Page 250 of In Love with a Ruthless Man

“Do you have any plans for your birthday?” Sergei was asking.

“Umm, yes.” Fredericka cleared her throat. “I actually do.” Just now, actually, but he didn’t have to know that.

Sergei gazed at Fredericka curiously, having noticed the way she had suddenly started chewing on her lip. That look on her lovely face meant she was lost in her thoughts, and they appeared serious enough to have her nervous.

“Won’t you share with me what your plans are?”

“Umm...”

“I take it I’m not a part of it?” he asked dryly, easily guessing the reason for her discomfort.

She slowly nodded.

“Is it something just for you Alyx and Anneke?”

She shook her head just as slowly.

Sergei’s tone became faintly puzzled. “Then what?”

“It’s...a...secret?”

Sergei stopped smiling. For as long as he knew her, Fredericka had always been vehemently against any kind of duplicity. Secrets were synonymous to lies in her book, which was why the fact that she was trying to keep something from him now made the billionaire both wary and suspicious.

“You know I’ll find out sooner or later,” he told her lazily, “so why don’t we just cut to the chase and you tell me now what your plans are.”

“It’s my birthday,” she tried to prevaricate, “so my plans are my business—-”

“Erie.”

She gulped.

“What,” the billionaire asked very softly, “are your plans for your birthday?”

She mumbled her answer in a nearly inaudible voice, but when the billionaire suddenly cursed, Fredericka knew he had still heard her, and she gulped again.

“What thefuck,Erie? Why the hell are you going to meet with Julian Alexeyev on your birthday?”

“I was thinking...” Taking a deep breath, she lifted her chin and say, “I’m thinking of dating him.”

His jaw clenched. “Did he ask you out?”Julian.It was always that fuckingJulian Alexeyev!

“I don’t need to explain anything—-”

“Answer the question!” His fury worsened at the flash of defiance in her gray eyes, and leaning forward, he grabbed her by the shoulders, snarling, “Answer me, dammit—-”

“Because I’m tired of being a virgin!”

The words were out before she realized what she was saying, and as the billionaire stared at her in disbelief, something inside her started to unravel and suddenly she couldn’t stop talking.

“I’m never going to fall in love, and I know that. I’m okay with that. But what I’m not okay with is turning forty and withering before I ever have sex!” Her voice started to rise. “So I will have sex, and I will lose my virginity, and—-”

“Then FUCK ME!”

Chapter Twelve

Fredericka

A PENNY COULD HAVEdropped, and it would have sounded like a bomb going off. The silence in the room was charged with tension, and for several moments all I could do was stare at the billionaire, unable to believe what I had just heard.

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