Chapter 24

He’s a liar.

“You said you wanted to dance.” Viktor gets up from his chair and cups my elbow. The doors leading to another room with a dance floor already laid out opened after the dessert was served. Music is already wafting in.

“Viktor, wait.” I drop my napkin on my chair as he pulls me away from the table. “I don’t know how to dance.” I yank back on him just as we approach the dance floor already filled with couples twirling around. This is not the dancing my friends and I did in high school. These people know what they’re doing.

“I’ll teach you. It’s easy.” He pulls me onto the edge of the dance floor where we won’t be in the way. He grabs my hand and lifts it, wrapping his other hand around my waist to my back. This part I know, and I position myself against him.

“I’m going to embarrass us,” I mutter.

He squeezes my hand and lowers his mouth to my ear.

“I’ve already told you, that’s not possible. Now, listen to my instructions. I’m going to step forward with my right foot, you step back with your left foot. Then sweep to the right, put your feet together then step forward with your right foot.”

I imagine the steps in my mind.

“A box step? Oh, I can do that.” I nod. “We learned it in gym class in middle school. I can also do-si-do if we need to.” I smile up at him. Although I’ve never done this with a partner, I remember the basic step.

He frowns. “What is the dose doe?”

I laugh. “It’s a square dance. Don’t worry about it, you’ll never have to do it.”

He firms his grip on my hand. “Are you ready?”

After a couple twirls past us, I nod, and he sweeps us up onto the dance floor. Immediately, I step on his foot.

“Shit. Sorry.” I try to look down at our feet to catch the steps, but he pulls me closer, until we are chest to chest.

“Just follow me, moy sladkiy voin. We’ll be fine.” He takes a step forward, and I step back with him. His eyes meet mine, and it’s like our breath becomes one. I lose the count somewhere, but I’m floating in his stare.

We’re dancing as though I’ve done this a million times before. Around the floor we go, without crashing into anyone else. Not that I’m concerned with anyone else at the moment.

His grip is firm, and when I falter in a step, he uses the hand on my back to guide me back into place.

Everything about the sort of man he is with me can be summed up in this dance.

“You’re doing good,” he says. A swell of pride fills my chest at his words that are given freely and without attachment. There’s no agenda to his compliment, simply truth as he sees it.

I bring my eyes to his, again being swept away by his fierce stare. Even when he’s dancing, he looks ready to tear apart anyone that gets in his way.

“When did you learn to dance?” I ask, breaking our gaze. It’s too intense, being this close to him.

He looks away. “A girlfriend a long time ago.”

My insides freeze.

“I thought you didn’t date? You said boyfriend-girlfriend was a game.” I stumble again over his foot but catch the count and he turns us back into the beat of the music.

“I was young.” He brings his eyes back to me and grins when he sees my expression.

“What’s funny?” I demand.

“You’re jealous.”

“I am not.” I would pull away from him if he didn’t have such a hard grip on my hand.

He chuckles. “You are. And I am enjoying it.”

We continue the dance in silence. He seems happy to bathe himself in the idea that I’m jealous of his past, while I try to convince myself he’s wrong.

Except he’s not.

When I imagine him dancing like this with someone else, my stomach twists into a knot. I hate it.

“Marlena.” He stops dancing and I crash right into him.

Dammit. I take a small step back from him and drop my hands to my sides. He doesn’t let me get away though; he links his hand with mine.

“Let’s step outside.” He pulls me to one of the French doors that is propped open for the guests to walk out to the patio.

There are several couples and small groups of people standing close to the heating lamps warming the area, so he leads me down the steps and into the garden below.

“I’m not sure we should be out here.” I look back as the lights from the party are hidden behind bushes.

He brings me to a spot just behind a tall wall of bushes. It’s bright enough from the house lights that I can easily see his warm expression as he shucks out of his suit jacket and wraps it around my shoulders.

“We didn’t need to come all the way out here,” I laugh, pulling the lapels close and sliding my arms inside. The jacket is way too big for me, but it’s warm.

“Admit you were jealous at the idea of me having a girlfriend,” he demands, cupping my chin and pushing it back to look down into my eyes.

“I won’t.” I can’t. “Are you jealous of the men I’ve been with?” Am I teasing him? I think I am. My cheeks heat at the prospect.

“Give me the names of every man that’s ever touched you. I will find them and beat them until the memory of you is gone from their minds.”

I search his eyes. He has to be joking.

He’s not.

The sincerity is touching. The violence is a little unnerving, but the raw possession I see inside him awakens a part of me I’ve done everything I could do to keep closed.

“You can’t do that.” I lay my hands on his chest. He’s warm from our dance, and his heart is racing. “You’d go to prison.” I smile.

“For you, I’d risk it.” His mouth crashes down on mine in the next breath and I’m gone again. It’s not the physical touch of his lips against mine that steals my thoughts, but the chaos of emotion that passes through from him to me and back again.

“All right,” I sigh when he breaks the kiss. “I don’t like the idea of picturing you with another woman. Okay?”

His arrogant grin is back, but it’s short lived. His phone vibrates and he checks the screen, his brows knit together in response.

“I need to join Andrei and Sergei for another meeting.” He slides his phone back into his pocket.

“All right. I’ll just find Izzy and Billie to hang out with while you’re doing whatever it is you do in these secret meetings.” I give him back his jacket.

He eyes me cautiously. “Don’t get into any trouble tonight. You and Izzy aren’t always the best influence on each other.”

I laugh. “Just because we encourage each other doesn’t mean we’re bad influences.”

“You encourage bad behavior.” He squeezes my hand as we round the wall and step back onto the pebbled path that will take us to the patio.

“You’re just not as much fun as we are,” I tease, reaching up to my chest to check on the necklace.

It’s gone.

I freeze.

“What’s wrong?” He turns to me. I look down at the ground, then around me.

“I told you! I told you it would fall off and now I’ve lost twenty-five thousand dollars!” Panic grips me.

“The necklace?” He spins me around to see it’s gone from my neck. “Maybe the clasp caught on my jacket when you took it off. We’ll check.”

“No. No. I’ll check, you go. People are waiting on you. I’ll check and go back inside. If it’s not there, I have to retrace my steps.” I give him a shove, though it would be more effective if I shoved the brick wall of the house.

He frowns, but his phone goes off again.

“It’s fine. I’ll meet you.” I shoo him away.

“All right, but go back inside when you’re done. And take this back. It’s cold.” He hands me the suit jacket.

There’s no point in arguing with him, so I take it and sling it around my shoulders while I hurry back to where we were standing.

I grab my phone from my clutch and turn the flashlight on, aiming it at the ground. I move some blades of grass with the toe of my shoe, my panic rolling through me as the seconds tick by.

Finally, a shimmer.

I crouch down and slide my fingers through the dry blades of grass and find the diamond. Relief slams into me as I pick it up, inspecting it in the light. The clasp is open just enough for the chain to have slid through.

It must have gotten caught on his jacket.

Dropping the necklace into my clutch, I take a big breath.

“What are you doing here? How the fuck did you even get in?” Someone’s on the other side of the wall.

I stay crouched, trying to hold still. It doesn’t sound like a conversation I should be overhearing, but if I pop out now it will be awkward.

“You think I can’t get into a little party?” I know that voice. Jimmy.

“What do you want? What couldn’t wait for a fucking phone call tomorrow?”

I shift my stance to be able to look through the evergreen bush and get a glimpse at the other man. I’ve never seen him before.

My phone silently pulses in my hand. A reminder to pick up more hairspray on the way to the wedding tomorrow.

Seeing the opportunity, I find the recorder app and turn it on.

“There’s a problem with the last car. How the hell am I supposed to find a LaFerrari Aperta?” Jimmy steps closer to the other guy. “Do you know how limited that limited edition is?”

Ferrari only made two hundred and ten of them. At a baseline price of two million dollars, no one’s going to be leaving that car just parked in some lot or on the street.

“How is that my problem?” the man demands. “You said you could do the job. So do the fucking job. Make the delivery, in full, or you’re out.”

I’ve been around enough of these sorts of exchanges to know he’s not talking about firing Jimmy. He’s talking about ending him.

“I found one, but it’s in fucking Los Angeles. I’m gonna need cash upfront if you want me to go out there to get it and bring it back.”

The man laughs, but there’s no humor in it.

“You’re a real piece of work. No wonder Agosti let you rot in the pen. I gave you a job, how you fulfill that job is your problem. And if you ever show up like this again, you’ll pay the price.” He shoves his finger into Jimmy’s chest. “Got it?”

“Yeah, I got it, Mr. Donato,” Jimmy grinds out. It’s too dark to see his face, but I can imagine the look of disdain he’s wearing.

I slow my breathing, waiting for them both to walk away. Mr. Donato’s feet fall on the pebbled walkway first, and then Jimmy’s figure disappears.

After several minutes pass, I ease out of my hiding spot and check my phone to be sure it picked up the conversation.

“How is that my problem?” Mr. Donato’s voice plays back to me, and I smile.

“Hey. Here you are!” Izzy hurries to me when I step out from behind the greenery. “The guys want to leave. Viktor’s looking for you; he said you should have been inside already.”

“He’s so impatient.” I drop my phone back into my clutch.

“He said you dropped a necklace.” She links her arm through mine. “Did you find it?”

“I did.” I grin. And so much more.