Page 39 of Hate to Love You
She was here tonight. In this club. Right where I’m standing.
Even with all the sexy bitches I see on a day-to-day basis, I’ve never seen a face prettier than hers, or a body more deliciously tempting. Tits, ass, and thick thighs in exactly the right proportions.
Christ, she was literal perfection.
I want her. And since I’m used to getting exactly what I want, exactly when I want it, the fact that I don’t already know what her pussy tastes like is pissing me the fuck off.
There’s something about her that has me mesmerized…and she’s not even in the building anymore.
What the hell is wrong with me?
I walk out of the club, a part of me foolishly hoping to find her out here in the atrium, waiting for me. But I don’t. Which just pisses me off more.
“David is bringing the car around, Boss,” Cal says, standing next to me.
If it was anyone else speaking to me right now, I would probably deck them in the face, but since it’s Cal, I give him a short nod.
My mind is spinning with more questions than I’m comfortable not having answers to.
Who is she? Where has she been? Why did she come back?
I need to know.
My Cadillac SUV comes around the corner, forcing some unhappy customers to step back closer to the wall. It stops in front of me, and Cal steps forward to open the door for me, before climbing into the front seat with David.
“Where to, Boss?” he asks.
“The office,” I reply. “I have work to do.”
I sit at my desk on my empty executive floor tapping a pen against the oak, and replaying the last hour. I may have also pulled up my club’s surveillance footage to try and find her again, but even that was spotty.
It was almost as if she knew where the camera’s blind spots were and was exclusively standing in them.
But that couldn’t be true.
It had to be a coincidence, but it was a disappointing coincidence. All I had were tiny little fractions of frames that contained her still image, the last one sitting frozen on my computer screen.
Lost in my thoughts my eyes accidentally drift to the envelope that Kristinah dropped off earlier today that I never opened.
Which reminds me that I no longer have a fucking assistant.
I look at my watch, realizing it’s just after two in the morning, and I sent my text to Anastasia about forty minutes ago.
Just relax. She’ll be here soon enough.
In the middle of my internal pep talk, I pick up the envelope and grab my father’s antique letter opener from the drawer of my desk.
I smile as I do.
This letter opener isn’t a letter opener at all, it’s a dagger.
…A dagger I was never supposed to have.
The pale ivory whalebone handle had been meticulously engraved with the Antonov Family Crest, and the blade, made of pure Russian obsidian, is sharper than any blade I have ever handled. And if you weren’t careful, it could slice half-way through your hand before you even realized what you’d done.
Which was exactly what happened when I was eight.
I’d found it on my father’s desk, while snooping around his office, and thought it was interesting. But when I went to pick it up, I bumped my elbow on the desk, which jolted the knife in my hand. It was only when my blood started pouring all over my desk and floor that I realized I’d accidentally scraped the sharp blade across the edge of my hand.