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“You’re tight.”

“Don’t say things like that when I’m trying to be quiet.”

His mouth touches the back of my neck. Then he moves.

Slow at first. Deep. Careful because of the shelves, because of the thin door, because anyone outside might hear if he lets go the way I can feel he wants to.

His thrusts remain controlled, but it still makes my palm curl around the shelf edge. Folded sheets brush my arm. His breath warms the side of my neck. My body takes him again and again, slick and aching and desperate for more than we can safely have.

“Harder,” I whisper before I can stop myself.

His hand tightens on my hip. “Elara.”

“Please.”

He groans very softly, then gives me what I ask for. The next thrust drives me forward onto my toes. I bite the exposed portion above his collar.

His hand comes over mine on the shelf, fingers threading through mine as he fucks me harder, still quiet, still controlled, but only just. The shelf trembles under my palms. Something small rolls behind a stack of towels. My heart nearly stops, but then his fingers slip between my thighs and find my clit, and I stop caring about anything except the pressure building in me.

“Nikolai,” I breathe.

His mouth is at my ear. “Quiet.”

“I can’t.”

“You can.” His fingers move faster.

I hate him a little for being right. I hate him more for knowing exactly how to touch me. My body tightens around him, pleasure rising so fast I have to bury my face against my arm and breathe through it.

He keeps thrusting, deep and steady, his cock filling me while his fingers work my clit. The room is too small, too hot, the air thick with the sound of our breathing and the wet slide of him inside me.

Then voices pass in the corridor.

I freeze. Nikolai stops immediately, buried deep.

His hand covers my mouth before I can make a sound. “Where is she?” Irina asks. “I swear I saw her—and Nikolai right here.”

“Obviously they’re not here anymore,” Galina replies.

My eyes go wide. Nikolai’s hand stays over my mouth. His body is still inside mine. I can feel him breathing against my back, feel the tension in every part of him as the voices pause too close to the door.

“Obviously,” Irina repeats. “I really wanted to talk to Nikolai before he leaves, but she’s got her palms dug deep into him. I just didn’t expect it to happen so fast.”

To Galina’s credit, she says nothing to that. “Will you be having your lunch here?”

“No,” Irina sniffs. “But I’ll be back later. Tell Nikolai I’m not done with him.”

Nikolai’s eyes close. I feel it more than see it, the way his forehead lowers to my shoulder and his control almost slips.

Don’t, his hand against my mouth seems to say.

I cannot help it.

The whole situation is too obscene, too risky, too much. I don’t think I can hold on anymore. Even though he’s not moving inside me anymore, my pussy continues to pulse around him, and I can tell it takes him a great deal of effort to control himself.

“Sure,” Galina replies and then I hear the voices fading.

My body doesn’t care about shame. It only cares about him. The voices move farther down the corridor.