“Because if he’s alive and scheming against the family…” That darkness returned to his eyes.
I winced, worried. “Um… He is. Or, if this isn’t Gregori, like your father Gregori, it’s someone else. Someone else who is definitely alive or was alive and is letting someone use their identity.”
More than that, it was starting to seem like a fact that this network was aligning against the Volkovs. Explaining it wasn’t easy. Showing the evidence through all the paperwork and files and transactions took time, too. But the further I dove into looking at all of this and the more I researched the matter, it seemed obvious that the Volkovs had someone targeting them for trouble.
Staying busy in the office and letting out my intrigue about this investigation was only half of my time, though. No matter what I did or told myself, the nights were still so long.
I hadn’t actually ever spent the night with Adrik. Fate was cruel to remind me of that during the twilight hours.
With every day that passed and I didn’t have a small interaction with him, I grew more convinced that any of the attraction he might have felt for me was an illusion and trick of the mind.
And with every night that passed and I lacked a touch from his strong hands or a kiss from his hungry lips, I forced myself to accept that those two times we’d come together were nothing more than flukes.
As I lay in bed and stared up at the ceiling, dreading and wondering if I’d dream about him again, I tried to talk myself out of missing him. Out of this inclination to yearn for him.
Join the club.
Like you’re the only woman in the world who has lusted for him.
At least you got a taste, right?
He used you for pleasure.
And it was good.
I cringed. It wasn’t just that he had made me feel good. I was on the verge of being a total idiot and believing that he’d ruined me for any other man.
At least you’re still here and safe.
He didn’t kill you.
He sees the value in keeping you around for your brain and accounting skills.
That still counts for something.
It was a paltrysomething, though. Because later that night, as I tossed and turned to yet another erotic dream of him dragging his hot lips down my body and kissing a wicked path toward where I ached for him between my legs, I woke up with a start.
Panting and sensing that my panties were wet again, I damned this curse of arousal.
I’d put up walls around my heart. I adapted to seeing myself as his thing and employee, not his lover or friend.
I avoided approaching him alone. I stopped initiatinganythingwith him, which he seemed to prefer with how busy and moody he was.
But he was still on my mind. Phantom touches could be reignited in my dreams, when I wasn’t conscious and able to tell myself to quit thinking about him like that.
Slumping back on the mattress, I hugged a pillow and squeezed my eyes shut.
It’s not going to happen, El.
The man is not going to want you.
Much less love me.
I just needed a little more time for it to truly sink in, for that hard truth to coat the chipped and cracked pieces of my lonely heart.
29
ADRIK
