Page 55 of My Dark Horse Prince

“Table for two,” he says. “Somewhere quiet, please.” He still doesn’t glance at her. He’s staring at me boldly, and I should be embarrassed. Men stare like that at knockouts. At movie stars.

They don’t stare at mousy little cripples at all, unless we get in the way. Which is fine. If any other man I’ve ever dated did that, it would make me ragingly uncomfortable.

But with Grigoriy, it’s different somehow.

As she shows us to our table, I can see the hostess’s attention shift. At first she was baffled. She thought she could get his attention and shift his focus. But he never wavers, and she begins to wonder. Who is this woman? Why’s he so intent on her?

And just like that, I become someone important.

That’s it, I realize. When I’m with Grigoriy, I feel important.

It’s dangerous. If he changes his mind, which he surely will sooner or later, then I’ll become nothing again. And it’ll hurt way more because I’ll remember what it felt like to be someone special.

That risk might make him the most dangerous person I’ve ever been out to dinner with.

When our waitress shows up, setting glasses of water in front of both of us, she makes the same immediate conclusions about Grigoriy and me, smiling at him brightly and ignoring me entirely. “Are you ready to order?”

But he turns her back toward me. “My fiancée always orders for me. I’ll eat anything, you see, so I let her choose. I eat whatever she doesn’t like.”

That takes me off guard—and the waitress too, judging from the look on her face. “Okay.”

I briefly consider correcting him. I’m definitely not his fiancée. But arguing with him about it might be worse than just ignoring him. “I’ll have the solyanka.” I love that soup, but the smell is strong. Onions, pickles, cabbage. It’s so pungent that it’ll surely keep him away. “And some pelmeni,” I say. “They have the three-way filling, right?”

“Three-way?” Grigoriy asks.

“Beef, pork, and chicken?”

The waitress nods.

“And some beef stroganoff,” I say. “It’s just not the same in Latvia.”

“You’re Latvian?” The waitress curls her lip.

“And you’re rude. Not wise for someone who works for tips.” Grigoriy’s finally looking at her, but only to glare.

She scampers off.

“That was right, wasn’t it?” he asks. “Aleks explained the etiquette a bit, but I’m not totally sure I remember it all.”

“She does work mostly for tips, but now I’m hoping she won’t spit in our food. Maybe the stroganoff wasn’t a great idea.” I pick up my water and take a sip, just to have something to do.

“Are women often rude to you because you’re prettier than them?”

I snort water through my nose.

My nose.

I feel like that’s enough of an answer, but Grigoriy just shifts his chair and pats me on my back. “Are you alright?”

Once I stop coughing, I manage the word, “Never.”

“You’ll never be alright?”

He’s so obtuse that it’s actually funny. “Never in my life have women been mean to me because I’m more beautiful than they are.”

His frown surprises me. “Then the world has changed a lot while I’ve been hibernating.”

I think about that word—hibernating—and decide it fits. He may shift into a horse, but as a human, he reminds me more of a bear. “I doubt it’s changed in that way, but very few people in the world have cause to be jealous of me.”

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