Chapter 24 Zatanna #2
I should argue more. I should tell him he doesn’t get to make decisions for me just because he has the budget of a small country and the emotional restraint of a mob boss in an expensive coat.
But I am exhausted. And sore. And if I’m being honest, the idea of not having to sit at my desk pretending I don’t remember exactly what his hands feel like is not the worst thing in the world.
Still, principle matters.
“At least tell me how long the men are staying,” I say.
“Until I decide otherwise.”
I lean back onto one elbow and stare at the ceiling. “That’s insane.”
“It’s practical.”
“For you.”
“For you,” he corrects.
I hate that the distinction makes my stomach flip. I hate more that I can hear the fatigue under his control now. The long day. The attack. Alena. His father. Me.
“You sound tired,” I say before I can stop myself.
The line goes quiet for half a second. Then, “So do you.” That softens something in me against my will.
I shift back onto the pillows and tug the blanket over my legs. “You know this is all very over the top, right?”
“Yes.”
“And you are still doing it.”
“Yes.”
I exhale through my nose. “Unbelievable.”
He is quiet for a moment, then asks, lower now, “Are you alright?”
The question catches me off guard.
I look toward the window where his men are still parked outside and think about the shots, the suite, the way he’d gone cool and distant after sex, and then the way he made sure I got home anyway.
“No,” I say honestly. “But I’m not the worst I’ve ever been.”
That gets a low huff from him that might almost be a laugh. “Get some sleep, Zatanna.”
“You say that like I won’t spend the next hour staring at your security detail and reconsidering every life choice that brought me here.”
“Then stare briefly and sleep after.”
I smile despite myself. “Bossy.”
“Tired.”
“Still irritating.”
A pause. Then, softer, “Still here.”
That lands somewhere inconveniently deep.
I tuck the phone closer to my ear. “Goodnight, Mr. Vasiliev.”
He doesn’t correct the formality. Just says, “Goodnight.”
The line goes dead.
I lower the phone slowly and stare at it for a second before setting it on the bed beside me. Outside, his men keep watch. Inside, my apartment feels too small for all the things I now know about him.
I pull the blanket up, lie back, and let out a long breath.
He’s exhausting. Infuriating. Completely unreasonable.
And somehow, impossibly, exactly the person I want to hear from before I fall asleep.
By the next morning, I’ve managed exactly three hours of sleep, two stress dreams, and one deeply unsettling moment where I woke up convinced the men outside my building had somehow multiplied.
They hadn’t.
Still two cars. Still two men in each. Still very much there.
I spend half the morning pacing my apartment, drinking coffee, and trying not to imagine what would happen if anyone at the office found out even ten percent of what happened last night.
Because that is the thing about secrets. They feel very dramatic and sexy when you’re keeping them in a hotel suite. They feel significantly less sexy in daylight, when you start wondering whether your coworkers can smell scandal on you.
By noon, boredom and anxiety are eating me alive, so I do the dumb thing.
I go into the office.
No one stops me on the way in. The men outside don’t even look surprised, which somehow makes it worse. One of them opens the car door like I’m royalty.
I mutter, “This is ridiculous,” and he says, with all the warmth of a filing cabinet…
“Yes, ma’am.”
Great. Even the security detail thinks I’m dramatic.
When I step onto the office floor, everything looks normal. Too normal. Desks. Coffee. Printers. Owen loudly complaining about a spreadsheet as if my world did not tilt completely off its axis less than twelve hours ago.
That should comfort me. It doesn’t. It makes me suspicious.
I make it to my desk, set down my bag, and immediately start scanning faces. Lina gives me a sympathetic little smile. Owen waves. Vivian ignores me with such ferocity it almost counts as attention.
No one is staring. No one is whispering. No one looks like they know I spent last night alternating between almost being kidnapped and losing my mind in a hotel suite with my terrifying boss.
Which, logically, is a good sign. Emotionally, I trust nothing.
I’m halfway through opening my laptop when Owen appears beside my desk holding a muffin and looking way too cheerful for a Monday.
“Well,” he says.
My heart stops. I look up at him, trying and failing to seem calm. “Well, what?”
He grins. “You look like you had a wild night.”
I freeze. Absolutely freeze.
My brain starts firing in every direction at once. Does he know? Did someone see us? Did Alena tell someone? Did Aleksei tell someone, which would be insane but not technically impossible if he suffered some kind of personality injury overnight?
I hear myself say, a little too quickly, “What does that mean?”
Owen blinks. “Uh. That you look tired?”
I stare. He stares back.
Then his eyes widen. “Oh my God. Zee. Did you think I meant—”
“I didn’t think anything.”
“You absolutely did.”
“I did not.”
He starts laughing, full-body, muffin nearly falling out of his hand. “Wow. That is the most defensive I’ve ever seen a person after noon.”
Heat floods my face. I want to crawl under my desk and live there forever. “I didn’t sleep well,” I say stiffly.
“Clearly.” He wipes at his eyes. “Jesus. I was just going to offer you coffee.”
I exhale very slowly. “Right. Great. Coffee.”
He leans in, still grinning like a menace. “So not a wild night, then?”
I narrow my eyes. “Owen.”
“Okay, okay.” He raises both hands. “No questions. But for the record, if someone ever says ‘you look tired,’ and your first response is mild panic, that tells a story.”
Before I can decide whether to throw something at him, Lina appears with a folder in her arms.
“There you are,” she says. “I was starting to think Mr. Vasiliev scared you off for good.”
My stomach drops all over again.
Lina notices immediately. “Oh my God, not in a weird way. I just meant because he’s…” She gestures vaguely toward the corner office. “Him.”
Owen snorts. “See? Everybody knows he terrifies people.”
Lina lowers her voice and adds, with perfect sincerity, “Although, honestly, if he ever looked at me for more than two seconds, I think I’d simply evaporate.”
I nearly choke on air. Because yes. That is the problem. That is exactly the problem.
I grab my coffee mug just so I have something to hide behind.
Owen notices. “You are being so weird today.”
“I’m not weird,” I say into the mug.
Lina tilts her head. “Zee, your ears are red.”
Fantastic. Absolutely fantastic.
I stand abruptly. “I’m getting coffee.”
“You already have coffee,” Owen points out.
“This is backup coffee.”
He watches me stalk toward the break room, then calls after me, “For someone who didn’t have a wild night, you are handling this very interestingly.”
I raise one finger behind me without turning around.
That only makes him laugh harder.
By the time I get to the coffee machine, I’m half mortified, half amused, and fully aware that if anyone in this office actually did know what happened, I would probably combust on the spot.
Still.
As I wait for the machine to sputter to life, one thought settles in with unpleasant clarity: If a harmless muffin joke can make me react like that, I am absolutely not emotionally equipped to survive whatever happens the next time Aleksei Vasiliev looks at me.
By the time I make it back to my desk with backup coffee, my dignity has mostly returned.
Mostly.
I sit down, open my calendar, and immediately regret everything all over again.
Because there they are. Three color-coded entries lined up across Aleksei’s afternoon like a very expensive speed-dating circuit from hell.
2:00 PM — Lunch, Adriana Bell
4:30 PM — Gallery walk, Sienna March
8:00 PM — Private dinner, Camille Reeve
Three women. Three venues. Three opportunities for Mr. Vasiliev to look devastating in a suit while I professionally facilitate my own emotional destruction.
Amazing. My work email is already a disaster.
Adriana has sent two follow-ups:
Just confirming dietary restrictions. Also, does Mr. Vasiliev smile? My mother asked.
I stare at that for a long moment before typing back:
No known allergies. Smiling status to be determined in the field.
Then I delete that, because apparently, I do still value my employment.
I settle on:
No dietary restrictions. Looking forward to seeing you both this afternoon.
Sienna’s text is somehow worse.
Would he prefer a more intellectual tone or a flirtier one?
What? I blink at my screen. Then, before I can stop myself, I mutter, “Is there a drop-down menu for this?”
I type:
I’d recommend being yourself.
Then I add:
He tends to appreciate directness.
That feels true enough. It also feels like I just handed another woman a loaded weapon.
Camille, meanwhile, is sending me photos of two dresses with the caption:
Too much? Be honest.
I actually put my head in my hands for a second. Why am I a stylist now?
After an internal debate that lasts too long, I type back:
The black one. Elegant, understated, impossible to ignore.
Then I pause, reread it, and think, Wow, Zee, way to help another woman seduce your terrifying billionaire crime boss. Very emotionally healthy of you.
Before I can spiral further, a shadow falls across my desk.
I look up. Aleksei.
He’s standing there in a dark suit, one hand in his pocket, the other holding a folder he clearly doesn’t need just so he has an excuse to be at my desk. His gaze drifts over me once—quick, assessing, impossible not to feel.
“What are you doing here?” he asks.
I blink. “Working?”
His jaw tightens slightly. “I told you to take the day off.”
“I did,” I say. “For half of it.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
I lift my chin. “I was bored.”