Chapter 4
brOOKLYN
In my dream, Pearl is a rocket ship, and I’m hanging onto her ratty old steering wheel for dear life as her explosive thrusters at the back propel us forward.
Blasting through the streets of New York. Angling so that we can roar up beyond the buildings, higher and higher into the sky, until we leave everything behind, my eyes closed and arms wide open, the black abyss of night surrounding me.
Then I wake up with a gasp, feeling pain everywhere .
I wince, choking back a groan as my brain slowly returns to consciousness. My head feels like I got hit by a hammer. My knees ache. My shoulder and hip are on fire, and my hands…
I squeeze my eyes shut, then open then, trying to blink away the grogginess as I lift my hands up in front of my face.
How did they get wrapped in bandages?
I shift again in bed, feeling the silk sheets slide over?—
Wait.
What. Fucking. Bed .
“Who were the men attacking you?”
A scream curdles in my throat as I bolt upright. Pain explodes through every corner of my body, making me wince before my gaze snaps across the room and my heart drops.
A hundred questions roar through my head. But number one with a bullet is why the fuck is Kir Nikolayev here?
It’s quickly followed by “where the fuck, for that matter, is here ?”
The room goes quiet—so quiet that I can hear the dull thud of my pulse in my ears as I try to make sense of the fact that Kir Nikolayev, the owner of the Zakharova and essentially my boss, is sitting in a chair, looking at me with a slightly chilling, yet simultaneously pulse-quickening glint in his eyes.
Which is…not an unusual reaction to being looked at by him. Not for me, at least.
To characterize the man as “good-looking” is like calling one of Madame Kuzmina’s grueling rehearsals “a bit challenging”.
He’s like a fucking god. Almost too attractive. Dark hair, sculpted cheekbones, a razor-sharp jawline and a square chin all make him look like a cross between legit royalty and a fucking Armani model.
He’s tall, broad-shouldered, and allegedly—Milena’s seen him lifting in the weightroom at the Mercury—hiding a physique that rivals most of the male dancers in the Zakharova half his age beneath those custom-tailored suits.
And his eyes …
I swallow, feeling the sinful pierce of those dark eyes as they lock with mine.
Dark, black, devil eyes.
He clears his throat.
“In case you’re unaware…” His gaze flits briefly from my eyes to my chest, and his eyebrow cocks.
I glance down and my heart just about leaps out of my throat.
Jesus fucking Christ .
I yank the duvet up over my nakedness. Heat explodes across my face.
“Where am I?” I blurt, averting my gaze. There’s no way I can look him in the eye right now. “And where are my clothes?” I add, my voice shaking slightly.
Kir draws in a slow, deep breath.
“You’re in my home. You were attacked. I brought you here to take care of you?—”
“Where are my clothes?” I say again, my voice rising half an octave as my hands tighten on the duvet cover. I pull it away a little, glancing down and exhaling with relief.
Still wearing panties, at least.
“If you can remember the men who?—”
“Where the fuck are my clothes!?”
This time, I do meet his gaze—defiant, lips pursed tight, throat working.
His brow furrows. Is it annoyance, maybe, at being interrupted?
“I cut them off,” he growls, “in order to examine you, Brooklyn.”
Warmth slithers around my core, making it tighten. Fuck me, there’s something… delicious about this man saying my name.
The accent is part of it. Kir’s Russian, obviously, but he also apparently spent time—a fair bit, I think—in England. The result is a mostly posh upper-class British accent, with a slight Eastern European lilt that gives it this sinful edge.
His voice, and his looks, and his utterly room-commanding presence, are why Val and I have a way of thirsting after this man, joking about his “big dick energy”.
I mean…c’mon.
That’s a thing, and it’s Kir’s face you’ll see when you look it up in the dictionary.
“I’m going to ask again,” he murmurs quietly. “Who were the men who attacked you tonight?”
“They’re…”
What? Angry patrons from my fucking strip club side gig?
Yeah, I’ll definitely be telling the gorgeous billionaire Bratva kingpin sitting across the room all about that.
“I don’t know,” I mumble, looking down. “They just…attacked me.” I chew on my lip, still not looking at him. “That was you, wasn’t it? Who fought them off?”
Kir is silent for a long second. So long that I slowly drag my eyes back up to his.
“What were you doing in that neighborhood, Ms. Ellis?” he says, not even acknowledging my question.
My lips twist wryly. “I could ask you the same thing.”
“But that’s not what we’re doing,” he says evenly, his tone commanding no bullshit. “I asked you a question. You are going to answer it.”
That slithering warmth in my core tightens just a little more, sending a peculiar throb through my body.
His firm authority both annoys me and sends tingles rippling through every nerve in my body. It’s an authority I want to defy and, weirdly, utterly submit to.
“I was just…out,” I lift a shoulder.
“At a strip club.”
My lip recedes between my teeth again. “That…was a mistake. I shouldn’t have been there.”
“No shit ,” he murmurs under his breath, his dark eyes narrowing sternly. “I prefer my dancers in one piece, Ms. Ellis.”
I nod, my lips twisting awkwardly as I finally meet his gaze.
“Thank you,” I say quietly. “Really. For…all of it.”
Kir dips his chin just barely, sitting back in his chair, his hands steepled in front of his way-too-gorgeous face. His long, masculine fingers tap together, the veins and tendons of his hands and muscled forearms rippling.
“Um…my clothes…”
“I told you: I cut them off of you to help you.”
“Well, I’d like to go home now…”
Kir takes a slow breath. “That’s not happening.”
I stiffen. “I… What ?”
Kir stays exactly as he is, one ankle over the opposite knee, his face impassive.
I blink incredulously. “Am I a prisoner?”
He cocks a brow. “You’re injured, and?—”
“ Am I a prisoner ?!” I yell.
“ No ,” he rumbles.
“Then I would like to go home. Please.”
He uncrosses his ankle from his knee and leans forward, resting his elbows on the thighs of his tailored trousers.
“T-thank you for what you did for me,” I say quietly, changing tactics. “But I would like to…”
I trail off as he suddenly stands and walks from the room without another word.
The seconds tick by.
What the actual fuck ?
I glance around nervously, really taking in the insanely elegant bedroom—gorgeous paneled walls, huge windows covered with heavy, sumptuous shades, a crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling, dimmed low and casting kaleidoscoping fractals across the floor and the duvet over me.
Heavy footsteps announce his return. A second later, the man himself comes billowing back in like a storm cloud bringing lighting and thunder.
He’s carrying a bundle in his hands, which he puts down beside me.
It’s clothes. Women’s clothes, specifically: lounge pants, a cardigan, a bralette.
Kir clears his throat, then frowns, glancing at his phone. “Excuse me a moment.”
He walks over to the windows and starts furiously typing, his sharp jaw clenched with—tension? Anger?
When I turn my attention back to the clothes, my eyes widen.
They’re…exactly my size. Like, exactly . And when I look at the labels, my jaw drops. The cardigan is Khaite. The bralette is Brunello Cucinelli. The silk drawstring lounge pants are freaking Chanel .
When I glance up in shock, Kir is off his phone and looking at me from where he’s still standing by the windows, his tall frame rigid and imposing as he sweeps a hand over his jaw.
“How did you know my size…?”
His silence says it all.
He undressed me .
I mean, I still have my underwear on. And it’s not like I’m shy about nudity, being a professional ballet dancer. Not to mention, you know, a stripper .
But stripping’s for strangers. And at the ballet, it’s backstage with other dancers.
Somehow, knowing that this man cut my clothes off and saw basically everything feels like another kind of nudity, weirdly intimate.
“These…”
“Are for you. Unless you’d prefer to go home au naturel. ”
I feel myself blushing as I glance at the clothes, then back at Kir.
…Who still doesn’t make a move to leave the room.
“Thank you,” I say quietly.
He nods.
“So I’ll just…put these on, then?”
Kir clears his throat and turns his head. I guess that’s the most privacy I’m going to get right now. But it’s not like he hasn’t already seen me almost naked.
I gingerly slip out of the bed, standing on unsteady feet before I start gently pulling the clothes over my battered body.
Wow. I’m more beaten up than I thought. Plus…my heart drops…I missed work without even calling in. Lou is going to throw a fucking fit . And I needed that money.
I always need money. Derrick might not have been the world’s greatest stepdad, but he tried, and he’s the only real family I have left.
I start to think through the logistics of picking up an extra shift to make up for the missed income tonight.
Maybe I can sell these , I think morosely as I finish getting dressed in what is, by far, the most expensive clothing that has ever touched my skin.
Kir turns to face me, sensing I’m dressed.
“If you’re ready, I’ll drive you home.”
Shit .
“That’s okay,” I say weakly. “I’ll just take the subway?—”
“It’s two-forty in the morning. I’m driving you home.”
The way he says it, like it’s a royal decree, has that strange slithering sensation winding through my core again.
He leads me out of the room and through his insanely beautiful home.
Honestly, it’s like the guy lives in fucking Versailles.
I’m not sure my jaw ever gets up off the floor the entire walk, starting from the bedroom I was in, down the hall and a sweeping staircase like something out of a Disney palace, through the ground floor and its enormous, professional-grade kitchen, and then out an unassuming back door to where a gorgeously sleek black Aston freaking Martin is parked on the white gravel driveway.
I mean, I knew Kir was rich. But holy fuck .
The engine purrs to life as I buckle in, the glow of the dash illuminating my wildly expensive new clothes as I discreetly run my fingers over the luxurious fabric. I smile with relief when I look down and see my grungy dance bag at my feet.
Kir clears his throat. “Your address?”
I’m prepared for this. Obviously, I’m not going to have him drop me off at a parked shitbox car that probably costs less than one hubcap on this thing. Which is also, you know, my home .
No fucking way.
I give him Val’s West Village address instead.
We drive in silence, him staring at the road, me desperately trying not to look at him . The whole time, I can’t stop touching the new clothes, like I’ve never felt this elegance and a level of wealth on my body.
I mean, I haven’t.
The gorgeous car pulls to a stop outside Val’s apartment building. Smiling weakly, I turn to Kir, shivering when I realize he’s already looking at me, those dark devil eyes piercing through my every thought.
“Thank you again,” I say quietly. “For all of it. Seriously.” I smile weakly. “Thank you, Mr. Nikol?—”
“Sir.”
I stiffen, my mouth going dry as heat floods my core.
Did he just say that? As in, call me sir , not Mr. Nikolayev ?
But if he can see the question on my face, he says or does nothing to answer it. He just keeps looking at me, those dark, gorgeous eyes eviscerating me as silence fills the inside of the car.
I chew on my lip for a moment.
“Thank you… sir ,” I finally murmur.
Fuck me, why does that sound so dirty and hot?
“Try to be safer in future, Ms. Ellis,” he growls back.
I know the front door code to Val’s building, so I type that in, listening to the Aston Martin idling, feeling those devil eyes still on me. I open the door, slip inside, and turn to smile at him, giving him a dorky-ass wave that I instantly regret. I mean, cringe.
After I hear him drive off, I wait for a moment or two, then step back outside.
I’m not going to try explaining to Val why I’m showing up at his place at this ungodly hour, banged up, wrapped in bandages, and wearing like six thousand dollars’ worth of “casual wear”.
He’s probably with someone, anyway. Or a couple of someones.
Instead, I walk to the subway, wait for a train, then head “home” to Pearl.
It’s almost dawn by the time I get there, and I’ve got rehearsal in a few hours. But until then, I need to sleep.
I block out the windows, lock the doors, then string the cable lock between the handles of the two front doors.
Can’t be too careful, right?
I keep the new clothes on, shivering a little as I pull my blanket up over me and curl up in the back seat, thinking of the stark differences between my life and Kir’s. Of everything that happened tonight.
And, as sleep pulls me under, of dark, black, devil eyes.