Page 47 of Wrath
“Not unless he says it’s okay. I’m sorry. I know this goes against the girl-code, but it’s not my secret to tell.”
“Is he CIA? James Bond?”
“Misha…”
“Alien?” she hissed.
“You’re going to be okay. You can trust him. But gosh, girl, I wish you had told me about Dimitri. I could have helped you. You don’t have to carry the burden of this on your own. But I guess, I’m one to talk. I never told you about my father, and the kidnapping until after the fact. But—no more secrets okay?”
Misha’s face crumpled and she nodded, but couldn’t answer through the lump in her throat. The call ended and Wyatt gently took the phone from her tight grip. He typed up something and showed it to her.
We need to get somewhere safe.
Goodness, she was on the run. She couldn’t go home. They knew where she lived. They knew where her family lived. But perhaps…
“My studio might be safe. I don’t think they know about that place. I don’t think.”
I can take you to my place, or a hotel,he typed.
He had a place?
For some reason, that unsettled her. He hid so many things from her, yet he knew every dark secret about her.
She pulled the coat tight. “I have spare clothes at the studio. Is it… is it okay if we go there?”
After a moment, he nodded, and helped her back on the motorcycle. A few minutes later, they were parking at the front of her studio. She’d hidden a spare key under a potted plant, which Wyatt disapproved of greatly, but it allowed them entrance. After she disabled the alarm, Misha walked through the lobby and into her studio.
“Um,” she whispered, dashing a glance around the darkened room. Gloss hardwood lined the floors and mirrors on the walls meant if she turned the lights on, they’d be exposed. “We’ll have to head down the back to the office in the dark. It’s kind of around the bend, so we should be safe there.”
Wyatt loitered after her, looking uncomfortable. God, she was the one who felt like a fish out of water. The way he’d handled himself at the club, he was in his element.
Definitely Secret Service. Maybe Homeland. Military of some sort.
She opened her office door and ushered him inside. “In here,” she whispered.
The window-free office space was small, but not tiny. Rolled up spare yoga mats and floor cushions were stacked next to her computer desk. The beautiful Ficus plant and her Himalayan salt candles brought some much needed positive ions into the space. Misha retrieved her locker key from the desk drawer and pulled out the desk chair for Wyatt.
“You can stay here while I change in the locker room.” She suddenly felt self-conscious.
In the end, she took a scalding hot shower to calm her nerves. When she was done, she dressed in a pair of soft flowing yoga pants and an oversized slouch top that tended to fall off one shoulder. Returning to the office, she found Wyatt standing guard at the doorway, surveying across the vast studio to look through the street-side windows. He cut a menacing figure in the dark with his arms folded, face stern and gaze focused. That gel he’d applied in his hair had loosened on the ride over, and his cheekbones were pink with wind burn.
“Sorry,” she said. “I needed a shower. You can have one too, if you like, but I’m afraid I don’t have any spare clothes here in your size.”
He gave the barest shake of his head and then returned to his watchful guard.
Alrighty, then.
Misha unrolled yoga mats and laid them on the empty floor space behind her desk. She dropped a few floor cushions down and flopped down, testing the spring of her makeshift bed. Not bad.
“Think of it like camping,” she told herself. Ooh. That gave her an idea.
She retrieved some pine incense sticks from her desk drawer and lit them up. Soon, if she closed her eyes, she smelled forest. Much better. She laid down, but still wasn’t comfortable. Lifting her heels, she shuffled her butt and pressed both lifted legs and ass to the wall. With her feet in the air, she took deep restorative breaths and tilted her head back to view Wyatt upside down. “Okay, I’m ready.”
He’d been watching her keenly during her ministrations.
She patted the floor beside her. “Come on. Sitting like this is extremely calming. All the blood rushes back to your brain.”
He pointed out to the street, shaking his head.
