Page 80 of My Wild Horse King

“This is ridiculous,” I say. “Really.”

“I’ll sleep on the floor.” Gustav breezes inside, sets our bags on the floor of the window-wall and shrugs out of his jacket.

For some reason, watching him taking clothing off sends a shiver up my spine, proving that I’m just as ridiculous as this situation. I turn to face the door, focusing an inordinate amount of attention on closing it and turning the deadbolt. For some reason, the simple act of turning the deadbolt makes heat rise in my face.

It’s a normal thing to do in a hotel, locking the door, but it feels. . .like I’m closing out the world so it’ll just be the two of us.

I shake my head and turn back, ready to just get it out there that we are clearly just roommates with a shared space, but instead of being halfway across the small room, Gustav’s standing right in front of me, his shirt half unbuttoned. He’s big—something I had never noticed before. The last time we were standing this close together, I was a horse.

“Oh.” I look up at his face, struck stupid by the curve of his brow, the strong, square shape of his jaw, and the deep golden stubble that has grown in on it. My stomach flutters. My mouth goes dry.

And he reaches past me and smashes some kind of bug on the wall.

I blink.

“Thank goodness you’re not the kind of girl who screeches for an hour because she saw a beetle.”

Except, I totally am.

I am one hundred percent that girl, when I’m not all choked up on hormones and, like, buzzing because for the first time since the early nineteen hundreds, I’m getting all hot and bothered over someone whoisn’tthe future czar of Russia. Someone who might one day like me back.

“You want to shower first?” He lifts his eyebrows.

“Uh, you can go first.”

He cringes a little. “That’s probably not wise. I need to use the toilet, too, if you know what I mean.”

I’m absolutely not sure whether to laugh or cry. I’m thinking about how hot he is, and how into him I am, and he’s thinking about how he needs to poop. I grab my bag and practically run into the bathroom.

The shower’s small and the tile badly needs to be redone, but the water’s hot, and it’sheavenlyto finally feel clean. The single best thing about the twenty-first century is razors. I have never liked armpit or leg hair, but everyone I knew, every woman I’d ever met, always had both. Razors were not easy or cheap to find.

The first movie I saw after waking up was calledHow to Lose a Guy in Ten Days, and I immediately noticed the blonde woman had smooth legs. When, a week later, I saw an advertisement for a Venus razor, I sent Boris to the store with threats if he didn’t come back with a whole handful of them.

They’ve changed my life.

I no longer feel clean if my legs are hairy, and for the first time in days, I feel both clean and moderately attractive. I’ve almost forgotten about my embarrassing moment of weakness earlier, swooning right before Gustav smashed a bug. I throw on my clothes, towel dry my hair, and shoot out of the bathroom, leaving the door open so some of the steamy air the fan couldn’t keep up with can escape.

“Your turn.”

But Gustav isn’t there.

I’m about three seconds from a meltdown—visions of Leonid hauling him out and dicing him into a million pieces or torching him into a pile of ash crowding my mind—when he waltzes through the door, not a care in the world.

“Where did you go?”

“I remembered there was a bathroom in the lobby,” he says.

He doesn’t even look embarrassed. Is poo not embarrassing to men? “Oh.”

“Is it fine if I shower now?” He points.

I nod, dumbly.

It must not be. He flashes me a half smile as he breezes past me, bag in hand, ready to get totally naked and stand under running water three feet from where I’m standing. I’m staring at him when he turns to close the door.

He tilts his head, winks at me, and shuts the door.

He winks.

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