Page 46 of Toxic Temptation
“Scout’s honor.”
I can’t help but smile. “There’s no way you were ever allowed to be a Boy Scout.”
“Only briefly,” he admits. “It didn’t take them long to decide I was perhaps not the best fit.” He turns up the power in his gaze and skewers me in place. “Now or never, Doctor. Give me your answer.”
I know I’m going to regret this. I know this is the worst idea I’ve ever had. But when I look at him—when Ireallylook at him—I don’t see the man who held a gun on me in that supply closet.
I see the man who saved his nephew’s life. Who held me while bullets flew. Who treats an eight-year-old boy like he’s the most precious thing in the world.
What it comes down to in the end is this:
Maybe, sometimes, you have to make a deal with the devil in order to save the angels.
“You wore me down,” I whisper.
He keeps his smile caged. I should’ve known he wouldn’t accept that wishy-washy bullshit. “Say it. I want to hear you say it.”
I take a deep breath, stepping closer to him under the moonlight.
"I'm in. You have yourself a deal, Kovan.”
16
KOVAN
The vodka I drank after I got home last night lingers like stubborn acid in my stomach. But it’s nothing compared to the way Osip and Pavel keep shooting glances at each other across my home gym.
They think they’re being subtle.
They’re not.
I grab a set of hundred-pound dumbbells and focus on my reflection in the floor-to-ceiling mirror, trying to ignore the way my head pounds with each rep. Three cups of black coffee haven’t done shit to kill this hangover.
The hangover isn’t even the worst part. The worst part is that I can still smell her perfume on my shirt from last night. Vanilla—sweet, innocent—but with an irresistible undertone of something decadently floral that made me want to bury my face in between her thighs and forget every reason why that’s a terrible idea.
“Pav,” says Osip, “come and spot me real quick.”
They move to the bench press, voices dropping to whispers the second they think I can’t hear them. Pavel leans over Osip, their heads bent together like schoolgirls sharing secrets.
I drop my dumbbells to the floor with a boom like thunder. “If you two have something to say, just fucking say it.”
Osip loses his grip on the barbell. Pavel helps him rack the weight, and they both turn to face me with matching guilty expressions.
“Someone’s cranky,” Pavel observes.
“I’m not cranky.”
I’m lying through my teeth. Iamcranky. I’m cranky because I spent half the night hard as a rock, thinking about how fucking edible Vesper looked lying on the planetarium floor, the scooped neckline of her shirt fluttering in the breeze of the air conditioning. A glimpse of chest, here and then gone again.
I’m cranky because I drank an entire bottle of vodka trying to forget about her, and it didn’t work.
If anything, it only made shit worse.
“We can see your face and it argues otherwise,” Osip says, still grinning like an idiot. They exchange another look. Pavel at least has the decency to look uncomfortable. Osip just grins wider. “We wanted to hear about your date last night,” Osip admits at last.
“Who told you it was a date?”
“So itwasa date?” Pavel’s eyes go wide.
