Page 4 of Disguised as Love

“Someday, I’m going to rub this conversation in your face,” Georgie teased. There was a hushed conversation on the other side, a deep rumble I expected was Mac, Georgie’s husband. I swore he had some kind of Georgie-radar, because if she was gone for more than two minutes, he knew. It was sweet, but it would make me feel claustrophobic.

“Go kiss Mac. I’m shutting off my computer right now. Love you, dorogaya,” I told her.

“Love you, too, malyshka,” Georgie replied, but she was already distracted, lost in the sea that was my muscled, Navy intelligence officer brother-in-law.

After I hung up, I looked over the latest set of numbers one more time before closing the computer with a sigh. We were so close. Years of research. Years of testing. Huge leaps forward that had been stalled by setbacks, and now I was finally only months away from everything becoming a reality. A reality I’d promised myself I’d make happen as a young girl back in Russia. It was part of the reason it was hard to leave the lab these days. I could almost taste the final success.

I slipped my feet back into the stilettos under my desk and stood, leaving behind my white lab coat and exchanging it for a red Gucci peacoat I’d bought on my last shopping trip to San Francisco with my friend, Violet. The silky liner of the jacket would never hold up to winters in St. Petersburg, but in California, I barely needed a coat at all. Especially not with spring dissolving into early summer. It was only the fog rolling into the peninsula this late at night that made the air chilly enough to warrant the gorgeous coat.

My office door locked automatically behind me, and the fingerprint and eye scanner cast a green flicker into the dim hallway. A body pushed off the wall across from my office. He was a huge man in both muscle and height, covered in tattoos that emerged from his tight gray T-shirt and up along his neck. The tail of a dragon wrapped around his ear and draped below his eye, partially covering a scar. His nose ring glinted in the half-light with a diamond stud larger than the ones I wore in my ears. His bald head was shaved down to the scalp, and his gray eyes were so pale they appeared to blend in with the white, giving him an even more monstrous appearance.

“Sorry I’m so late,” I said to him as he turned to lead me down the hallway.

“No later than usual,” he said, his Russian accent thick, tugging at memories of my childhood and making me ache for my family in a way I hadn’t in a long time. Maybe it was because the latest edict from my father meant I wouldn’t be able to see them anytime soon.

The cool night air hit us as we made our way to the parking lot.

“Have a good night, Professor Leskov,” a cheery voice said from our left, and before I could blink, Ilia had pushed me behind him with his gaze trained on the young undergrad who’d spoken. Her eyes widened as she faced my bulky bodyguard. I put a hand on Ilia’s arm and peeked around him.

“Goodnight, Mika,” I said quietly. “See you in class on Monday.”

She nodded, all but running from the professor known as the ice queen and her scary bodyguard. I sighed, and Ilia looked at me with a grimace I could see even in the shadows of the streetlight.

We’d talked about this a million times, but he would forever be on guard, and my students would forever be afraid of him, just like the majority of the staff was. Hell, I’d been frightened of him the first time he’d shown up on my doorstep as my new bodyguard. But now, he was just another reminder of the life I couldn’t forget. One more thing I didn’t have a say in.

Silence followed us to the car and then to the cottage-style house I’d bought just a few miles from campus. I waited in the vehicle, like always, while Ilia cleared it. When he came back out, he opened the car door for me and escorted me inside.

“Goodnight, Miss Leskov,” he said.

“Goodnight, Ilia,” I responded before shutting and locking the door behind him.

I’d just barely flung my bag and coat onto the rack by the door when there was a sharp knock. I turned back around, opening it without looking, thinking it was Ilia. Instead, I was faced with an enormous man who, impossibly, could dwarf even my giant bodyguard.

My eyes widened in shock, and my instinct to slam the door was thwarted by a booted foot in the crack. My heart slammed into action, the furious pace threatening to block out sound as it pounded in my ears with fear crawling up my back. Papa’s warnings I’d passed off as ridiculous swam through me. I pushed on the door to no avail. As the porch and hall lights merged into one, they brought the man out of the shadows, and I recognized him instantly.

“What the hell?” I demanded. “What did you do to Ilia?”

I peeked around him and located Ilia slumped on the ground near the porch steps. I started toward my bodyguard, but the man blocked my path.

“He’s fine. He’ll wake up with a headache, but that’s it.” His voice was deep with a silky tone to it I could easily imagine narrating the romance audiobooks Violet had turned me on to. I’d needed something to get my brain to turn off after a long day of flipping through numbers and formulas, and the easy entertainment had helped. But right now, as sexy as his voice was, I resented it. Anger flew through my veins, shoving the fear to the back.

I tried to sidestep him again, but he wrapped a huge hand around my elbow. It scoured me with heat, sending a wave of electricity over me.

“We need to talk,” he said.

“Let go of me.” I tried to jerk my arm out of his hold, and when he didn’t let go, I glared up at him. It was like a child looking at a giant, but I refused to be intimidated.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked.

I did, but all I wanted at the moment was for the electric shocks traveling through me from his touch to subside.

“Let. Go. Of. Me.” I said each word like its own growl.

To my surprise, he did as I asked.

I twirled around and tried to push the door closed again, using every inch of the tiny muscles I had. It was a ridiculous effort that he easily thwarted, holding it open with a single hand. My stomach twisted, dread filling me again. I’d been through this so many times I couldn’t even count them, although they’d occurred less and less over the last few years. I’d thought the U.S. government had finally gotten tired of asking me about my father. I’d thought they’d finally realized I had nothing to tell them. But now, it all came flooding back. The interrogations. The veiled threats.

“We need to talk,” he repeated quietly. He was so close the warmth of his breath skated over my cheek, sending another wave of havoc through my veins. “But not here. Let’s take a walk.”

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