Page 25 of Valentine's Miracle

“Room service, sir, madam.” The man in a hotel’s uniform bows his head as he pushes a trolley inside the room.

He’s sweating and nervous, and I don’t blame him for feeling that way. Silas is just a complexed man with even more complicated expressions. He generally looks like he’s going to kill someone or he’s plotting the murder with a blank face.

I don’t know if I should thank Sebastian or reprimand him for his actions. He chooses one of the scariest people in the company for my protection and the dread doesn’t all come from Silas himself.

It’s also the uncertain path I travel down during this convention because throwing Silas back into my life can create a meltdown.

“Thank you,” I say, fishing out cash to tip him.

The man leaves in a hurry and avoids Silas at all costs. That leaves just the two of us again, and he seems to be back to his usual self, somewhat angry and somewhat impassive.

Even his expressions are at war with each other.

I look down at all the food and groans. There is too much, I ordered breakfast, and I expected a decent amount to feed one person, but it comes as a meal for three people. Meals in the States are much bigger in proportions than other countries that I have had the luck of visiting.

“Come sit.” I wave my hand at Silas, and he glares. I’m so used to it now that it doesn’t bother me as much as it did before. That signature look of his is what makes him Silas.

“I have to return you to your boss in the same shape or better after this convention. Don’t say I didn’t feed you.” I bite into the buttery bread.

He snatches a piece of bread, chewing on it in silence as the sunlight darkens by a cloud. My phone lights up with an email; the sender is not someone I recognize. The date is February thirteenth, nothing out of the ordinary while the email is the same.

The sender finishes the email with a bunch of information at the bottom that tells me she is a marketing manager at a law firm. She wants to know if I would be interested in a tour of the law firm. This tactic is to get me drunk on their employee benefits, but it’s not the first time I have had these emails.

My math skills aren’t limited to mathematics; they can be used in a variety of subjects with the right amount of knowledge. I have had students in my core classes tell everyone that they either want to be programmers or they want to go into engineering.

Not a lot of people want to go into accounting, but surprisingly, the majority want to be in the physics job area.

“I can take care of myself,” Silas says.

I snap out of my thoughts, swallowing the bread with one eyebrow raised. “I know you can. No one can carry a filled car tire as if it’s a leaf.”

I swear I saw him roll his eyes. “It’s for training.”

I have never seen someone train with car tires. Sebastian had sent pictures to me in an angle that is just too voyeuristic to be comfortable. It felt like I was the criminal taking pictures of Silas’ naked back when it was Sebastian that did the crime.

“Can’t you use normal things, like those prison weight things that every guy puffs out their chest for in movies?”

It sounds better in my head, but it’s out already so I just proudly finish the sentence. “Not that you look like a prison inmate. I’m just stating an instance, don’t put me in a chokehold.”

He scoffs, the reflective greens have a tinge of humor in it. I stand by my word, I’m not seeing things. Silas is actually not seeing me in a negative light, and a flush of happiness rolls through me with a blush heating up my cheeks.

“Normal doesn’t work for me anymore,” he comments and drinks his water.

“Normal works for everyone,” I insist. “You just strive for more.”

I don’t know about workout because I have never lifted up a dumbbell in my whole life, but body logic tells me that to maintain is to be normal and to be the best is to have more. I think I read that somewhere in a magazine that Sebastian had to look at women.

Sometimes I’m embarrassed to know him, and Fyodor too. They’re practically cut from the same cloth, and they could be long lost brothers for all I know.

“The best.”

I look up, waiting for him to elaborate. He stills his movements, green eyes piercing at me with unnatural stillness as my heart thumps loudly. The piece of bacon seems to get heavier as the seconds pass.

“I want to become the best.”

“Is business that competitive in that world?” I question, confusion nagging in the back of my mind. Silas is more than efficient and one of the most sought-after bodyguards that I know of from the company’s words and the praises of previous clients.

“I don’t want to be weak.” He pauses, clenching his jaw. “Being weak cost me everything.”

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