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)
“Hey there, Sunshine.”
As Mikhail pulls a pair of jeans over his ass, sans underwear, I tug the sheets in close to my body—my naked body.
Mikhail’s grin he fails to hide with a tilted chin announces he heard my gulp. He acts ignorant, though. “Do you always strip the bed after messing the sheets?”
“I… We…” Once again, that stumbling idiot better step back before I smack her. “What are you doing here, Mikhail?” Like a freight train missing the station, the truth smacks into me. “There aren’t two penthouse apartments in this building, is there?” He shakes his head, leaving the excavation search for my brain up to me. “Andrik was so—”
“Andrik?” Mikhail interrupts, his brow high.
My mouth gapes as horror rains down on me.
Did I invite a stranger into Mikhail’s home?
The hits keep coming.
Did I sleep with said stranger in Mikhail’s bed?
I refuse to mention the other numerous surfaces we treated like a set of a porn movie franchise, or I’ll never leave our exchange with my dignity intact.
Mikhail’s silence bombards me with confusion. Anytime I’m confused, I turn into a blubbering idiot. “He knew the code. He let us in. I assumed this was his penthouse.”
I’m seconds from falling to my knees and begging when Mikhail’s ruse is broken by a hefty stint of laughter. “He knows the code because his tech company designed the system installed here.”
“So you know Andrik?” Please excuse my daftness. I only got a few hours of sleep, and my brain is still in a lust haze.
I breathe out a sigh of relief when Mikhail jerks up his chin, but I still feel terrible that I treated his place of residence like a whore house. I’m also going to need to replace his sheets. Washing them was satisfactory when I thought they belonged to the man partially responsible for the stains. I can’t continue with that ruse now.
“I honestly thought this was Andrik’s place. I would have never—”
“Stop,” Mikhail interrupts, padding closer like he has no idea I’m naked behind heavenly layers of softness. “You’ve got nothing to apologize for.”
“I used your home as a—”
“The very thing it was purchased for.” He smiles and winks, and although they shouldn’t, their friskiness conjures up memories of the dark and dangerous man I was wrestling last night. “I didn’t have the laundry installed next to the bedroom for no reason.”
He skirts by me to open a double glossed door at the other end. It exposes the washer–dryer combination I was seeking.
Mikhail takes a moment to relish the gratitude on my face before flicking his eyes to a dresser on his right. “My old college shirts will still swamp you, but I was a little scrawnier back then, so it’ll look more like a dress than a potato sack.” He nudges his head to the bathroom I visited last night. “Spare toothbrushes are in the second drawer, hair dryer is under the vanity, and any folded towel is unused.”
He’s about to give me privacy I’m not sure I deserve before he remembers something that sees him spinning like a ballerina. “There’s a handful of girlie shit in the bottom drawer of the vanity. If they’re not to your satisfaction, I can go grab you anything you need.”
I’m lost to what he’s referencing. Girlie shit could mean anything. Makeup. Deodorant. Those annoying floss sticks Nikita is rarely without. There are literally millions of things he could be referring to.
My cheeks turn the color of beets when he lowers his eyes to the sheets I’m clutching.
On darker sheets, the micro smear wouldn’t be noticeable. On pure-white sheets, it stands out like… You get the picture.
“I’m sure whatever you have is fine. I’m not menstruating. It’s a side effect of a broken… vagina.”
Someone dig a hole so I can bury my shameful face in it.
I’m too weak from embarrassment to do it myself.
Mikhail must have a ton of sisters. He shrugs off my embarrassment as if it is as weightless as a midge before he heads for the exit. “All right. Cool. Though you should probably keep that”—he waves his hand at the lower half of my body—“between us. Andrik’s head is big enough. He’ll have trouble walking if he learns he broke your pussy.”
He twists his torso to face me, his smile matching the one I’m struggling to keep under wraps. He reminds me so much of Nikita. If I didn’t believe opposites attract, I’d be introducing them at the first available opportunity.
Nikita needs someone who will fight tooth and nail to protect her, and although Mikhail’s guns look capable of taking down a mountain lion with one punch, the dusting of a bruise under his eye weakens my hypothesis.
He’d fight to the death, but I need to be one hundred percent confident he’d win before I ever recommend him to Nikita.