“When required.”
“Am I requiring you?”
His mouth curves. “You’re difficult to refuse.” That should sound practiced, but it does not. Roman says it like the admission annoys me.
I like that far too much.
The music changes, slower now, with a heavy beat that seems to climb through the floor and into my body. Roman takes my coat from my shoulders and hands it to one of his men without looking away from me. The black dress beneath is closer to my body than anything I would have chosen for myself before yesterday. It’s elegant, yes, long-sleeved and high enough at the neck to be respectable, but the fabric follows every curve, and Roman notices.
His gaze moves over me once. Only once.
It’s enough to make me forget how to breathe.
“Come here,” he says.
He draws me into the music as if the dance has already begun and I’m the only one late to it. His hand settles at my waist. My palm rests against his chest. We do not dance like the couples around us, not really. There is less performance in it. Less room. Roman keeps me close, guiding me with small movements, histhigh brushing mine, his body warm through the fine fabric of his suit.
I should feel awkward.
Instead, I feel dangerously graceful.
With Lev, dancing had always been a public duty. His hand on my back, his smile turned outward, his attention drifting toward whoever mattered more in the room. I knew the steps. I knew where to place my hands. I knew how to look pretty beside him without demanding too much space.
But Roman danceswithme.
He watches my face when he turns me. He notices when I hesitate. He adjusts before I can stumble. Once, when the music dips lower, his hand slides a little farther around my waist, and I feel the pressure of his fingers through the dress as if he has touched bare skin.
“Stop looking at me like that,” I say.
“Like what?”
“Like you know what I’m thinking.”
“I often do.”
“You absolutely do not.”
His head lowers a little, his mouth near my ear. “You’re thinking this dress was a mistake.”
My pulse jumps. “Wrong,” I say.
“No?”
“I’m thinking Elena has excellent taste for a woman who hates me.”
Roman laughs quietly, and the sound goes through me better than the music. “She does not hate you.”
“She looked at me like I had been dragged in on someone’s shoe.”
“She hates surprises.”
“Then she must adore you.”
His eyes warm with amusement, but before he can answer, his phone vibrates.
The change in him is immediate.
He glances at the screen. “I have to take the meeting.”
