Page 40 of Hostage of the Russian
The endearment should have annoyed her. Instead, it sent warmth spreading through her limbs like honey. She blamed it on the single glass of wine she’d barely touched.
“Would you prefer I lie to you?”
“God, no.” His smile turned predatory, but in a way that made her pulse quicken rather than her blood freeze. “I’ve had enough liars to last a lifetime. Your honesty is refreshing.”
“Even when it’s insulting?”
“Especially then.” He leaned forward, forearms resting on the table, and Azriel caught the scent of his cologne. Something expensive and masculine that made her want to lean closer. “Tellme something else honest, then. What did you think when you saw me in that lecture hall that first day?”
Heat crept up her neck. “That you were going to drag me out of there and ruin everything I’d worked for.”
“And?”
“And?” She frowned, not understanding.
“There was something else. I saw it in your eyes before the fear took over.”
Azriel’s throat went dry. She remembered that moment, the split second before panic had set in when she’d looked at him and thought he was the most devastatingly attractive man she’d ever seen. Even terrified and furious, she hadn’t been blind to the way he moved, the confidence in his bearing, the sharp intelligence in his dark eyes.
“I thought you were beautiful,” she admitted quietly, then immediately wanted to take the words back.
Something shifted in Kostya’s expression. The playful charm didn’t disappear, but it deepened into something more intense. “Past tense?”
The question hung between them, loaded with implications that made Azriel’s heart race. She reached for her wine glass, needing something to do with her hands.
“You know you are,” she said finally.
“That’s not what I asked.”
Their server appeared then, asking about dessert, and Azriel had never been more grateful for an interruption. Kostya ordered tiramisu without consulting her, his eyes never leaving her face, and she found herself wondering when the last timewas that someone had made a decision for her that wasn’t about control or punishment.
When they were alone again, he seemed to sense her need to change the subject because he began telling her about his brothers. Not the sanitized version he might have given a stranger, but real stories. Viktor’s obsession with terrible action movies. Fedya’s secret weakness for romance novels that he thought no one knew about. Ilya’s tendency to rearrange furniture when he was stressed.
“And you?” Azriel found herself asking. “What’s your secret weakness?”
His smile turned mysterious. “I think you’re beginning to figure that out.”
The weight of his gaze made her stomach flip. She was definitely not drunk enough to blame her body’s reaction on alcohol anymore.
The tiramisu arrived, and Kostya pushed it toward the center of the table with two spoons. “Share with me.”
It should have been simple. Just dessert. But when their fingers brushed, reaching for spoons, when he watched her lips close around the sweet treat, when he licked mascarpone from his own spoon with deliberate slowness, it felt like the most intimate thing she’d ever experienced.
“This is dangerous,” she said softly.
“What is?”
“This. You being...” She gestured helplessly. “Like this.”
“Like what?”
“Charming. Funny. Normal.” She set down her spoon and met his eyes. “It makes me forget what you are.”
“And what am I, Azriel?”
“Dangerous. Violent. Someone who took me from my life and forced me into marriage.”
He was quiet for a long moment, the playfulness fading from his expression. “Yes,” he said finally. “I am all of those things. But I’m also someone who spent two days sitting beside your hospital bed, terrified you might not wake up. Someone who researched your favorite flowers and spent an hour in a florist shop this morning trying to get them perfect. Someone who is more proud of your achievements than I have any right to be.”
