Poor Maxim thought he was going to woo his fiancée back with king crab, honeysuckle ice cream, and a 360-degree view of the city. But with any luck, Maxim’s plans would be fulfilled by Nikolai himself.
Throwing his keys to the valet, Nikolai took the elevator up to the top floor. The walls had been painted to look like mysterious doors leading off in every direction, in homage to Alice in Wonderland.
Likewise, the decor of the restaurant was opulent, colorful, and slightly surreal, with turquoise velvet sofas and paintings of white rabbits on the walls.
Nikolai saw that Nadia had already beat him there. He spotted her in the back corner of the dining room, facing toward the window with the late afternoon sunlight pouring through the greenhouse glass, illuminating her skin with a golden glow.
She looked so unutterably gorgeous that he stood there for a minute, staring at her, ignoring whatever the hostess was saying to him, just drinking in the vision before him.
Nadia was wearing a jade-green dress that clasped over her left shoulder, leaving the other shoulder bare. Her dark hair was pulled up into a high ponytail that hung down to the middle of her back. This particular style put him in mind of genies and Arabian princesses, and only enhanced her look of ethereal exoticism. It highlighted the cat-like shape of her green eyes as well, and the way her dark brows followed that same shape, slanting upward on the outer edges.
Nadia had ordered a glass of white wine but hadn’t touched it yet. She looked tense, and not at all as if she was anticipating the arrival of her fiancé.
Nikolai wondered how she would react if he were to walk over to her table now. He felt an urgent curiosity to know if the sight of him would cause that flash of a smile to break out on her face, bringing those elusive dimples into view.
She looked so lovely that he could hardly resist the temptation to approach her now. But resist he must, because that would spoil his plan. He had to wait, to make sure that she suffered the full frustration of Maxim’s failure to appear.
So instead, he brushed off the hostess and took a seat at the bar, where he could see Nadia’s back—though not her gorgeous face—and ensure that she kept waiting, without growing angry enough to leave.
It was harder to watch this process than Nikolai had anticipated.
He could see Nadia’s agitation mounting as 7:00 came and went. She sent several texts, and even stepped into the hallway leading to the bathrooms so she could make a call.
Of course, those calls and texts went unanswered, because Leonid had Maxim’s phone safe in his pocket. Not that Maxim had even noticed.
By 7:38, Nikolai thought that Nadia would leave. She came back to the table flushed with anger at Maxim failing to pick up his phone. She snatched up her handbag, obviously intending to pay the bill and go.
However, as she picked up the purse, she hesitated. She took something from the interior—it looked like a book. Then she sat down again.
She motioned to the waiter and placed an order for dinner.
While she waited for the food, she started reading the book, and making notes on a sheet of loose paper.
Nikolai realized she must be reading her mother’s journal. She’d decided to stay at the restaurant, to eat and work.
Which was perfect.
Nikolai gulped down the remainder of his wine, leaving fifteen hundred rubles on the bar as a tip for the bartender since he’d been sitting there so long.
He walked over to the bathrooms, and then toward the front door, as if he were about to leave.
But as he passed Nadia’s table, he glanced over and stopped short.
“Oh!” he said, in a tone of surprise. “Look who it is.”
Nadia glanced up. Without meaning to, without thinking about it, that brilliant, enchanting smile broke into view.
Though he had hoped to see it, the effect upon Nikolai was much stronger than he anticipated.
He felt his heart racing in his chest, and a foolish grin breaking out on his own face. He’d planned to be calm, restrained. But he felt oddly elated just from standing next to her.
“What are you doing here?” Nadia said.
“I met a couple of Ministers for drinks,” Nikolai said, gesturing vaguely toward the bar, as if he’d been over there with a whole group of people.
“Hmm,” Nadia said, one eyebrow quirked in mild suspicion.
She wasn’t buying the coincidence, not a hundred percent.
