The knock at her door came just after nine, a familiar three-beat pattern that made Mina's stomach drop before she'd even processed the sound. She was still in the tank top from last night—thin, gray, worn soft—and she'd barely run her fingers through her hair before pulling the door open.
Vlad stood in the frame, two paper cups in one hand, and her hoodie stretched across his shoulders like it belonged there.
The sight of him in her clothes—her small, soft hoodie straining against the width of his chest—sent a heat wave through her that had nothing to do with temperature. His dark hair was still damp, curling slightly at the temples, and his gray eyes swept over her face before dropping to her chest, where her nipples were already tight against the thin cotton.
"You forgot this," he said, but he didn't hand it over. He was wearing it.
She tried to form words. Failed. His mouth curved just slightly at the corner, and he lifted the cups in his hand.
"Coffee. You take it with cream and that vanilla sugar."
She nodded, still mute, and stepped back to let him in.
He moved past her, and she caught his scent—soap, clean sweat, the fabric softener she used on the hoodie that now smelled like him. He paused in her living room, looking around with that quiet, assessing gaze she'd seen him use on the ice before a play.
Her apartment felt suddenly small. The cluttered coffee table with her psychology textbook splayed open. The half-eaten bag of chips. The blanket bunched on the couch where she'd fallen asleep watching a documentary about penguins. She saw it all through his eyes and felt a flush creep up her neck.
He set the coffees on her kitchen counter and turned back to her, his brows pulling together in a frown that made her breath catch.
"You sleep okay?"
She opened her mouth to lie—yes, fine, great—but he was already moving, his hand lifting, his thumb brushing the skin just under her eye. The touch was featherlight, barely there, and it stole every word she had.
"You look tired," he said, and his voice was low, rougher than usual. "Dark circles, malyshka."
The ache in her chest sharpened into something unbearable. Brotherly. It's brotherly. He's being protective. She swallowed hard.
"Couldn't sleep," she admitted. "Just... thinking."
His thumb lingered, tracing the curve of her cheekbone, and she wanted to lean into it, to close her eyes, to let him hold her up. But he dropped his hand and looked past her toward the narrow hallway that led to her bedroom.
"You want to lay down?"
Her heart stopped. Then restarted at double speed.
"I—" She blinked. "What?"
"Together." He said it like it was the most natural thing in the world. "Take a nap. You need rest. I'll stay."
She stared at him. He stared back, patient, solid, completely unselfconscious. He genuinely did not see what he was offering. He was a man who saw a tired friend and had found a solution. Straightforward. Practical. Russian efficiency applied to emotional care.
"You want to nap," she said slowly, testing the words. "With me. In my bed."
His head tilted. "You don't want to?"
She wanted to scream. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to grab his face and kiss him until he understood exactly what he was doing to her. Instead, what came out was a breathless, "No—yes—I mean—" She took a breath. Closed her eyes. "Okay. Yeah. Let me..."
She turned and walked to her room, aware of every step, aware of the thin tank top and the way her thong rode above the waistband of her jeans. She heard his footsteps behind her, heavy and steady, and she had to grip the doorframe to steady herself.
Her room was a disaster. Clothes on the chair. A water glass on the nightstand. The sheets twisted from a restless night. She stood in the middle of the floor, suddenly frozen, as he stepped past her and looked at her bed.
"Twin," he said. Not accusatory. Just observational.
"I'm short. It works."
He turned to her, and the corner of his mouth lifted again. "Not for me."
She watched him kick off his shoes—scuffed sneakers that looked too big for her floor—and sit on the edge of her mattress. The bed groaned under his weight, and he lay back, his head hitting her pillow, his legs still bent over the edge.
He looked at her expectantly. "Come."
She couldn't move. He was in her bed. Her bed. The thought was so large, so bright, that it blotted out everything else.
His gray eyes found hers, and his expression softened. "Mina. Come here."
Her body moved before her brain caught up. She crossed the room, climbed onto the narrow mattress, and hovered, uncertain. The twin bed left almost no room for maneuvering. She was either going to hang off the edge or...
His hands found her waist.
Warm. Broad. He pulled her sideways, and she collapsed against his side, her head landing on his chest, his arm coming around her back. She didn't fit. She was too long for the bed with him there, and they both knew it the second he adjusted, tugging her higher until she was almost draped across him.
"Better," he said, his voice vibrating through his ribs against her ear.
She could feel everything. The hard planes of his chest under the hoodie. The slow, steady thud of his heart. The warmth of his hands, one splayed across her lower back, fingers toying with the hem of her tank top, the other resting heavy on her waist.
Her body was screaming at her. He's right here. He's touching you. He's in your bed.
And then his hand moved lower.
His fingers brushed the lace of her thong, where it peaked above her jeans, and she heard him make a sound—a low, interested hum. His thumb hooked the elastic, tugged it gently, let it snap back against her skin.
She inhaled sharply.
"Hm." He did it again. "This is the same as last night. The lace thing."
"Thong," she whispered into his chest.
"Thong," he repeated, like he was tasting the word. "It's a strange design. Not much fabric."
"That's kinda the point."
He hummed again, and his hand settled lower, thumb tracing the edge of the elastic, not quite sliding under it, just... exploring. "Feels nice. Soft."
She could not breathe. Could not form a coherent thought. She was lying on top of Vladimir Rosanov in her tiny twin bed, his hands on her waist, her skin burning under his touch, and he was talking about her underwear like he was analyzing a new piece of equipment.
"You wear them a lot," he said. It wasn't a question.
"Yeah."
"I like them."
Her heart stopped. "You—what?"
"The fabric." His thumb pressed lightly, tracing the curve of her hip. "It's nice to touch."
She wanted to cry. She wanted to kiss him. She wanted to ask him if he had any idea what he was doing to her, but she already knew the answer. He didn't. He was lying in her bed, holding her like she was precious, playing with her thong like it was a fidget toy, and he had no idea that she was falling apart in his arms.
She closed her eyes and let herself sink into him.
His hand stilled on her waist. "That's it," he said softly. "Rest."
She felt his lips brush her hair. Just once. Light. Innocent. The way you'd kiss a child goodnight.
The ache swelled behind her ribs, bright and painful and beautiful. She pressed her face into the hollow of his throat and breathed him in.
Minutes passed. Or hours. Time lost meaning in the warm dark of her room, with his heartbeat under her ear and his hands heavy and safe on her body. She felt herself drifting, the edges of her thoughts going soft and blurry.
And then, just before she slipped under, she heard his voice, low and wondering:
"Your bed is very small."
A laugh bubbled up from her chest, muffled against his neck. "You're very large."
"Hm." His arm tightened around her. "Maybe we should fix this."
She didn't know what he meant—fix the bed, fix the size difference, fix the space between them that she felt every time she looked at him. She didn't ask. She was too afraid of the answer.
But his hand kept tracing the lace at her hip, a soft, repetitive motion, and she fell asleep to the feel of it, warm and steady, like she was the ocean and he was the tide.
When her breathing went soft and even, Vlad stopped moving his hand.
He lay still beneath her, feeling the weight of her body—light, so light, like she might float away if he let go. Her breath warmed his collarbone through the collar of the hoodie. Her fingers were curled loose over his stomach, trusting, unguarded.
He looked at the ceiling. A water stain. A crack running from the corner to the light fixture. He wondered when she'd noticed it, if it kept her up at night, if she'd told her landlord. He could fix it. He knew how to patch drywall.
The thought settled in his chest, warm and unfamiliar.
You could fix things for her.
He pushed it away. She was his friend. A good friend. A sweet girl who wore too-small beds and lace underwear and blushed when he looked at her too long. She was shy. He was protective. That was simple.
He tugged the blanket up with his free hand, covering her shoulders where the tank top had slipped. Her skin was cool. His fingers brushed the nape of her neck, and she sighed in her sleep, pressing closer.
His chest ached.
He ignored it.
He closed his eyes and let himself feel the soft rhythm of her breathing against him, the small space of her room, the quiet hum of the fridge in the kitchen. He let himself stay.
He didn't have to think about what it meant.
He just had to be here.
His hand found the lace again, thumb tracing the edge, and he listened to her breathe until the sound pulled him into the dark, warm shape of sleep.
Sleep came like a slow tide, pulling him under in layers. The weight of Mina against his chest. The soft rhythm of her breath against his throat. The warm, cramped dark of her room, with its water stain and its crack in the ceiling and its faint smell of her shampoo sunk into every surface.
He dreamed of ice. The clean scrape of a blade. The thud of a puck against the boards. A crowd roaring somewhere far away, like static on a radio. He was skating, or trying to—his legs felt heavy, slow, like he was moving through honey. The ice beneath him was wrong. Too soft. Too warm.
And then Mina was there, standing at center ice in that thin gray tank top, her hair loose and dark around her shoulders. She was saying something, her mouth moving, but he couldn't hear her over the static. He tried to get closer, but the ice kept softening under his weight, sucking at his blades, pulling him down.
He reached for her.
His hands found something solid. Warm. Curved.
The dream shifted, darkening at the edges, and his fingers flexed, gripping the shape beneath them. It fit in his palms like it belonged there. Heavy and full and soft under the thin layer of denim. He pressed his thumbs into it, spreading, testing the give of the flesh beneath the fabric.
In his sleep, he pulled her closer.
His hands worked on their own, finding the twin curves of her ass through her jeans, cupping them, squeezing. The denim was rough under his fingers, but underneath it he could feel the lace of her thong, the narrow strip cutting between her cheeks, and something in his chest went loose and satisfied at the discovery.
He kneaded the flesh in his palms. Hard. Possessive. His fingers dug into the meat of her ass, spreading her apart through the denim, holding her open like he was testing how far she could go. The seams of her jeans pulled tight. The lace of her thong strained.
Mina made a sound in her sleep. Small. Breathless. Her hips shifted against him, not pulling away but pressing closer, like her body knew what it wanted even if her mind was still under.
His hands tightened again. Squeezing. Spreading. The heels of his palms ground against her flesh, and he felt the give of muscle and fat beneath the denim, the soft resistance of her body as he pressed her open. His fingers curled into the crease where her thighs met her ass, thumbs tracing the seam of her jeans where they pulled tight across the center of her.
She was small in his hands. Everything about her was small—her waist, her wrists, the narrow bed they barely fit in. But her ass was full, generous, filling his palms like it was made to be held, and he held it. Hard. His fingers left prints in the denim.
The dream shifted again. The ice was gone. The crowd was gone. There was only warmth and pressure and the shape of her body under his hands, and he groaned low in his throat, a sound he didn't hear, pulling her flush against him, his cock stirring against the curve of her hip through layers of fabric.
Mina's breath caught. Her eyes opened.
Darkness. The familiar shape of her ceiling. The weight of him underneath her, his chest rising and falling in the slow rhythm of sleep. And between her legs, pressing against the soaked fabric of her thong, the insistent shape of his arousal—half-hard, thick, unmistakable even through layers.
But that wasn't what woke her.
It was his hands.
Both of them, palm-full and greedy, wrapped around her ass like he was claiming it. Squeezing. Spreading. His fingers kneaded the flesh through her jeans, and she could feel the pressure building between her legs, the ache where the denim pulled tight against her cunt, the thong riding up as his thumbs worked the seam apart.
She went rigid.
Every nerve in her body fired at once. Her breath stopped. Her fingers curled into the fabric of the hoodie she'd given him, and she lay frozen, suspended in the impossible reality of what was happening.
He's asleep. He's dreaming. He doesn't know what he's doing.
His hands squeezed again. Harder this time. She felt her cheeks give under the pressure, felt the denim pull taut across her thighs, and she bit her lip so hard she tasted copper.
He was strong. She'd always known that, intellectually—she'd seen him check guys into the boards, seen his body in the weight room, seen the way his arms strained the sleeves of his jerseys. But she'd never felt it. Not like this. Not with his hands wrapped around her like she was something he owned, something he could shape and press and hold however he wanted.
Her body responded before her brain caught up. Her hips rocked back, pressing into his hands, and she heard herself make a sound—a broken little whimper that she swallowed against his chest.
His thumbs pressed deeper. The denim strained. She felt the seam dig into her, felt the lace of her thong cut between her cheeks as his hands spread her open, and she had to clench her jaw to keep from crying out.
A dream. It was just a dream. He didn't know.
But her body knew. Her body was awake and aching and pressing back against his hands like it had been waiting for this all along.
She could feel everything. The calluses on his palms. The way his fingers curled into the meat of her ass, gripping like he was afraid she'd disappear. The slow, rhythmic squeeze and release, squeeze and release, like he was petting her, like he was soothing himself with the feel of her in his hands.
And the other thing. The thing pressing against her hip. Getting harder.
Her entire face burned. She pressed her forehead into the hollow of his throat and breathed him in—soap, sweat, the fabric softener she used on the hoodie—and tried to decide if she was going to wake him up or lie here and die of want.
His hands kept moving.
One slid lower, curving under the swell of her ass, fingers pressing into the crease where her thigh met her cheek. The other stayed on the full curve, gripping, spreading, his thumb tracing the seam of her jeans where it ran between her legs.
She was soaked. She could feel the dampness of her thong against her skin, the slick heat pooling between her thighs, and she pressed them together instinctively, trying to ease the ache.
The movement made him groan in his sleep. His hips bucked against her, and she felt the full length of him against her thigh—thick and hot—and she had to bite her lip again, harder, to keep from making a sound.
He doesn't know. He doesn't know. He doesn't know.
She chanted it in her head, a desperate mantra against the rising tide of her own want. He was dreaming. He was holding her in his sleep. He had no idea his hands were on her ass, squeezing and spreading like he was claiming territory, his body pressed against hers, his cock hard against her hip.
And she had no idea what he was dreaming about.
The thought sent a lance of heat through her belly. Was he dreaming of her? Of someone else? Of an abstract shape that happened to be her body, warm and soft and convenient? She didn't know. She couldn't know. He was a closed door she couldn't open, and the not-knowing was a knife in her chest, sharp and sweet and unbearable.
But his hands stayed. His grip didn't loosen. His fingers kept working her flesh through the denim, pressing, spreading, holding her open like he was memorizing the shape of her, and she let him.
She stopped fighting it.
She went slack against him, her breath evening out into something that wasn't quite sleep but wasn't quite awake either. She floated in the warm dark of her room, feeling his hands on her, feeling the slow pulse of his heartbeat under her ear, the steady rise and fall of his chest.
His thumb slipped, just barely, pressing between her cheeks through the denim, and she gasped—a soft, sharp sound that she couldn't suppress. Her hips jerked against him, and his hand adjusted, cupping her ass fully, pulling her tighter against him, his cock pressing into the cradle of her thighs.
"Mina," he breathed.
Her heart stopped.
Her name. In his sleep. Rugged and soft, the same way he said it when he was awake, but different—underneath it, something raw. Something that sounded like mine.
She lifted her head, just enough to see his face in the dim light filtering through her curtains. His features were relaxed in sleep, jaw loose, mouth slightly parted. But his brow was furrowed, like he was chasing something in the dark of his own mind, and his hands were still moving, still gripping, still working the flesh of her ass like it was the most important thing in the world.
"Vlad," she whispered. Testing. "Vlad, can you hear me?"
No response. His breath even. His grip unrelenting.
She let her head fall back to his chest. Her eyes closed. Her body surrendered to the weight of his hands, to the press of his arousal against her thigh, to the warm, impossible fact that he was here, in her bed, holding her like she was something precious even in his sleep.
She didn't know how long she lay there. Minutes. An hour. Time melted into the rhythm of his breathing and the steady pressure of his fingers on her flesh. She drifted in and out of a half-sleep, her body attuned to every micro-movement he made—the way his grip tightened when she shifted, the way his hips rolled against her when she pressed closer, the low, satisfied sound he made when she settled against him.
And then, slowly, his grip began to loosen.
His fingers relaxed. His palms flattened against her cheeks. The pressure eased from a possessive squeeze to a gentle hold, and then, finally, to stillness.
She waited. Her breath held. Her heart hammering.
His hands slid up her back, slow and wandering, like they were searching for something. They found the hem of her tank top and slipped under it, palm-flat against the bare skin of her lower back. His fingers traced her spine, one vertebra at a time, from the base up to her shoulder blades, and she shivered under the touch.
Still asleep. Still dreaming.
His hands moved in patterns she couldn't follow. Up her back, down her sides. Across her ribs, the tips of his fingers brushing the underwire of her bra. He didn't linger there—he moved on, mapping her body like he was learning it by touch alone, his brow smoothing out as he settled deeper into the geography of her.
And then his hands found her waist.
He traced the curve of it, thumbs pressing lightly into the soft skin above her hip bones, and she felt his breath hitch—just once, a tiny catch in the rhythm of his sleep. His hands measured her, spanning the narrow width of her torso, and he made a sound in his throat that she couldn't read.
Then his arms tightened around her, pulling her flush against him, and he held her there, pressed into the curve of his body like she was a puzzle piece that finally fit.
"Malyshka," he murmured. The word was slurred with sleep, barely audible, but she heard it. She heard every syllable, every consonant softened by the dark and the warmth and the weight of her against him.
A sob caught in her throat. She forced it down.
He doesn't know.
But her heart knew. Her heart was a wild, reckless thing in her chest, throwing itself against her ribs, screaming at her to tell him, tell him, make him see—and she pressed her lips together and stayed silent, because losing this would break her, and she wasn't ready to be broken.
She would take his hands on her ass in the dark. She would take his murmured name in his sleep. She would take every stolen, impossible moment, and she would hoard them like treasure, because this was all she got, and she would make it enough.
She pressed a kiss to the hollow of his throat. Soft. Silent. A secret pressed into his skin.
His arm tightened around her. His hand settled on her lower back, fingers splayed, heavy and warm.
And they stayed like that, tangled together in the narrow twin bed, as the light through her curtains shifted from gray to gold, and the radiator hissed its dry, metallic rhythm, and the world outside kept turning while theirs stopped at the edges of this small, perfect room.The prose continues in the same intimate register, staying in the moment as Mina processes what just happened and Vlad remains asleep. The beat of Vlad's hands finding her ass in his sleep is fully delivered—the grabbing, squeezing, spreading—and rendered through Mina's experience of it. Now the scene needs to continue forward from this new threshold of unconscious intimacy. Let me think about what comes next: Vlad waking up, the conversation or non-conversation about it, and the story turn. The author's constraints require Vlad to remain oblivious. So when he wakes, he can't realize the significance of what his hands were doing. He might wake with his hands still on her, but interpret it as a natural sleeping position—holding her, being comfortable. The turn could be that the physical closeness deepens unconsciously, and Mina has to live with the secret knowledge of what he did in his sleep, unsure if it means anything or if it was just random dream movement
She must have slept. She didn't remember the moment it happened—the soft fall from half-awake into true rest—but she woke to a shift beneath her, the deep muscle movement of his chest rising with a long, slow breath, and she knew he was surfacing too.
The light was different now. Brighter. Golden. Late morning, maybe early afternoon. The radiator had gone quiet, and the only sound was his breathing, slow and even, beginning to change rhythm as consciousness pulled at him.
She stayed still. Held her breath. Watched his face.
His eyelids flickered. His jaw shifted. A long blink, slow and heavy, and then his gray eyes opened—unfocused for a moment, soft with the residue of sleep, searching the unfamiliar ceiling above him.
He blinked again. His gaze traveled down, found her face, and a slow warmth spread through his expression. The corner of his mouth lifted.
"Hi," she whispered.
"Hi." His voice was ruined—low and rough, scraped clean by sleep. He cleared his throat. "What time is it?"
"No idea." She didn't move. Couldn't. His hands were still on her, one flat against her lower back, the other draped over her hip, heavy and casual. "Past noon, maybe."
He hummed. His fingers flexed against her skin, a reflexive movement, and she felt the echo of his earlier grip—the memory of his hands on her ass, squeezing, spreading, holding her open under the denim. The heat of it rushed back, and she pressed her thighs together under the blanket.
He didn't notice. He was looking at her ceiling now, at the crack running from the corner to the light fixture. "You should get that fixed."
"The crack?"
"Mm." His thumb traced a slow arc across her hip bone. "Water damage. It'll get worse."
"I'll mention it to my landlord."
"Landlords don't fix things." He said it with the flat certainty of someone who had learned the lesson the hard way. "I can do it."
Her heart clenched. "You don't have to—"
"I know." His hand stilled. "I can."
The words hung between them, simple and solid, and she didn't know what to do with them. He was offering to fix her ceiling. To patch a crack she'd stopped noticing months ago. To take care of something small and broken in the space where she lived, because that was who he was—a man who saw a problem and found a solution, who didn't think twice about using his hands to make things right.
She swallowed hard. "Okay."
His gaze slid back to her, and she caught the ghost of a smile before it faded. "Your bed is still very small."
A laugh escaped her, rusty and surprised. "You keep saying that."
"Because it keeps being true." He shifted beneath her, testing the dimensions of the mattress with a subtle roll of his shoulders. "My feet hung off the end."
"I noticed."
"You didn't say anything."
"You were asleep. I figured I'd let you suffer in silence."
His chest vibrated with a low chuckle. "Kind."
"I try."
They were quiet for a moment, lying in the golden light, her body draped across his like she belonged there. His hand moved again, rubbing a slow circle into the small of her back, and she felt the tension in her shoulders ease at the touch.
"You slept good?" he asked.
She thought about his hands. His fingers pressing into her flesh. The way he'd whispered her name in his sleep. The hard press of his arousal against her thigh.
"Yeah," she said. "Really good."
"Good." He said it like it mattered. Like her answer was something he'd been waiting for without knowing it. "You needed it."
"How long were you out?"
He considered. "Came in at nine. It's..." He turned his head, squinting at the window. "Maybe one. Two."
"You slept for four hours in my tiny bed?"
"Apparently."
"On top of your friend."
"You're very comfortable." He said it simply, like it was a fact—like the weight of her body on his chest was no different from the weight of a good pillow or a well-worn sweater. "Also, you were warm."
"I run hot."
"You were also not letting go."
Her cheeks flamed. "I—"
"I'm not complaining." His hand slid up her back, fingers brushing the nape of her neck, and she shivered. "It was nice. Like having a blanket that breathes."
"A breathing blanket."
"A very pretty one."
Her brain short-circuited. He said things like that—casual, offhand, with no apparent awareness of what they did to her—and she was left scrambling to catch up. Pretty. He called me pretty. As a blanket. A pretty blanket that breathes.
She pressed her face into his chest to hide the blush he couldn't see.
His hand found her hair, fingers threading through the dark strands, stroking in long, slow pulls that made her want to purr. "We should eat," he said. "You have food?"
"Some."
"I'll make you something."
"You don't have to keep feeding me."
"I want to."
The words landed in her chest like stones dropped into still water. She lifted her head, searching his face for any sign that he understood what he was saying, what he was doing to her. His gray eyes were clear and calm, steady as they met hers, and there was nothing there but warmth. Simple. Uncomplicated.
He had no idea.
"Come," he said, and his hands moved to her waist, lifting her off his chest with an effortless strength that made her stomach flip. "Let's see what you have."
He sat up, and she slid off him, landing on the mattress beside him. The loss of his warmth hit her immediately—the absence of his chest under her cheek, his arms around her, the steady thud of his heart against her ear. She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to hold onto the feeling.
He stood, stretching, his back to her. The hoodie rode up, exposing a strip of skin above his waistband, and she watched the muscles in his lower back shift as he raised his arms over his head. The ink on his forearms rippled. The hoodie pulled tight across his shoulders.
He looked back at her, caught her staring, and lifted an eyebrow.
She looked away so fast she nearly gave herself whiplash. "Kitchen's through the hall," she said, her voice too high. "Left at the bathroom."
He chuckled. Soft. Warm. "I remember."
She heard his footsteps retreat, heavy and sure, padding down the narrow hallway. The creak of her kitchen floorboards. The clink of a cabinet door opening.
She pressed her hands to her burning cheeks and tried to remember how to breathe.
Her phone buzzed on the nightstand. She grabbed it, grateful for the distraction, and saw Dmitri's name on the screen.
So. How's the nap going?
She stared at the text. Her thumbs hovered over the keyboard. She typed: How do you know about the nap?
The response came almost immediately. Mina. It's been four hours. He hasn't answered anyone. You haven't answered anyone. The math is not hard.
She let out a breath that was half laugh, half sob. He's making me food now.
Making you food. In your kitchen. After a four-hour nap in your bed.
Yes.
And he still doesn't know.
No.
A long pause. Three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.
He's going to figure it out eventually, you know. A man doesn't spend four hours in a girl's twin bed making her breakfast without something clicking.
She looked toward the hallway, where the sounds of kitchen activity drifted through her apartment. The fridge opening. The tap running. The low rumble of him humming something she didn't recognize.
You don't know him like I do, she typed. He thinks I'm a friend. A shy friend he has to protect.
And his hands on your ass?
Her fingers froze. She stared at the words, her heart suddenly pounding, cold and hot at the same time. She hadn't told Dmitri about the party. About the thong. About the way Vlad touched her in his sleep, casual and possessive, like he owned every inch of her.
She typed carefully: What about his hands on my ass?
Don't play dumb. I saw him at the party. His hand was in your waistband for half the movie. He either knows exactly what he's doing, or he's the most oblivious man on the planet.
Relief flooded through her, so sharp it made her dizzy. He was talking about the party. The movie. Not about this morning. Not about the way Vlad had squeezed her in his sleep, spread her open, pressed his hardness against her like a brand.
The second one, she wrote. Definitely the second one.
Jesus, Mina. A pause. You really have it bad.
She looked at the words. Felt the truth of them in her chest—heavy and aching and bright. I know, she typed. I know.
From the kitchen, Vlad's voice called out, muffled by distance: "Mina. You like your eggs scrambled or fried?"
She looked up, toward the sound of him in her space, making her food, wearing her hoodie. The word caught in her throat—tender and raw and too huge to contain.
"Surprise me," she called back.
She heard him hum in acknowledgment, followed by the crack of an egg against a bowl, and she pressed her phone to her chest, closed her eyes, and let the feeling wash over her—the impossible, unbearable sweetness of wanting someone who had no idea they were already hers.