She turns quickly, surprise flickering across her features before she composes herself. “Mr. Vetrov. Yes, she mentioned I’d be working in your wing starting immediately once I finish these windows.”
Her voice is carefully neutral and professionally distant, but I catch the slight tension in her shoulders when she says my name. She’s working hard to maintain the illusion we’re strangers, but her body betrays her awareness of me.
“The guest room can wait.” I step into the room, noting how she takes a small step back to maintain distance between us. “I have business associates coming tomorrow evening, and I need the personal areas to reflect appropriate standards.”
“Of course. I’ll finish up here and move to your wing right away.”
She turns back to the window, clearly hoping I’ll leave, but I move closer instead. Close enough to smell the subtle scent of her shampoo mingling with the glass cleaner and see the way she tightens her hand around the cleaning cloth.
“Is there a problem with the new assignment?”
She glances at me briefly, then focuses on a spot on the glass that doesn’t exist. “No problem at all, Mr. Vetrov. I appreciate the opportunity to take on additional responsibilities.”
The formal tone grates against my memory of how she used to say my name. Not my real name, but the alias I gave her, spoken like it belonged to her in ways that made me forget why I needed to keep my distance.
I step closer, using the pretense of examining her work to invade her personal space. Her body goes rigid, and she holds her breath like she’s afraid of what might happen if she relaxes even slightly.
Good. She should be afraid. Not of me, but of what still exists between us despite the years and lies and carefully constructed walls. “You missed a spot.” I point to an invisible flaw in the glass, forcing her to lean closer to see what I’m indicating. “There.”
She follows my gesture, and for an instant, our hands are almost touching. I catch the subtle pause in her breathing and know whatever control she thinks she has over this situation is more fragile than she wants to admit.
“I don’t see...” She starts to say, then stops as she realizes how close I am and how easy it would be for me to touch her, to break the professional distance she’s working so hard to maintain.
Instead, I step back, giving her space to breathe. “Perhaps the lighting is different in my wing. You’ll have better luck there.”
She nods quickly, gathering her supplies with hands that shake almost imperceptibly. “I’ll head there now.”
With a nod, I leave her in the guest room and return to my office, but concentration remains elusive. Every sound in the house makes me wonder if it’s her footsteps, her voice, and her presence moving through spaces that suddenly feel too empty without her in them.
I open my laptop and try to focus on the surveillance reports Andrei compiled, but the images of Luca’s men blur together on the screen. I can’t pretend I’m not distracted by thoughts of the woman who’s occupying far too much of my attention.
When I find the blurry photograph of an unfamiliar car parked near our Santee operation, I pause. The angle is wrong, and the image quality is poor, but something about the silhouette in the driver’s seat reminds me of Anton Volkov.
I flag the image for Andrei’s review, adding a note about increased surveillance in that sector. Even as I handle the business of staying ahead of Luca’s plans, part of my mind remains focused on Danielle.
On the way she looked at me in that guest room, like she was fighting a battle I couldn’t see, along with the tension in her voice when she called me Mr. Vetrov, as if the formal address was a shield against memories that threatened to overwhelm her.
I can’t veer my thoughts from the night four years ago, when she traced the scar above my eyebrow and asked how I got it. I almost told her the truth about the knife fight in Moscow thatleft its mark when I was sixteen and stupid enough to think loyalty was more important than survival.
I remember the hotel room in perfect detail, along with the sound she made when I finally got my hands on her the way I’d been wanting to since she challenged me about the vintage I’d selected…
She was wearing a black dress that clung to curves I’d been admiring from across the room, and when I finally approached her, she looked up at me with eyes that held more intelligence and fire than I’d encountered in years of cultivated social interactions.
“That’s an interesting choice,” she said, nodding toward the wine bottle I’d been examining. “Most people go for the name recognition.”
“Most people don’t know what they’re drinking.” I’d set aside the bottle and selected something that would pair better with the dinner they were serving. “You prefer the popular option?”
“I prefer honesty over pretension.” She smiled, and something in my chest responded to the warmth in her expression. “Are you always this serious about wine selection?”
“Only when I’m trying to impress someone.” The admission surprised me as much as it seemed to surprise her. I didn’t flirt with civilians and never engaged in casual banter that might lead to expectations I couldn’t fulfill, but something about her made me forget my usual caution.
“Am I someone worth impressing?”
The question hung between us, loaded with possibility I shouldn’t have wanted to explore. Smart men in my positiondidn’t get involved with women they met at parties. Smart men kept their personal lives carefully separated from their public ones, but when she looked at me like that, intelligence and humor and something that might have been genuine interest dancing in her dark eyes, I forgot about being smart.
“Would you like to find out?”
We left the party together an hour later, and I took her to a penthouse suite at Hotel Solamar. It was neutral territory, where I could indulge in temporary connections without compromising the security of my actual home, but nothing about that night felt temporary from the moment she walked through the door.
