Page 11 of Velvet Venom

Did I just walk into a strange man’s office with him? I suppress a shudder and hug the soft leather jacket closer around my shoulders as I hear him answer the phone and then start speaking in Russian.

I try to tune the conversation out as Andrey is obviously speaking the language because he doesn’t want me to hear whatever’s going on with a container.

I walk over to the large one-way glass window that looks out across the Velvet Lounge. My eyes scan the crowd as I search for Stacy. I can’t believe she just up and ditched me. She went to dance with a hunk she’d been eyeing out at college, and then they disappeared.

So much for promises of plying me with alcohol and helping me find a hunk to take my mind off Harry and my secret impending engagement to Quasimodo.

Okay, so I know it’s unfair of me to judge the guy before I’ve seen him. But this is the twenty-first century. What pussy minded wet-wipe would allow his parents to force him into a marriage they arranged for him eighteen years ago?

I give Andrey one more coveted glance as I give up trying to find my so-called best friend and move to the bathroom. If the guy I’m betrothed to, fuck I hate that word, looked like Andrey, there would be no way in hell he’d go for an arranged marriage.

The man oozes confidence, power, and…danger. Not to mention, he’s drop-dead gorgeous, with his thick, dark hair neatly cut and heavier on the top. His piercing blue eyes look right into my soul, and his face looks like it’s chiseled by a master.

I don’t have to see his torso naked to know the man is ripped and in excellent shape. You only have to look at the way his shirt stretches over his powerful chest and his bulging biceps to know he’d have no trouble lifting me to wrap my legs around his waist.

Whoa… Halt… Stop the thought train, Isabella. NO! I tell myself. Not him. Although, he’d make a nice buffer to hide behind when my father finds out what I’m about to do to thwart his fucked up plan to knock woman’s rights back to the eighteen hundreds.

I love my father, but right now, I despise what he’s done and his deception. And when he finds out his little princess, whom he’d kept in a glass cage surrounded by trolls to guard her, is no longer chaste… Well, that’s going to be his fault for being a fucking liar and betrayer of the worst kind of betrayers.

I take a deep breath and look around the most gorgeous bathroom that should grace a top hotel, not an office. My eyes move to the mirror that lines the one wall above a marble countertop that boasts two hand basins on one side.

The rest is just space with a hair dryer, an electric razor, some bottles of deodorant, cologne, and a cactus on the other end of it. I try hard to avoid looking at the scraggly weirdo in the mirror sporting an expensive bomber jacket that smells of hints of cedar wood, mint, and vanilla.

The scent stirs an elusive memory in the back of my mind, giving me a feeling like I’ve been wrapped in a warm blanket, safe and sound. The man who gave me his jacket had seemed oddly familiar to me. His green eyes and the way they softened when they looked at me gave me the same feeling his jacket did.

But they also inspired a flash of terror that hit me between the eyes, making me instinctively step back toward Andrey. I could feel the man had immediately sensed my unease and had moved away as if he didn’t want me to feel uneasy.

I give myself a mental shake. I’m probably just reading too much into it because the man had been nothing but a gentleman to me, helping me in my time of need.

Then, giving me his leather jacket, which, as the woman from behind the bar pointed out, was not a cheap jacket. I smile, peeling off my souvenir from my night out… my thoughts skid to a halt so fast as the man’s words come back to me.

That was an odd choice of words for him to choose— a souvenir to remember this night by? It was as if he knew I wasn’t meant to be here. Is he one of my dad’s spies? No, Isabella, I doubt it. If he were, I wouldn’t be in Andrey’s bathroom.

I’d already be locked up in Prison Moretti. He could’ve been one of my father’s mob clients or, rather, mob boss clients. My survival training taught me how to recognize the hunter and prey—to determine which one was ultimately the apex predator. Like Andrey, that man was an apex predator.

Even though my knight in a Tom Ford jacket was every woman’s wet dream and romance author template for gorgeous, I didn’t feel that kind of attraction to him.

It was just a morbid sort of fascination by the way he’d appeared from nowhere and then disappeared as he’d come. I didn’t miss the looks Andrey, and the man exchanged. It was like two alphas sizing each other up. I guess the man knew when to step away.

After all, Andrey manages this club, and I’m sure that even though the man looked more than physically capable of tackling a lion, having two Easter Island solid stone statues come down on him wouldn’t have been the smart move on his part.

I sigh as I finally brave looking in the mirror, and I’m mortified. Smudges of colored cocktails that have taken over my once-cream shirt have seeped onto my skin. My shirt looks like that thin skin that holds a sausage together but shows all its content.

While that sausage skin has a use, right now, my shirt is not much more than a joke showing off my white lacy bra. I swallow as I remember the way Andrey’s eyes were captivated by my breasts, and right away, my clit gives a little achy throb to get my attention.

As if the rest of my over-sensitive system hadn’t already alerted me to the fact of how dark, alluring, and goddam sexy Andrey was.

The fact he speaks Russian makes him even sexier, as I have a weird attraction to that language, especially when it’s spoken with the correct pronunciation and a deep, whisky-smooth voice.

A voice that I can envision moaning hot sexy words to me as his lips kiss and gently nip from my neck to my breasts while he drives me over the edge with a rock-hard cock.

Uh-oh! Now I can feel myself getting wet as the ache in my pussy intensifies. Images of the Dark Velvet Room rush through my mind. When Stacy disappeared, I was forced to take a peek inside. One of the bouncers escorted me to ensure I was truly looking for my friend and not trying to sneak in without a VIP pass.

What I had seen behind that velvet curtain was everything, and more so, the way Stacy had described it to me. The waitresses wore high heels that accentuated their long legs. The vaginas were barely covered by a small triangle piece of velvet in front and a thong that could double for dental floss at the back. Their breasts were completely exposed except for red velvet nipple caps.

Everyone wore a mask that obscured the top half of their faces. Most of the patrons inside were either completely naked or clad in their underwear. There was a bar on the far end of the room with a cordoned-off booth hidden behind satin drapes no one seemed to go near. Not like the other curtained-off booths where I’d heard many types of cries, moans, and different heights of ecstasy coming from.

The dance floor had people wrapped around each other and not shy about fondling their dance partners or other people’s dance partners quite openly. It was like a huge swingers club that catered to all tastes if the dominatrix I saw walking out of the one booth was anything to go by.

---