She flinched as though he'd physically hit her, her face tightening into a terrifying mask.
"What the fuck are you saying?"
Staring into her eyes, Nik knew he couldn't do it. He couldn't hurt her. He took a deep breath and bet everything he had on his partner's hand. "I told you how I felt about family."
He willed her to remember last night's conversation.
"Family is everything." She was nothing. Tatyana's world spun around her, a dizzying display of color. She was alone. He didn't love her. Not enough. "You told me once you'd say the words, ass. When we were done. Say the words." She had to hear them. Final confirmation that they were over.
"Tatyana."
"Say the damn words, Nikky," she yelled at him. When he said he no longer wanted her, she'd be gone. Forever. He'd never see her again. No one here, she glared at Igroek, would.
"Language, Brat."
"The words!" She slid her foot out of her slipper, prepared to beat the words out of him.
Nikky stepped back, glancing behind him. At the giant man at the door. A stranger. Not one of his. The room was full of strangers. All watching her. Them.
"Fine, you want me to say the words, I'll say them. I choose my family, Tatyana. My family over you. Are you happy?"
She was. She stared at him. Because those weren't the words. He stared back. He knew that.
She knew that. They weren't done.
A hush hung over them, the men around them waiting for her reaction. Nikky's men braced for her rage but it wasn't Nikky's men Tatyana had to entertain. No, today her target audience was the crazy gnome and his merry band of male chauvinistic pigs. They expected the little woman, the irrational woman, the weak woman. Everything she was not. This would be her finest performance yet.
"But, but, but." She screwed up her face so tightly, she drew tears. "You said you loved me, forever." She let out a heart wrenching wail. After decades of death and loss, she had unlimited sadness to draw upon.
The circle around them widened, even Nikky stepped back. "Tatyana."
"No." She fell to her knees, unable to watch his face while she did this. "You can't leave me, Nikky. You can't." She wrapped her arms around his legs. "You said you loved me. You called me your little bunny." She used the most inane endearment she could think of.
"Aren't I your little bunny?"
"Tatyana." He stumbled backward.
Burning her bare knees on the carpet, the ass. "Was it because of last night?" She dug her nails into his calves. "Because I didn't allow you to stick yourȄ"
"Tatyana!"
She buried her face in his pant fabric to hide her grin. "I've changed my mind. I'll do it.
Whether Father Kaerta says it is immoral or not. I don't care about my soul and eternal damnation." She crossed herself. "Not if I can't have you. I want you. Don't you want me, Nikky?" She parted her robe, showing him her silky camisole, boy shorts. "Don't you want this?" His body stiffened. That was a yes.
"Put your clothes back on, Brat." Nikky yanked her robe up to cover her shoulders.
He was such a prude in public. "Nikky, I love you. Don't you know that?" She grabbed at his hands.
He pushed her away. "Pull yourself together, Tatyana. You're the heir to an empire, the Igroek princess, Russian royalty. Think of everything you have. You have."
She had. Not the family had. She had. It was a message. Princess, royalty... All she had was at the Crown Hotel. Was
she to go there? "It means nothing to me, Nikky. Not if I can't have you." "The Kaerta boy is right. Have some dignity, Granddaughter." Igroek's lips curled with disgust.
The Kaerta boy was going to marry her. Tonight, if all went well. "I'll do anything. Anything, Nikky. I don't want to be alone." She threw herself onto the carpet then peeked up through the veil of her product treated hair. Yes, the gnome was embarrassed, his face red. Nikky's grandfather wore a strangely pleased expression. The gnome's men stared at her, horrified.
Boris was coughing, Pavel slapping his back with a heavy hand. She sobbed some more, raking the carpet with her nails, messing up her wedding day manicure. It was a sacrifice she'd make Nikky pay for later.
"I want her on a plane tonight," the gnome railed.
Hell, no. "You're sending me away, Nikky?" She rose to her knees, tears streaming down her cheeks. "How can you be so heartless? I lost my parents, I lost you, and now you're sending me away from the only home I've ever known?"
Released from the death grip on his legs, Nik found it more difficult to tear his eyes away from the brat, rolling around the floor, pitching the mother of all hissy fits. She was a terror, an absolute terror, and he adored her, now more than ever.
"Give her a couple days, Igroek. This is a shock and the girl is..." Grandfather coughed. "...
delicate." Delicate, Nik's ass. The only thing delicate about Tatyana was her hold on reality.
"We'll continue to offer her our protection for the duration of her stay. It is the least we can do under the circumstances."
"That's not necessary, Kaerta." Igroek smirked, smug that he'd won. "I think I can handle the protection of one little woman."
"Indeed." Grandfather's lips twitched.
Grandfather was not on their side, but not on Igroek's, either. He didn't help them, but he also didn't tell Igroek his granddaughter would require round the clock surveillance by a team of his best men.
"We shouldn't leave her there like this." Nik nodded at the prostrate Tatyana, slapping her slipper against the floor, sobbing nonsense about his sexual prowess. Flattering nonsense, thank goodness, but nothing he'd like the entire casino to know. "Someone should take her to the hotel room." Although he was
