Page 11 of Nikolay

The words landed so hard for a second all I could hear was blood rushing in my ears.

Arousal.

He’d said it plainly. Quiet enough that no one else nearby should have caught it over the music, but there it was between us, stripped and ugly and true enough to wound because it had been visible. Because he had seen it on me and decided to use it as a weapon.

I wanted, with sudden ferocity, to dump the entire tray down the front of his crisp shirt.

Instead, I started moving again. If I opened my mouth now, something ugly and Texan would come out, and while I wasn’t above either of those things, I was still on shift.

He followed.

“I am speaking to you.”

“I heard you.”

“Then answer.”

I let out a breath that wanted to turn into a growl and made it through my teeth instead. “No, sir, I do not usually throw myself into a public frenzy during demonstrations. Thank you kindly for the concern.”

Sarcasm. Fine. Not my best survival skill, but it was all I had left that wasn’t tears or violence.

His face did something small and dangerous. Not softened. God, no. But the anger twitched, altered by my tone.

“That would almost sound like wit,” he said, “if your performance tonight had not been so embarrassingly transparent.”

Embarrassingly.

Well. There was a word a woman could build a murder on.

I reached the bar and set my tray down harder than intended. Crystal rattled. Kyra’s gaze flicked from me to him, taking in my flushed face, his rigid posture, the whole nasty picture at once.

I planted both hands on the polished black surface and willed myself not to whip around and tell him exactly what he could do with his opinions.

He didn’t stop.

“Do you imagine,” he asked behind me, each word clipped to a finer edge, “that this place exists for your personal awakening? That because you possess any number of tiny skirts and a dazzling smile, the rules do not apply to you?”

I turned then because I couldn’t not.

The room behind him went on in shadows and velvet and low sin. Up close, the scar near his right eye had drawn tight. His eyes looked darker here, but the amber in them flashed when the backbar light struck. He was furious, yes. But there was something else under it still, something that only made this worse because I had seen its shape already and now he was trying to bury it under my skin.

“Why do you care?” I asked.

I meant to say it stronger. It came out softer, rougher, too honest by half.

That stopped him.

Only for a beat, but long enough for me to see I’d landed somewhere he hadn’t wanted me near.

Then his mouth hardened. “I care about standards.”

Bullshit.

It sat there between us, too obvious to dignify.

Before I could decide whether to say that out loud, Kyra set down the glass she’d been polishing with a precise little click that cut cleaner than shouting might have.

“She is the best person I have on this floor in every aspect, Your Highness,” she said, her voice quiet and carrying that faint Greek lilt she mostly kept tucked away, “and I would appreciate it if you did not berate my server at the bar. If you have a concern, take it up with Bodhan.”