the dips and hollows. “We’re staying in Venice until you do.”

  “That could take months. Years.”

  “We have months, Kat. Years,” Dair dismissed huskily as he gave a warning nip of her earlobe with his teeth.

  Just days ago Kat had been strapped to a chair, staring out of a window at the freedom outside, with no hope, no expectations, and now this!

  It was too much.

  She burst into noisy tears.

  Dair raised his head in alarm, cursing himself for being a first-class idiot as he saw the tears flowing down Kat’s cheeks. “Oh God, don’t cry, Kat.” He gently cupped her cheek, smoothing away the flow of those tears with the pads of his thumbs. “I’m sorry. Please stop. God, I am such a stupid bastard…” he muttered in self-disgust. “Talking about keeping you locked away in my palace as a sex-slave, after all that you’ve been through. Of course I won’t keep you there against your will. I—I’ll court you in the old-fashioned way,” he promised desperately as those tears showed no signs of stopping. “Dates. Flowers. Chocolates. I’ll even dress up in that damned tux occasionally if it makes you happy.”

  Nothing he said seemed to stop the flow of those tears.

  Because she doesn’t want you, you stupid bastard. You rescued her, she was grateful, and that’s all this was. All it could ever be to Kat. And that simply wasn’t enough for him anymore.

  Dair rolled away from her to sit on the side of the bed. “That was out of line, Kat. Forget I said—” He broke off his apology as he felt Kat’s arms steal about his waist, the damp heat of her cheek now pressing against his back.

  He placed his much larger hands over the tops of hers, wondering if this was the last time she would touch him intimately. If he would one day have to stand back and watch her touching another man like this. Someone like Lijah, who she seemed to like and trust.

  No.

  There was no fucking way—

  His breath arrested in his throat as Kat pushed his T-shirt up his back, his heart pumping loudly in his chest as he felt the soft touch of her lips against his scar.

  “I’m not going to fall in love with you again, Dair.”

  His chest tightened painfully. “I know I’ve been hard on you the past few days,” he acknowledged huskily. “But I can be gentle too, Kat—” He broke off as she gave a throaty chuckle. “Okay, so maybe I can’t,” he accepted heavily, knowing that he only had to touch Kat for his control to break. “But I could try, damn it!”

  “Dair, I’m not going to fall in love with you
again—”

  “You already said that once!” He scowled darkly.

  “—because I’m already in love with you,” Kat continued as if he hadn’t spoken. “I love you, Dair.” Her arms tightened about his waist as she placed her cheek against the bareness of his back. “I fell in love with you when I was fifteen years old, and I only had to see you again, be with you again, to know that I never stopped.”

  Dair gave a low, heartfelt groan of thanks before turning to take Kat in his arms, crushing her against his chest, never wanting, never intending, to let her go ever again.

  Chapter 17

  Palace Bellini, Venice

  Four months later

  “What the fu—! I know I told you not to climb up any ladders when I wasn’t here!” Dair dropped the pastries he had been out to buy for their breakfast before he crossed the room in two long strides and lifted Kat off the ladder and into the safety of his arms.

  Kat smiled up at him, eyes glowing with love as she kissed the disapproving line of his lips. “Open up, Dair,” she encouraged throatily as his lips remained stubbornly closed.

  “Absolutely not.” He carried her out of the room and down the hallway to their bedroom. “Not until you promise me you won’t do that again. Well?” He looked down at her sternly as he stood beside their bed.

  She looked up at him beneath the dark sweep of her lashes. “What do I get if I don’t promise?”

  “A sore backside!”

  “Oh well, in that case…”

  He gave a rueful shake of his head. “I told you there’s going to be no more spanking for some months. No more sex either if you don’t give me your promise about the ladder,” he added challengingly.

  Kat pouted up at him. “You’re just being mean now.”

  “What’s it going to be, Kat?” Dair remained adamant. “Your promise or no more sex.”

  Kat pretended to give the options some thought, when in reality there was no contest.

  She was four months pregnant—so much for thinking she wouldn’t become pregnant from just one night of unprotected sex!—and her hormones were raging out of control. She had wanted—craved—Dair before, but now she was insatiable. The two of them spent half the morning in bed together making love, and again during afternoon siesta, and again at night when they went to bed.

  Despite what he said, she didn’t believe that Dair would willingly give that up either. “A gentle spanking isn’t going to hurt me,” she wheedled; she loved it when Dair laid those big hands on her bottom.

  The past four months had been the happiest of Kat’s life, Dair having wasted no time, once assured that Kat really did love him—several hours of heated lovemaking had convinced him, and the men in the main cabin be damned—in arranging for the two of them to be married. As Kat had never been legally married to Sergei there was nothing to stop them.

  Sergei…

  The only discordant note in the past four months had been news of Sergei’s death. He had been found shot and floating in the Hudson during the early, dangerous, stage of her pregnancy, and Dair had been reluctant to tell her. But as they now told each other everything…

  Dair pretty much ran his security company from here nowadays, no longer active, but more in the role as liaison for any missions he needed to send his men on.

  Kat had felt only a pang of regret at hearing of Sergei’s demise, and that was for a life wasted, rather than any feelings for the man she had once thought of as her husband.

  Once Dair had assured her that he wasn’t responsible for having Sergei killed, the two of them had speculated as to whether Ivan or Gregori had been behind it. Ivan, because his son was now a threat to his place at the head of the Orlov family rather than an asset, and Gregori’s reasons were obvious.

  In the end Kat and Dair had decided they didn’t need to know who was responsible. That part of Kat’s life was well and truly over, the book firmly closed. She was too busy being happy with Dair to spare any lingering regrets for the man who had tried to kill her.

  She never would have guessed that Dair would turn into a doting and indulgent husband and father-to-be.

  Sometimes Kat was so filled with happiness, just from being with him, she felt as if she might burst.

  She gave him another seductive smile. “I was only trying to finish that last bit of painting in the nursery—”

  “You were deliberately disobeying me.” He looked down at her sternly. “As I can no longer spank you I may as well make love to you instead—but don’t think for one minute that I’m not storing all these misdemeanors up for after the baby’s born, because I am!” he warned.

  “Oh goody!” She grinned unabashedly.

  “You’re incorrigible!”

  “Where you’re concerned, I am,” she agreed happily.

  “Insatiable witch!” he murmured in satisfaction as he lay Kat down on the bed before joining her.

  “And you love me for it!” Kat chuckled throatily, now knowing her husband’s bite was definitely worse than his bark, in the most pleasurable way possible.

  Dair loved everything about Kat, every moment of every single day and night. His heart was so full of love for her that he couldn’t imagine how he had ever thought his life was worth a shit without her.

  The answer was, it hadn’t been.

  In Kat, in being with her, he had at last found the reason for pulling back from actively being involved in the security company that had once meant so much to him.

  This, being with Kat, and the baby they were expecting, was truly living.

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  About The Author

  Carole Mortimer is a USA Today Bestselling Author and recipient of a Pioneer for Romance Romantic Times Award in 2014. She was recognized by Queen Elizabeth II in 2012 for her ‘outstanding service to literature’. Shadow Alpha is Carole’s 200th novel.

  She is happily married to Peter. They have 6 sons, and live on the beautiful Isle of Man. She also loves to hear from Readers!

  Other books by Carole Mortimer

  Carole has written 173 romance novels in the Presents/Modern series from Harlequin Mills and Boon.

  She has also written 24 Regency romance novels in the Harlequin Mills and Boon’s Historical series.

  ALPHA series:

  Christmas Alpha: Novella, published November 8th, 2014

  Dark Alpha: Full-length novel, published January 18th, 2015

  Shadow Alpha: Full-length novel, published March 15th, 2015

  Midnight Alpha: Full length novel, Preorder March 8th, publishing date May 17th, 2015

  Renegade Alpha: Full length novel, publishing July 2015

  Warrior Alpha: Full length novel, publishing September 2015