A curious bastard, Demyan sent him a friend request and then looked over to where Alina was frantically trying to pretend she was working.
‘Did Marianna have anything for me?’
‘She did,’ Alina said, her voice still shaken, and he merely yawned as she told him about the casino invitation.
‘Maybe...’ Demyan said. He was still cross with them for not being open last week!
‘No way,’ he said, when she told him about the mental health awareness function tonight.
Alina told him who’d be attending.
‘No way,’ Demyan said, but this time with a Russian swear word between the other two words. ‘They’ll be looking through my home at the weekend, the last thing I want is a close-up of my prospective buyers.’ He paused, not pleased with himself for revealing that the sale was hurting him.
A small bleep alerted him and he glanced at his computer. It would appear he had a new friend.
Alina’s father!
Bastard, Demyan thought, not quite sure why he was meddling, or even interested. He had no idea how he’d use this, just a certain knowledge that he would.
Demyan loved mind games.
‘Reply and say...’ He looked at Alina and then back at her father and hesitated. Maybe she deserved some fun. A small smile spread on his lips, a smile Alina had never seen—it could perhaps be labelled mischievous.
‘Tell them that I would be thrilled to support such a worthy cause...’
‘Really?’ Alina couldn’t make out his smile. ‘I never thought of you as getting behind mental health awareness.’
‘You should try co-parenting with Nadia.’
Now she got the smile.
‘Tell them that we’ll be delighted to attend.’
‘We.’ Alina frowned. ‘You and...’
‘You.’
‘But I’m working...’
‘For me,’ Demyan said. ‘Sort it.’
‘Demyan, I—’
‘Don’t bore me with details, Alina. And if you wave that contract at me, I tear it up; if you choose to be working at the restaurant this evening, I fire you. Tonight, no doubt, they will want a speech as well as a donation and there will be invitations too. My PA attends functions such as this one so that I don’t have to remember all that’s said.’ He glanced over. ‘You can meet me back here at six or I will pick you up.’
‘But, Demyan—’
‘Go.’
‘It’s midday.’
‘I’m not that much of a bastard, Alina. I assume you have to do your hair and sort out what to wear...’ He leant back in his chair and put his feet on the desk and made up his mind. ‘I will pick you up at six.’
‘I...’ She didn’t get to finish.
‘Be ready or don’t bother coming back tomorrow.’
He said the sweetest things at times!
As she went to get her bag Demyan halted her.
‘Alina.’ He looked as she turned. ‘I send you home to get ready, not cry over some loser who blocked you.’
Yes, he said the sweetest things sometimes and this time she meant that thought.
‘I’ll try.’
‘Fifteen minutes,’ Demyan said.
‘Sorry?’
‘Set a timer and give yourself fifteen minutes to cry over him then get on with your life.’
‘Is that what you do?’
‘I don’t have to get over people,’ Demyan said. ‘I don’t care for anyone enough.’
‘You say the sweetest things.’ This time she voiced it.
This time he smiled.
Fifteen minutes!
It would take more than that to get over her father’s rejection. Alina fell through the door and onto her bed and let her pillow have it, but actually, thanks to Demyan’s surprise invitation, she didn’t have time to bemoan her father.
What to wear to an A-list function?
I don’t have anything suitable...
Alina started the text and then halted. Was she asking him for money, making excuses?
Demyan would see it as both.
Alina deleted the text and lay on her bed. The problem, though, was a real one, there would be serious money there tonight. Her work wardrobe consisted of suits and a rather large little black dress that she used for any work functions, and even if she hit the shops the type of dress she could afford simply wasn’t going to make the grade and she couldn’t afford designer...
Alina swallowed as a thought came to mind but though she pushed it away it kept building, so much so that she climbed out of her bed, went to her wardrobe and pulled out a box, telling herself that she was being ridiculous to even consider it. As she pulled back the tissue paper and pulled out the dress, it was even more beautiful than Alina remembered. Reds, purples and yellows pulsed beneath her fingers.
Her scattered mind had once flitted to, instead of paintings, designing and making dresses. She loved working on silk, loved the halo effect around the flowers, and she was lost in them now as she eyed her masterpiece.
It had taken many goes and she’d spent a fortune but, rather than doing anything with it, Alina had simply been unable to part with it and had spent another small fortune having it made into a dress.
‘Stunning fabric,’ the dressmaker had said, and Alina had nodded, omitting to mention that the stunning fabric had been created by her own hands.
Was it stunning enough, though? Alina thought, eyeing herself in the mirror.
It was all she had.
So, instead of buying a dress that would still be deemed too cheap, Alina spent that money on having her hair glossed and expertly curled.
Oh, and on buying shoes!
Kissed-by-Demyan-Zukov shoes, Alina decided to name them as she tried them on.
She was entitled to celebrate that!
They were so beautiful that they deserved only the prettiest feet and so Alina spent what time she had left giving herself a pedicure, then a manicure, and finally she turned to her face. What was the point? She was always blushing around Demyan so it would only come off and yet, with him, she was no longer shy. Alina pondered that as she did her face, settling for waterproof mascara and neutral lipstick, and then imagined his mouth kissing it off.
She was going to sleep with him. She wanted to sleep with him. If her heart couldn’t cope with being one of Demyan’s flings then it had just better toughen the hell up.
As she stared in the mirror, and the knock on the door finally came, the very last thing on Alina’s mind was work.
* * *
Demyan was expecting a black dress and a whole load of support underwear as he knocked at her door.
Good.
He was annoyed with himself now about asking her to accompany him. Still, it would serve well to remind Alina that his appalling reputation was merited, given that since she’d started working for him, things had been terribly tame. Well, no more! This was business, and sometimes he mixed it with pleasure. If he saw someone he liked, and he usually did, Demyan had every intention of Alina being driven home alone.
Then she opened her door.
A blaze of colour and curls and curves greeted him and it went straight to his groin.
Demyan didn’t say the first thing that came to mind, it would have been far too rude, so he said the second—he told her she looked beautiful but in a way she could never understand. ‘Tiy viy-gli-dish’ kra-see-va.’
‘Swearing again, Demyan?’
‘No.’ He smiled. ‘I was expecting black.’
‘Black’s for work.’ Alina smiled. ‘I’d never choose it, I like colour and light.’
‘Come on.’
She smelt of summer and nervous energy and there was anticipation there too.
‘When we arrive, do I—?’
‘I arrive,’ Demyan said. ‘You will go in separately. I am a single man, Alina. You don’t want to ruin my chances, now, do you?’
Alina swallowed. Nothing could ruin his chances but it was a very deft reminder that this wasn’t a date, even if she’d somehow, by the time she’d painted her third toenail, convinced herself that it was.
It hurt far more than it should.
Alina was dropped off and showed her pass and was let in as Demyan drove around to where the celebrities and important guests were making an entrance.
He was completely at ease arriving alone, it was often one in, two out—he never left empty-handed. Then he saw Alina, standing there in that amazing dress, and he could see by the set of her shoulders he’d offended her, and when he took a glass of champagne and held one out to her she declined.
‘Have one.’
‘I’d better not, I’m working,’ Alina said, and he laughed.
Yes, he’d offended her. Not arriving with him, shouldn’t have, of course, this was high-end stuff and naturally he needed staff around him.
The royals arrived and Demyan turned his back at the first opportunity. He did not want to think of them in his home, did not want that picture in his mind.
‘Let’s go through.’
They were seated at a circular table and a terribly beautiful, very jittery blonde called Livia—‘Not Olivia, Livia,’ she corrected before anyone could make a mistake—visibly sagged when she saw Alina. Still, she perked up considerably when Alina was introduced as his PA.
‘You’re working late,’ Livia said, and then got straight back to flirting with Demyan.
All through the meal she persisted, dismissing Alina as if she wasn’t there, and again Demyan was very conscious that Alina was next to him. If it had been Marianna, even though they slept together at times, he’d be flirting back with Livia.
‘I recognise her,’ Alina said, when Livia excused herself to go to the loo.
Demyan recognised her too. Oh, not for her acting skills, he’d recognised the offer that had just been delivered—the slight tilt to Livia’s head as she’d stood.
‘I don’t,’ Demyan said, and turned and gave Alina a smile as the lights dimmed. ‘Wake me up when it’s my turn to speak.’
God, they droned on, Demyan thought. He loathed speeches and how everyone had to be thanked five hundred times when surely an email would suffice. Livia was back, more jittery than ever, and Demyan was just about to doze off when the voice on the stage reached him.
‘I remember going to a friend’s house for dinner and not wanting to leave. My friend and I fell out a few weeks later because I never asked her back to mine. I couldn’t. I never knew what I might find and I also didn’t want anyone else to see what went on at home.’
Demyan felt as if the spotlight was on him as this woman, this stranger, described, almost to the letter, his childhood.
He glanced at Alina, who was listening, with no idea of the chaos taking place in the head beside hers. He half expected a flash mob to stand and dance around him, because surely this was a set-up, surely this was his hell that was being so eloquently described.
Alina felt the tension beside her and turned and saw Demyan’s intent expression as he took in the words.
‘I did everything she told me, I did everything right, while knowing that I was setting myself up for disaster. If it worked, if we survived the night by tapping the bed four times before I got in, as well as taping the curtains together, as well as...’ She gave a smile. ‘I’m sure you get the message, but if it worked it meant we had to do it again the next time and the next and the next. The rituals became more complicated...’
Whatever Olivia was offering was becoming increasingly tempting.
Livia.
He was about to get up to walk off but he felt the calm of Alina beside him, laughing at a joke the speaker made. Then he found out that it wasn’t his life being described, because the speaker’s mother had got better at times and when she’d got worse, carers had stepped in.
He glanced at Olivia and didn’t even correct her name to himself as she gave him a bored eye-roll. Demyan didn’t give one back; instead, he listened.
He was truly shaken to his core.
‘Her speech...’ Demyan said to Alina as the applause started, then halted. He wasn’t going to discuss this with his PA, he didn’t need to explain things to Alina.
‘Good luck,’ Alina said, as Demyan got up to speak.
She watched intently. It was bliss to be able to examine him from a distance.
She watched as he went for his jacket and then changed his mind.
Demyan thanked everyone, very nicely.
The little barb about Nadia remained on the notes in his pocket and instead he spoke about how he rarely attended fundraisers, yet this was a worthy one and this charity he would do all he could to support.
‘We hope that means Demyan will be back next year,’ the MC said as Demyan returned to his seat, and as he caught Alina’s eye, he saw her biting down on her lip, because she knew he was leaving Australia.
‘Come.’
Alina didn’t want to dance, or rather she did but the conflicting messages from Demyan were messing with her head.
He hadn’t meant to dance either. Livia was making fervent glassy eyes and usually that would be the preferred option but, right now, he chose to inhale summer and he led Alina to the floor.
‘Making promises you can’t keep,’ she said.
‘I keep all my promises,’ Demyan said. ‘There is internet banking, Alina. I will give good donations’
‘You know full well that they want more than your money.’
Demyan knew that, he was supposed to be closing things down, unjoining the dots, not putting his hand up.
‘Are you still cross?’ Demyan asked, trying to change the subject.
‘About being dropped off at the servants’ entrance?’ She stared right back at him. ‘It’s a bit Upstairs, Downstairs,’ she said, referring to a television drama set in Edwardian London.
He just frowned.
‘Yes, Mrs Bridges,’ Alina said to his frown.
‘I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.’
‘You’d laugh if you did.’
Alina wasn’t laughing as he pulled her in closer.
‘Relax,’ Demyan said.
But she was scared to, for if she did, for even a second, her hands might reveal that they wanted him closer, or her face might lift to his, so instead she danced rigidly in his arms.
‘Why so tense?’ he asked.
‘I’m not used to functions like this,’ Alina said, but did not explain that neither was she used to being in the arms of someone as incredible as him. Despite her bravery as she’d got ready, he’d made sure she’d got that message that this was work as he’d dropped her at the employees’ entrance. She was trying for professional now but her body happily forgave that humiliation as her nipples throbbed beneath her silk dress and the tops of her thighs ached for attention from the man she kept half at arm’s length.
The woman who had made the speech danced past them with her partner and Demyan wanted to tap her on the shoulder, to ask how, how did she stand there and admit things like that, how did she now dance and smile and laugh? Instead, he pulled Alina in closer and felt her resistance, and he held her there, his mouth to her ear as if to hush her protests.
Yes, she protested, but silently and only for a moment, her body tense at first but then she came to terms with the male dragging her deeper in. And then she accepted, leaning into him, and Demyan exhaled at the small compliance, his hand, moving a little lower than her waist.
He rarely danced, perhaps one, and then bed.
Dancing was boring, but no
w he wasn’t bored.
They danced, because if they didn’t the night ended, if they went back to their seats or took a drink or stopped then it ended, and Demyan didn’t want to end it just yet.
He told her again she looked beautiful but he confused her again because it was in Russian.
‘What does “tiy viy...”?’ she couldn’t remember the rest.
‘It means you need sticking plasters over your nipples,’ Demyan lied, but he could feel the mouth near his cheek stretch into a smile.
‘Only when you’re around.’
God, he was hard and this dark horse didn’t mind in the least—she’d even made a small joke.
‘You’re working me too hard.’
‘What happened to shy?’
‘I don’t know,’ Alina admitted.
He was used to eager women but that wasn’t the word he’d used for Alina.
Willing.
Not that word either, Demyan thought as his hand slid over her silk-clad bottom and his face moved in front of hers. ‘What does malleable mean exactly?’
‘Flexible,’ Alina said.
‘No,’ Demyan said, as a vision that wouldn’t help matters flicked into his head.
‘Impressionable?’ Alina offered.
‘No...’ Demyan shook his head. With two languages at his disposal he couldn’t place the word he’d use to describe her.
‘Persuadable?’ Alina smiled.
That would be me, Demyan thought, because right now he could scrub ‘no virgins’ out of his rule book and bed her and bed her and bed her.
Beddable.
That was the word.
Breakable.
He looked at that lovely face and a mouth waiting to be kissed and he denied them both the pleasure, but for once it was for her sake.
‘Come on,’ Demyan said. ‘I take you home.’
She didn’t want home, she wanted back to the hotel, she wanted all his body had promised as they’d danced. The music shifted and they could step back but they danced one more dance and he moved them so they were well in the shadows. He wanted to kiss her, which was unusual for Demyan. She wanted a night with this man. In high heels she still didn’t match his height but as she spoke, her mouth grazed his neck and she felt the pressure of his palm on her head and her lips brushed the skin, which wasn’t a kiss and he could perhaps allow that.
The Only Woman to Defy Him Page 7
