Page 9 of Ensnared
"Shut the fuck up you commie Russian bastard," he yelled and then pointed to her. "And you-"
Eve didn't give him a chance to finish. "He's not Russian, he's Ukrainian and you are becoming belligerent. If you continue, I'll call-"
"Yeah, yeah, security. I get it," he muttered, getting up from the bar and throwing a few bills onto the counter. "Stupid bitch."
He threw her a parting glare before disappearing around a corner. Eve looked over to Dimitri and frowned. He was watching the man walk away with an odd smile on his face. As if the whole scene had been fun and he hoped to see the man again.
All men were weird, she told herself.
Pulling her tray off the bar top she exited the bar and surveyed the surrounding slot machines. She could do a loop around the floor just to make sure no one slipped into her area without notice and without a drink, she thought. She was preparing to step away from the bar when Dimitri's cool voice stopped her.
"How could you tell?"
Eve knew immediately what he was referring to and turned to eye the man beside her.
Standing there behind the bar, Dimitri seemed as he always did to her—out of place. Cloaked in an air of undefinable power, his presence demanded a person's full attention. With his shirt's sleeves rolled to his elbows, which displayed the rippling tendons running down his wide, tattooed forearms or the way his perfectly fitted vest accentuated his narrow waist and wide chest, he felt like so much more. Like there was way more to this man than just this. There wasn't anyone else like him at the hotel that she had seen. Not with that perfectly tousled wheat-colored hair and sharply cut jaw. Everything about him was simply out of place. Wrong even. Certainly, wrong for Bar Eternal, but more so wrong for this moment here and now. He seemed like a man filled with a force of presence that should be used for bigger and better, if not dangerous things. Not the normalcy of working here in the lowest bar in this entire hotel.
Blinking, Eve pulled her thoughts back to his question and shrugged.
"To be honest, I couldn't at first," she admitted. "Especially when I overheard you talking on the phone once. I'm pretty sure you were speaking Russian that day, and I was positive you were Russian. But then I heard you speaking on the phone again and it was different that time."
He was in front of her now, having moved to the end of the bar where she stood on the other side. He gave her a considering smile. "You speak to a lot of Ukrainians?"
Eve laughed. She thought of her limited experience with the language and quickly debated on admitting it or not. Seeing the honest intrigue in his expression she smiled and shook her head. "No, but my brother and I used to be obsessed with this YouTuber from Ukraine and we would spend hours watching him and his brothers play video games and fight with each other." She used to love watching that show with Ricky. The two brothers lived in the most desolate, monochrome countryside she had ever seen, but they always did crazy dangerous things that kept her hooked. "I guess you just sound the same," she said. "And admittedly I cheated," she confessed with a laugh. "Your last name reminded me of a neighbor I used to have. Mr. Malinski. He was Ukrainian as well. So, I looked it up and confirmed that your surname, Zaretsky, is indeed Ukrainian."
His eyebrows lifted as he studied her, his curiosity clearly piqued.
She was about to say more but a small group walked up to the counter. Eve didn't miss the flash of annoyance in Dimitri's blue eyes as he turned to the guests. Taking this as her moment of escape, she grabbed her tray and walked away. Even despite the small crowd of customers between him and her, she could feel Dimitri's eyes on her back until she finally turned a corner around a group of machines.
Thankfully by the time she came back to the bar with a new round of drink orders whatever it was that existed between them had passed. Dimitri hardly paid her any attention. He only spared her the occasional glance as he worked. If he wasn't filling drink orders he was on his phone.
With the distraction gone her mind turned back to the one thing she didn't want it to—that damn photo. A burning sensation sprouted in her chest and spread throughout her body like veins until she felt a little sick. Was that all their year-and-a-half relationship was worth? Not even two months later he was posting his new fling on social media?
What if this new girl wasn't a fling? What if he didn't wake up and see that she had been the best thing in his life and call her to apologize as Eve had been hoping he would?
Clutching her empty tray to her chest, Eve stepped away from the bar. She couldn't let Dimitri and his perceptive wintry gaze see her on the verge of a panic attack.
Her mind raced with thoughts of Landon. All those confessions of love. All those endless weekends and nights helping him research his stupid book. All of it for nothing. All of it meaningless. She had been used.
Closing her eyes, Eve walked. She didn't even know where she was walking but she just needed a moment of reprieve. Blinking away tears, she spotted the sign for the bathrooms and began to make her way to it. She needed to splash some water on her face and just-
"Hey, where are you going?" The sudden appearance of a figure right in her path startled her from her thoughts.
Frowning, Eve stopped and stared at a man in front of her. He had an almost hostile smile on his lips that sent alarm bells ringing in her mind. Now her mind was completely alert and she recognized the man from earlier—vape guy. Eve stifled a groan.
Stepping to the left and out of his path, she gave the man a pointed look. "Excuse me," she said firmly.
The bitter smile on the man's face hardened and she could see the malevolence in his eyes flare.
"No," he practically growled back. Stepping in front of her, the man reached out to her. "You're gonna-"
Her heart stammered offbeat. The instant thoughts of fear of what this man could possibly do to her on the busy casino floor started but never had a chance to finish as a tall imposing figure stepped out in front of her. The man's hand, poised to make contact with hers, was abruptly intercepted by Dimitri's firm grip, leaving both her and the man stunned.
"Hey! What the fuck?! Let go!" The man screeched as he pulled frantically at his hand. But Dimitri didn't budge despite the man's desperate attempts. He stood there grounded like a tree holding the man's hand in an unyielding grip, making the vape guy look like an unruly child being scolded by a parent.
Looking beyond the vape guy's head, Dimitri spoke in Russian to the three men in black suits materializing from behind some slot machines.
The vape guy looked frantically at the three men as they seized him by the shoulders. "Wait I-" His voice broke off into a grunt as the three security guards forcibly turned him around and began to march him to the left toward one of the discreet personnel doors along the outer walls.
