12. Mikhail #2
I come around the desk. I stop several feet away from her and lean against the edge of the desk. I push my sleeves up my forearms and grip the wood behind me. “You have compromising information about a powerful man,” I say. “And your first instinct is to reassure him?”
Her eyes widen. For a moment, she looks genuinely offended. Then horrified. “I’m not threatening you.”
“You should at least have reminded me that you could.” She stares at me as if I have begun speaking another language.
Perhaps I have. The language of rooms she has never been invited into.
The language of leverage, debt, favor, danger.
The language of men who smile while deciding what a person is worth.
“Earlier, I humiliated you about being late.”
I lean close enough that only she can hear me. “We both know why you were late. Whose bed you were in.” It is a cruel thing to say. It should make her angry. It should make her stand up for herself. Instead, a deep blush crawls across her chest.
“You should have made me answer for that,” I say.
“You should have come in here angry. You should have asked what I intended to do about the situation. You should have made it clear you have witnesses. People behind you. A university that would have to explain why its student was removed after spending the night with the governor.”
Her throat moves. “You think they would choose me over you?” Too honest. My cruelty doesn’t anger her. It breaks something. “I don’t want trouble,” she says. “That’s all. Please. All I’m asking is that you keep what happened between us quiet.”
Irritation moves through me again. Unreasonable. Sharp.
I should be pleased. This is exactly what I told myself I wanted this morning. A clean boundary. A practical girl making a practical choice. She will work, study, go home, and one day remember me only when a certain kind of cold strikes the window.
Instead, I dislike the neat, temporary shape she’s trying to give herself in my office. “You want me not to tell anyone here that you spent the night with me,” I murmur, my eyes moving toward the darkened glass. “You want me to keep it quiet.”
“Yes.”
“Do you realize who I am?”
Her brows draw together. “You’re Mikhail Korolev.”
“No. My question is whether you understand what that name means here.”
Her grip shifts on the folder. I take it from her and place it on the desk. She tugs her skirt lower. She knows more now than she did last night. Enough to be careful. Not enough to understand the problem. “You’re rich. Is that your point? I knew that when I saw your house.”
“No, Taylor. Many men are rich.”
“So you’re powerful?”
“Warmer.”
“Important,” she guesses.
I say nothing. Our eyes remain locked in a contest. Her jaw tightens, and I lose when I look away from her eyes and glance at the curve of her throat.
“Dangerous,” she says.
Understanding enters her expression. My eyes travel down her body. Her breath changes. Her breasts lift beneath the pale blouse in a way I remember from last night. Her body doesn’t sort danger cleanly from desire. Neither does mine.
I glance toward the closed door, then back at her. “Are you certain you want to keep what happened secret?”
I adjust my cuff link, though it does not need adjustment. I’m not entirely sure why I am pushing her except that I want her to understand exactly what she has surrendered. If she is going to survive this world, she must be willing to bite. So far, she’s unwilling even to bare her teeth.
Or perhaps it’s the way her thighs appear beneath the hem of the skirt, her fingers still trying to tug it lower.
“I can make things easier for you,” I say.
Her expression goes flat. “Can you?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sure.”
“You dislike the offer.”
“I know what it costs.”
“There would be no cost.”
“A priceless offer, then,” she says sarcastically, reclaiming her folder from the desk. Her voice is steadier now. Too steady for someone twenty years old and less than an hour into her first day.
I think of my mother’s voice on the telephone. Men at her gate. Wolves smiling in daylight.
I think of Taylor in the back of my car, probably angry with herself and with me and with the world for being exactly as complicated as she feared.
“Your placement here could benefit you,” I say. “Recommendations. Access. Better assignments. Introductions. Language support. Additional paid translation work, if you need it. Safety.”
Her eyes narrow at the last word. “I don’t want any trouble.”
“That is not what I offered.”
“It’s what it sounds like.”
“You think I am trouble?”
“Yes.” Immediate. No hesitation.
She is afraid. Not of me hurting her. Not exactly. She’s afraid of becoming a story told about herself in rooms where she is not present. Afraid every success will be contaminated by suspicion. Afraid that if I offer help, she will become the kind of girl who takes it.
“I want to do my job,” she says. “I want to get good grades. I want to learn the language. I want to go home without ruining my life. That’s all.”
Each sentence comes sharper than the last. Mine, the worst part of me thinks again.
No. She is not.
I fold my hands behind my back because I do not trust them. “You believe I would ruin your life?”
She gives me a tired look, and I want to let her rest her cheek in my palm. To take the weight from her. To show her what I mean. “I think I could probably do that all by myself,” she says. “You’d just make it easier.”
“Fine.”
She blinks. “Fine?”
“I will keep it quiet.”
Relief flashes across her face so quickly she cannot hide it. I dislike that too. “Although I still believe you should have used the leverage.”
Her eyes flash. “Well, it’s early days. I still could.”
My voice lowers before I can stop it. “I would love to see that, kotik.” Kitten.
The effect is immediate. Beautiful. Her whole body goes still.
Then the blush starts. Not in her cheeks this time.
Lower. At the base of her throat, beneath the collar of that pale blouse, creeping upward from the place where I remember putting my mouth.
Slow and pink and impossible for her to hide.
She looks furious. She looks mortified. She looks, for one dangerous second, exactly as she did when she was trying not to say my name in the dark.
“Mikhail,” she whispers. A warning. A plea. A mistake.
I tilt my head.
“Governor Korolev,” I correct.