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I ignore the needling voice in my head, the plan forming in my mind instead. A plan to make Natalia Obelensky feel safe, wanted, anddesired, a plan to give her a window into her freedom–
And then snatch it from her, and watch her shatter.
Natalia
My mind is still on Ruby’s party as I dance for the gentleman sitting in front of me on the champagne room couch, his hand on his thigh as he watches me twist around the pole. He’s sixty years old if he’s a day, and I see his fingers twitch again and again towards his groin, as if the not-so-subtle hint will encourage me to tell him,by all means, go ahead and jerk off while I dance. I’d love that.
Fucking disgusting.
Ruby had tried to push me toward some of the guys who were at the party, urging me to flirt, have fun, make out with someone. I hadn’t entirely been sure why I wasn’t able to. It wasn’t that none of them were handsome–in fact, a few of them had been exactly the bad-boy type I’ve often been attracted to, but with a rougher edge that I would never have found in my old life. It wasn’t even that I was worried about my cover being blown–none of them would have had a reason to suspect me.
In fact, a good meaningless fuck might have been exactly what I needed. A perfect excuse not to go home alone again, imaginingblue eyes and demanding hands that I should be afraid of, not fantasizing about.
The one man I nearly approached, though, had been all wrong. Light blond hair, long on the top and shaved on the sides, and those pale blue eyes that sent a shock to my soul when he’d turned to look at me. I felt a chill go down my spine. Even though his eyes had raked down my body with the kind of blatant interest that told me I could have ended up in bed with him, all I’d been able to think about was a different pair of icy eyes, a different man looking at me with that same blatant lust.
I turned away instead, going to find Ruby, my body throbbing with a need that frustrated and pissed me off. Now I’m here at work again, wound tighter than a guitar string, thrumming with the need for something other than my own fingers to get me off. I need to get laid, but I feel as if Mikhail has cast some strange spell over me, invading my thoughts until it’s only him that comes to mind.
Which makes me angrier still. I shouldn’t want him like that. I shouldn’t even entertain the thought. I should have the same distaste for him that I have for the man staring at me right now, and in so many moments, Ido. But it’s all tangled up with a fretful lust that makes me feel cold and hot by turns, feverish and frustrated.
Fucking hell, I need to just get laid anyway. Maybe then I can stop thinking about it.
I’m sliding down the pole, twisting with my back arched and my hands above my head, facing away from the man on the couch, when the door to the champagne room suddenly flies open.
I flinch in shock, managing not to fall only by virtue of excellent reflexes and long practice. I land on my feet like a sinuous cat, hearing the surprised grunt of the man behind me on the couch, as the last man I expected to see right now steps through the door as if I summoned him with my thoughts.
Mikhail strides in, cool and casual as if he belongs here, coming up short when he sees the man on the couch and me mid-dance.
“What the fuck?” I hear the man behind me growl angrily, his voice raspy with age, and I let go of the pole, glaring at Mikhail.
I swear to fucking god, if you get me in trouble with Igor again–
“That’s a good question,” I snap, narrowing my eyes at him. “What the fuck? I’m with a customer–”
“I was told to go ahead and go in,” Mikhail says smoothly, taking another step forward. “I assumed you were done, but seeing this–” he shrugs. “I can only assume that since I paid extra for your time again, I take precedence over–whoever this is.”
His eyes slide down my body slowly, possessively, sending a shudder through me. Fear and desire twist together in my belly, that feverish chill sliding over my skin, disturbing me. The way he looks at me, as if he can buy me, as if heownsme, makes me want to grab him by the throat and strangle him.No one owns me,I think furiously as I stare him down. Yet, that blatant possessiveness sends a flush of heat through me that pools between my thighs, making me feel faintly dizzy with the desire to find out what he might do to me if I let him.
“Get out,” Mikhail snarls, craning around me to look at the man on the couch. “I’ve bought her time. It’s mine now. Get the fuck out.”
“My hour isn’t up–”
“It is now.” Mikhail stalks forward, his eyes narrowed dangerously. “I was told she was ready for me. Which means it’s time for you to leave–unless you want me to help you out of the room, old man.”
The tension crackles in the air for a moment. A part of me wants the old man on the couch, disgusted as I am by him, to tell Mikhail to go fuck himself.It would serve him right.But instead, I hear the soft leather rustle and squeak as the man gets up slowly, walking past Mikhail.
“I’ll be sure to mention this to Igor,” he rasps, looking between Mikhail and me, and I feel a cold knot in my belly. But Mikhail just shrugs.
“Do that. I guarantee he won’t give a fuck, after what I just paid him.”
“What the fuck was that?” I gasp, wheeling on him the moment the door shuts behind the other man. “You can’t do that! You can’t just–just come in here, not wait your turn, and be rude to other customers! This is my fucking job!”
“And I’m paying.” Mikhail steps towards the stage, his gait cool and careless, his full mouth smirking slightly as he gives me another of those possessive looks. “I don’t like seeing you with other men, Athena.” He steps closer still, up to the very edge, inches from me. Every part of me wants to step back, away from him, but I’m frozen in place.
“I didn’t like seeing you dance for him,” he continues, his voice sharp, almost angry. “I didn’t like the idea of you so close to him–like you were with me the other night. Would you havedanced for him like that, Athena? Would you have gottensoclose to him, so close that he could smell you, almosttasteyou?”
A shudder goes through me, but I feel a pulse between my thighs at the memory of that dance, the orgasm that had torn through me as I gyrated above him, how fuckinggoodit had felt.
I swallow convulsively, still feeling as if I can’t move. “It’s my job,” I manage finally, looking down into those pale, jealous blue eyes. “You’re a customer like any other,Mikhail,” I say his name with the exact opposite intonation of how he says mine, sharp and cold, without any of the sticky, clinging sweetness that he always coatsAthenain.
