Total pages in book: 187
Estimated words: 177397 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 887(@200wpm)___ 710(@250wpm)___ 591(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 177397 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 887(@200wpm)___ 710(@250wpm)___ 591(@300wpm)
My endeavors to make contact with Mikhail weren’t as stellar as my attempt to reach Vlad, but cut me some slack. Vlad didn’t look like I had vomited in his mouth after we kissed. Mikhail appeared disgusted after our lip lock.
“Hey. Yeah. Everything is fine.” My bullshit radar sounds an alarm, but before I can call Nikita out on it, she continues. “I was just wondering if you could do me a favor. You’re at home, right?”
“Ah…” I scan the internal walls of the elevator before grimacing. “I can be, if it’s urgent.” When she sighs, I blow my cover by straightening my spine. “Is it urgent?”
“Kind of.” After another deep sigh, she tells me how she made a promise to pay the medical expenses of a child the hospital was refusing to treat since she didn’t have insurance, and that she was hoping the money in her box would be enough to cover the expenses.
This is why I love her. She would give you the clothes off her back if you asked. But I’m lost as to why she needs the equivalent of her life savings to pay the bill. Maksim is giving her the world. She never has to penny-pinch again.
“Why are you using the funds you set aside? Maksim gave you a limitless credit card and permission to use it for whatever your heart desires. Use that.”
“I can’t.”
“You can, and you don’t have much choice. You have two, three nights’ admission max saved.”
I’m reminded how daft women become when we’re trapped in a love haze when she says, “And?”
“And…” I leave her on hold for a couple of seconds to ensure her head doesn’t get too big for her boots. It’s what best friends do. “During your two-minute rundown on what happened, you said the clerk announced the Petrovitches were several thousand in debt. I don’t think you have that much in your box, Keet. Because if you did, you would have purchased your grandfather’s breathing machine with it months ago.”
Her sigh breaks my heart. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Yeah, you do. Maksim gave you that credit card for a reason. He wants you to use it.”
“That was before we…”
I follow my co-rider out of the elevator on the seventieth floor before asking. “We…?”
She says the last thing I expect. “We’re kind of not on speaking terms.”
“Huh?” One word shouldn’t relay so much devastation, but it does. If Maksim and Nikita can’t make it, there is no hope for the rest of us. “Since when?”
“Since I threatened to leave him—”
“You what!”
Her voice is almost a sob. “Things are complicated.”
“Oh, I bet they are. Maksim is—”
“I miss him, Z.”
I’d give anything to be in front of her right now. She couldn’t say no to some friendly PDA. Not with that much angst in her tone. “Then tell him that.”
“I can’t. What if I lose him too?”
“Keet…” Nikita is the smartest woman I know, but she has no street smarts whatsoever. “I love you, girl, but sometimes you’re so blind you can’t see what is directly in front of you. Maksim would never put you in that position. He loves you too much to ever hurt you like that.”
Her breath catches in her throat. “No—”
“He. Loves. You. That’s why he is struggling to give you the promise you need to move past your fear that you will lose him too.”
I resonate so much with what I’m saying, but this isn’t about me or my wish to be placed first. This is about my best friend and how she’d rather be picked last than love and lose.
“He isn’t a man who can sit back and let the person he loves be hurt because she wants him to promise not to retaliate. I don’t know a single man who could promise that, let alone one who spent most of his childhood protecting his mother.”
“He told you about that?” she asks through a sob.
“No. But I know you, and I understand your fear.” I give her the honesty she deserves. “And I also understand Maksim’s. He doesn’t want to hurt you. He wants to love you, but that comes with a prerequisite of protection. Everyone knows that. You just seem to have gotten the criteria a little mixed up since you’ve forgotten the love a parent has for a child is different from the love of a spouse.” I give her a moment before hitting her with the big stuff. “Maksim isn’t your dad, but I sure as fuck hope he loves and protects you as fiercely as your father did your mother, because that is the type of love every girl should strive for. That is real love.”
A stupid tear rolls down my cheek when Nikita murmurs, “Z, I have to go.”
“Fuckin’ oath you do.” I cough to ensure my words come out clear before making sure she doesn’t forget who she is talking to. I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t stir her. “Give him a kiss from me.”