Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 89090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
“It means yes. Just like might. Might is a maybe. Maybe is a yes, and yes means you’re coming.” She barges me toward the back exit door like I don’t sign her paycheck each week, her shoves filled with a strength I didn’t know she had. “Millie and Taylor are waiting for us out back. Maria will meet us at the dance club.”
“Vas—”
“Doesn’t get a say. We’re dancing, not pimping ourselves out.”
Although I agree with her, she doesn’t understand all the hard work one night out could unravel. “Can I at least invite him to join us?” Her groan rumbles through her hands plastered on my back. “I doubt he’ll come, but he will be less pissed if we toss him an invite.”
“Fine.” She gives in quicker than expected. “Hand me your phone. I’ll text him the deets while you fix whatever the hell is going on with your hair.”
My hand shoots up to defend my hair from her harsh words. “What’s wrong with my hair?”
She doesn’t need to answer me. The lifeless mane that hasn’t circled anyone’s wrist for the past six months reflects in the tint of the SUV.
I once thought my voluptuous hair was an asset.
I was an idiot.
“Does anyone have a brush?”
One text message later, along with a mini blowout with a battery-operated hairdryer, and a handful of expletives from the driver maneuvering us through a packed nightclub area, we arrive at a new club at the end of the entertainment district.
If you don’t like mingling with your neighbors, Kronstadt’s nightlife district is not the place you want to be. All the nightclubs, restaurants, and taverns are within a three-block radius, and the streets are forever littered with the who’s who of the social circuit.
“Hold on,” I announce when Nat stuffs my cell phone into the middle console Saka, her bodyguard/driver, will monitor while we dance the night away.
Nat refuses her parents’ money, but she’d be a fool to give up their offer of protection. They have a lot of enemies, and Nat would be an easy target without her security detail since they’re unaware of their two-year-long tiff. Not even moving to Russia lessened the threat.
“I want to see what Vas said before you store my phone away.”
Lines sprout from her nose when she screws it up like a bunny. “He said something about cruising by later and to have fun.”
I cock my brow as suspicion runs rampant through my veins. “Vasily Cabanow told me to have fun?”
When she nods, I call her bluff by tossing open the console lid and snatching up my phone.
“All right!” she shouts before she yanks my phone out of my hand, dumps it back onto the stack of four, then plonks her scarcely covered booty onto the console, slamming it shut. Yes, that’s how tiny she is. “Those weren’t his exact words.” I wait and wait and wait for her to spill the beans. It feels like two lifetimes before she eventually confesses, “He said he’ll be here to pick you up at ten.”
“A.m.?” She must mean in the morning because it is twenty to ten now.
Nat laughs as if she has a few screws loose. “Puh-lease. Like he’d let you off your leash for that long.” That is a low blow, and she knows it. “I’m sorry. That was uncalled for. I get bitchy when I’m horny.”
I was once known to hold a grudge.
Not anymore. Life is too short for pettiness.
Needing the focus off my fucked-up life, I say, “I thought you were dating that sergeant guy. What was his name?”
“Dud.” She slips off the console, then slides out of the car. “His name should be Dud. I swear I could draw a map to my clit, and he still wouldn’t know how to find it.” After leaning in like we’re not surrounded by a hundred men silently pleading for a chance to access the map she referenced, she whispers, “And get this…” She builds the suspense with a slight pause. “He wanted me to crawl to him, on my hands and knees, like some kind of baby. It was so gross.” I swallow to relieve my burning throat, but her next whispers are more effective than spit. “Though I doubt I’d feel the same way if he’d known what he was doing when I reached his feet.” She shakes her head as her expression switches to disgust. “He thought I was wet for him.” Her expression deadpans. “I was covered with his spit. Even while kissing the lower lips, there is such a thing as too much tongue.”
I get whiplash from our conversation when she loops her arm around my elbow and drags me toward a nightclub at the end of the street while asking, “Have you ever?”
“Ever what?”
With half the patrons of the bar spilled onto the street, it is so noisy, Nat has to shout her answer. “Crawled to a guy.”