Page 61 of Disguised as Love

Her voice halted me with my hand on the doorknob to my room. “I’m not doing this for you.”

“I know, but you’re still helping, and I’ll never forget it.”

Another debt I’d owe. To a mercenary. An assassin. A woman with ties to the underworld that would never let her go.

Inside my room, I showered away the day. The cuffs of the blue cashmere sweater I’d bought had blood on them. Ruined. I walked into the closet and saw the clothes I’d bought from Alexia’s boutique had arrived, and someone had hung them. It made me uncomfortable to know someone had been in my room, going through my things, but it was part of Raisa’s life. A life she’d given up to become a professor and scientist. I wondered if she missed this or if it was her life in Stanford that would forever call her home.

Then, I cut my thoughts short. I couldn’t afford to continue to wonder about her.

I dressed in sweats and a long-sleeved T-shirt from my go-bag, and then I scanned the closet, bathroom, and bedroom with my app. I wished I had stronger equipment, because I didn’t trust these results.

I turned on my phone and texted Nolan an update. I didn’t even wait for a response before I turned it back off because I knew what it would be. He’d tell me to get the fuck out of Russia, and he’d be right. But I couldn’t.

I stared at the hidden door to Raisa’s bedroom, dragged my hand over my face, and then found the latch that opened it. On the other side, someone had moved the table I’d drawn across the door the night before back to its original spot. None of this gave me a feeling of security. The way the staff moved in and out of the rooms was ghost-like.

The fire was lit in Raisa’s room just like there was one in mine. No other lights were on, and I could see the shape of her under the covers in the bed. I took out my phone, scanned her room like I had mine, and then stopped at the side of her bed.

She had her back to me, hair spread out around her on the pillow like the night before. My body ached to join her. To pull back the covers, slide in next to her, and tuck her ass up to my groin. To let my fingers and palms caress her, find the heated core of her, and make her call my name.

I’d let fucking Damien Volkov put a gun to my head, because all I’d been thinking about was the little moans she’d made while I’d been kissing her. How the fury she’d sent my way when she’d learned I spoke Russian had only increased my desire to see what she’d look like on top of me with true passion. She’d be a firestorm. One that would be hard to catch, and I’d never want to put out.

“Did you kill him?” Her whispered question startled me out of my reverie.

“No,” I said.

She turned in the bed, brown eyes taking me in from head to toe. The hard-on I’d been fighting with thoughts of her became almost impossible to shake.

“Ilia or Ito-san will be at your side tomorrow,” I told her.

“Where will you be?” she asked.

“Sleeping. Searching.”

She didn’t question my decision. Didn’t beg me to be the one at her side. I hated it and admired it.

“If you tell me what you’re looking for, I can help. This is my home, and he was my father, so I know both better than you,” she suggested.

I hesitated but then simply told her the truth because I needed to find the card, stop whatever Malik and Yano had planned, and then get the hell out of Russia as soon as possible.

“I was told it’s an SD card,” I said.

She blew out air. “A needle in a haystack. Isn’t that the American term?”

She knew it was, but I nodded anyway.

Then, I turned away toward the hidden door, dragging the side table across to prop it open this time instead of barricading the entry.

“Ito-san is outside. I’ll be right in here. If you need me, just call,” I said, but I didn’t look back at her. I couldn’t risk it. The craving to pick up where we’d left off on the roof of the apartment building was too great.

“Chicken,” she said so quietly I almost didn’t hear it.

My eyes narrowed, and I turned back to face her. She was on her side, both her hands slid under her face, and the blanket had dropped slightly to reveal another T-shirt like the one she’d slept in the night before, not sexy lingerie you’d expect from the model-like Russian mafiya princess.

“What?” I asked, voice gritty with the effort it took to keep away from her.

“Big bad Malone is terrified.”

I cringed at her saying my real name, darting my eyes around the room even though I’d just swept it.

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