Page 82 of Lethal Obsession

“No. Too conspicuous. I’m on the Quantum Drift, which belongs to one of our shell companies. We usually loan it out to corporate clients as a perk. Which brings me to why I’m here, actually.” He puts the glass down carefully and draws a deep breath. When he raises his head again, his smile has disappeared. “Lars sent me a message about the party he promised you. Unfortunately, brilliant as Lars is, sometimes he really doesn’t think shit through.” His eye settles on my face. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, Ofelia, but there’s no way I can host a party on the yacht. It would draw too much attention and put both of us in danger.”

“It’s fine.” I try to ignore the dull disappointment sinking inside me. “I understand.” I do my best to smile. “It was just an idea, anyway. It’s not like I have a stack of friends to party with.”

And since the only party I wanted to have was with you, alone, in a very big bed, that’s not really the point, is it?

A sudden chill rushes through me, and I wrap my arms tightly around myself, staring fixedly at his half-finished glass of water on the table. “You could have just called,” I say quietly. “There was no need to put yourself at risk by coming in person.”

“Less risky in person, actually.” Alexei’s response is flat and immediate. “I don’t know whose phone lines are being monitored.”

So he’s not even here because he wanted to see me.

My heart sinks even further.

A silence falls that I’m not sure how to break. It stretches on, neither of us moving. I watch the condensation roll down the glass and form a ring of water on the wooden surface.

When Alexei finally speaks again, his voice is slightly rough. “Like I said, I can’t host a party. But if you wanted to, you could—” He cuts off abruptly. I look up sharply, but his face is turned away, his mouth a hard line, as if he’s closed it on what he wants to say.

“I could what?” I let my arms fall and move an inch off the counter.

He keeps his eye turned determinedly away.

I take a tentative step forward. “I could what, Alexei?”

He still doesn’t look at me, but I don’t miss the way his hands tighten on the edge of the table.

I take another step toward him, so barely a meter separates us. “What were you going to say?”

I’m close enough to see the pulse beating in his neck, the tension cording the muscles that disappear beneath his T-shirt.

I want to touch him, and I’m terrified to. Afraid he’ll push me away, that the euphoria I feel having him here will be stolen away yet again and replaced with bitter disappointment.

Then suddenly I remember the look in his eye that morning in Paris, when he glanced at me from the door. The naked hunger in it, like he wanted to taste all the parts of me he hadn’t already.

And just like that, I throw caution to the wind and close the distance between us, pressing my lips to the throbbing pulse in his neck before I can second-guess myself. “Tell me,” I whisper.

14

Alexei

Fuck.

The moment Ofelia’s lips touch my skin, my internal battle is lost.

Although it was probably lost the moment I kick-started the Ducati on a deserted beach this morning.

Or even when I first boarded the yacht and told Andrew to set a course south-southwest.

Certainly after I disregarded Mak’s less than subtle warning and continued down the Spanish coast.

Or maybe, I think, as my arms slide around her silk-covered waist and I’m enveloped by the intoxicating scent of rose and almonds, I lost the fucking battle the moment I got on that plane from Miami to Paris.

If not long before that.

“Tell me,” she whispers, and the hot touch of her breath has me so fucking hard I could throw her down on the tiles right now and never regret it for an instant.

Or you could take her with you, whispers the dark bastard inside me, and devour every fucking inch of her in your own sweet time.

I don’t want to say it. I came here fucking determined not to say it.