Better to keep my distance.
My fingers drift absentmindedly to my cufflinks—diamond-encrusted Russian brown bears, the national animal of my country—a gift from Charlotte. Once again, my mind flashes on an image of her bent over my desk as she straightened up what few accoutrements I keep in my office. The soft curve of her hips in that midnight black pencil skirt. The image alone is enough to send another rush of blood to my cock.
I need to get my fucking mind straight. Screwing my assistant is a recipe for disaster, just as much as heading to Room 306 in an hour to tango with a senator’s wife would be. I plan on doing neither. And yet, my libido is begging me to reconsider the former option.
I’m standing in a room full of the overdressed elite—enough money and power circulating around me to give any social climber a hard-on—but it is the mental image of my assistant’s soft, pale flesh that is distracting me from the task at hand. I am remembering how she stumbled over the area rug in my office—the one she insisted I needed to “breathe some life into the room”—as she stepped back to pick a mote of dust from the shoulder of my suit. A simple touch, an innocent one at the time, but as I think back on it now, it feels less pure. More tense. Less like grooming, and more like foreplay.
I caught her when she tripped against me and held on a moment longer than necessary, but letting her go wasn’t easy. Not when I wanted to fist my hand in the roots of her hair and yank back to expose that soft, tender neck. Not when I wanted to hike her skirt up over her hips and spread her thighs farther than she’d ever spread them for another man.
But I had to let go of her. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to stop myself from fucking her senseless then and there.
What I force myself to remember is this: the feeling of wanting to drive my cock into Charlotte is no more than that—a feeling. I know damn well what happens when I let my emotions drive my decision-making. Even an emotion as base and reductive as sexual desire can be dangerous when misapplied.
No, my thoughts are best kept to tonight’s work, and far away from young, innocent Charlotte.
I let out a long breath and finish the three fingers of whiskey in my glass.
I close my eyes to reorient myself. Control, Kostya, I admonish silently. Get your shit together. Charlotte’s curves fade away. The cold hard steel of concentration takes her place.
I need no limitations; I will tolerate no distractions. I will make room only for the presence of mind to do what needs to be done.
My silent meditation prevents me from immediately noticing the man coming for me. One rabid foot tangles with the other as he falls forward. His champagne spews on the front of my jacket and shirt, as the bulb of the glass shatters into my chest.
Clumsy bastard.
He catches himself and stands upright unsteadily, holding the stem of what’s left of his glass. I clench my fist, ready—always ready—to feel the crunch of his jaw beneath my fingers. He looks up, and mumbles condescendingly through fat, drunken lips, “Oh, big man, too slow to get out of the way.”
He gives me a petulant shove, and my head throbs with the need to crush him.
“Move!” he snarls.
He would be wise to exercise more caution. One more shove, and he’ll find himself in a dumpster by morning.
“Excuse me,” I reply. I’m polite because we don’t need a crowd. A simple warning will do.
For now.
I hand him a new flute of champagne from the dozens on the bar and hang on when he tries to take it from me. I fix him with a cold stare. “This will be your last glass and then you will leave.”
“Wha—”
I keep my voice low, calm, but unyielding. “You will leave, or your family will find pieces of you on every beach on the West Coast. Am I understood, or would you like a more hands-on demonstration?” My voice is quiet enough for only his ears, but the anger vibrates through every accented syllable.
I’ve always found the fear my voice inspires in these people to be funny. Too many evil Russians in the American cinematic diet, I would guess. But the truth of the matter is far simpler: I could do exactly what I am threatening. I know it, and he knows that I know it. His pupils dilate and his breath wheezes out his nose.
He fears me.
Good.
He nods slowly, sets his glass on the bar behind me, and stumbles to the door. I don’t know who he is, but he certainly knows who I am. And that’s enough.
I check my watch, a classic Volstok Amphibia given to me by my ex-wife on our wedding day. Yelisey Rusnak, my advisor, is already at the door, earpiece in, connected to a microphone in my lapel.
“Get the car,” I growl under my breath to him. I’ve had enough. I want to leave before any more of these overbred scum try to drag their grubby fingers across my suit.
I see him in the distance and we make eye contact. He nods once. I walk toward him. Only a bit smaller than my six feet four inches, Yelisey is as imposing as any man I know. Women find him irresistible, and I find him indispensable. But only one of those two parties knows the real Yelisey, and I hired him for his ferocity more than his
