The Player (The Game Maker 3)

At the end of his hour, Dmitri had looked at my purchases. "I need you to feel comfortable spending more."

"I don't think that's possible." He was no longer a mark I planned to fleece. Had he achieved pack status in my heart yet? No. But he could.

He'd pulled up a spreadsheet on his computer, highlighting a sum. "What we make annually on the patents alone."

I'd squinted. The length of that number couldn't be right. I'd rechecked it, but the figure remained unimaginable. "Need . . . to sit . . . down."

He'd helped me back to the couch. "I want us to spend our lives trying to kill our fortune--no matter how impossible a prospect that might be. Will you try to do better tomorrow? Endeavor to shock me."

The next day, I'd cracked my knuckles before hitting the computer. I'd purchased cars, wardrobes, jewelry, and thirty cruise tickets. I'd set up a college fund for Cash and bought my parents authentic fine art. Again, I'd shown Dmitri my take (without the mountain bike and gifts I'd secretly ordered for him).

He'd said, "More income came in overnight. You didn't even scratch the surface. Perhaps tomorrow you will be more aggressive. . . ."

Now he canted his head, forever deciphering my expressions. "If you are anxious, I'm not helping by putting pressure on you. I apologize." He pressed a kiss to the palm of my hand. "You must have a reason for remaining away from them. I look forward to when you can share it with me."

Guh. He was too good to be true.

I kept hearing Karin's warning, reinforcing my own experience, yet I couldn't prevent my feelings from growing. My mom had said people got greedy. That they knew better, but they chose to ignore all the warning signs.

I was greedy for Dmitri.

And yet I knew so little about him. Dip a toe, Vice. "When I woke, you were staring out at the water." And touching your scar. "What were you thinking about?"

"Myriad things."

"Such as . . ."

"You should have had a period by now," he said, taking me off guard.

"You noticed?" My eyes widened. "Oh, wait, did you think . . . ? Dmitri, I took my pills straight through, so I wouldn't start this month."

His broad chest rose and fell on a deep breath.

"You're relieved?" I frowned. "But you want children."

"Not yet. We have so many things still to do, and I think a pregnancy would distress you greatly."

But he'd said I would make an incredible mom. "Why do you believe that?"

"Because you have no idea what kind of father I'd be. How could you when I've told you little of my family or of myself?" He was providing me an opening!

"We could remedy that."

He squared his shoulders, as if bracing for a hit. "What do you want to know?"

Impulsively, I brushed my fingers over the scar on his wrist.

He stiffened, pulling his hand from mine. "You are very observant, aren't you?" Details are my job. Or they used to be. "Even I can barely detect it. I had the scar removed by laser a few months back, for when I eventually married."

"Dmitri, the sight of it doesn't bother me. But . . . did you try to commit suicide?"

Curt nod. "Years ago. Maksim stopped me before I could do my other arm."

When I thought of how close it must have been . . . Thank you, Maksim!

Dmitri gazed away. "I'd made sure not to say anything out of the ordinary--in what I'd thought would be our last conversation--but my brother must've detected something in my tone. To this day, I don't know what made him drive over."

"Why did you do it?" How physically and mentally excruciating taking a blade to one's own flesh would be!

He was clearly weighing how much to tell me. "I couldn't imagine a better life because . . . I didn't know that there would be you."

Those lifeline looks? Might really be lifelines! Did he comprehend how much pressure he was putting on me?

He faced me with a frown. "That's one of those things I shouldn't have said out loud, isn't it?"

This was too much responsibility for another human's happiness. What if our marriage didn't work out?

I was just a freaking grifter!

We stared into each other's eyes until I felt calm enough to say, "Will you explain what pushed you to try to take your own life?"

He scrubbed his hand over the back of his neck. "Maksim told me I would have to reveal everything from my past for us to move forward. Do you believe that?" Dmitri was genuinely asking for my advice.

"I think it can be very helpful." I remembered Benji, struggling, in so much pain. "My adopted brother had a traumatic childhood. If he'd kept everything bottled up, I believe it would have destroyed him."

Dmitri rose to pace. "And he is better now?"

"It's taken years. But, yeah." I didn't get the sense Dmitri truly wanted to talk, more like he was checking off something unpleasant in order to solidify our marriage. "Don't talk to me just to tick a box."

"Perhaps if I shared my past, you would tell me more about yours. I want you to. I want us . . ." He eased his pacing to face me. "Are we getting closer?"

"Do you want to know if we're bonding?"

"Precisely."

"I think so. Do you?"

He nodded. "Each minute I spend with you, I crave a thousand more. I wake and see your head on my chest, and I feel as if I live within a fantasy."

Heart thud. "My toes curl whenever you say things like that. But then I wonder how you can feel so strongly when we still don't know a lot about each other."

He opened his mouth to say something, then must've rethought it. "When I suspected you might be pregnant, part of me welcomed the idea, because a child would bond us."

It hadn't with Walker and Karin. "Dmitri, there are other ways for us to get closer."

Gazing away again, he said, "I will . . . I'm ready to talk about my past." He settled onto the bed and drew back against the headboard once more. "What do you think happened to me?"

I wouldn't flinch from this. "After your father died, you were sent to live with someone who sexually abused you."

He blew out a breath. "You are very perceptive. But actually, he was sent to us."

CHAPTER 32

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"I . . . it was very long ago." Dmitri seemed to be losing his nerve.

"How old were you when it started?"

He cleared his throat. "Seven years old. From seven to nine."

So young, an innocent little boy. My protectiveness for Dmitri burned like an inferno. "Was the man supposed to be a guardian?" Someone in a position of trust.

"Yes. His name was . . . Orloff." Dmitri's fists clenched. "He . . . molested me, and many other children before me. Both boys and girls. He physically abused Maksim, beating him and locking him in a dark cellar for months."

I eased closer to him. "I'm so sorry, Dm

itri."

"I don't know if I want to tell you these things yet. I cannot tolerate pity."

"You don't have to talk to me before you're ready, but you should know I could never pity the man you've become."

Placated, he said, "Orloff wasn't the first to abuse us. My father was a violent drunk. My earliest memories are of him beating me and my brothers and my mother. Especially at night. In the winter, night was unending."

My God. No wonder he and his brothers rarely drank.

"When I was almost six, I woke to a horrific argument. My father had taken issue with something trivial Aleks and Maksim had done, was bent on punishing them. He sounded more enraged than I'd ever heard him. Desperate to protect them, my mother fought back. He shoved her down the stairs." Voice gone thick, Dmitri said, "I will never forget the sudden quiet. I sensed she was gone, but terror of my father kept me from going to her. He left my mother for me to find the next morning."

I would give anything to have spared him that! When I thought of Dmitri as a terrified boy, I wanted to hold him, but he looked like he might bolt at any second.

In a lower tone, he said, "I only recently told my brothers she died to protect us."

Dmitri's words: provide infinite patience, love unconditionally, and safeguard with your life. His mother had given her life to safeguard her sons. "You must have missed her so much."

His expression turned fierce. "I need you to understand: there was nothing she could do. There were no shelters. If she'd run with us, my powerful father would have found her. Even if she somehow managed to escape him in the winter with three young sons, she had nowhere to go."

He thought I would judge his beloved mother. "Dmitri, it was a different time and place, a world away from what I know. I would never question her actions." But I would judge her abuser.

Seeming satisfied with my vehement answer, Dmitri continued, "When Aleks was only thirteen, our father would've done the same to him. Aleks defended himself, accidentally killing the man instead. Fearing he'd go to jail, my brother fled, leaving me and Maksim behind. Orloff arrived shortly after."

So much violence and horror. "That's why you hadn't spoken to Aleks in so long." Because he hadn't been there when Dmitri had very badly needed him to be. At seven, Dmitri had needed a protector.

He nodded. "Aleks was like a father to me. And then he was . . . gone. In my young mind, I viewed it as abandonment. He left us behind and got to shed all our painful history, and then was adopted by a very wealthy and decent man, Natalie's biological father, Kovalev."