Chapter 10
“Eat the damned curry already.”
Nala stared at the plate of rice and brownish sauce stuffed with carrots and onions. An unknown scent claimed her, and she wasn’t sure she liked the foreign spice or not. “Except what if it’s too hot? What if I cry again because my mouth is on fire?”
“That’s why I got the mildest one available. I’m pretty sure they’re laughing about us in the kitchen.”
“Oh, excuse me, my PNW sensibilities…”
“You mean your inability to eat anything slightly spicy?”
“Okay, Mr. Fresno.”
“Being able to withstand the hottest spices is a time-honored Californian tradition. Don’t let the yuppies tell you otherwise.”
“I can’t believe I’m sleeping with a Californian. I’m losing all of my street-cred.”
Vincent reached across the table and latched onto her wrist. “I may have upped the property taxes when I bought my loft, but at least I live there and am contributing financially and socially to my immediate community.”
“Holy shit. You know how to spear an Oregonian right in the heart.”
“Baby, we are the Romeo and Juliet of House Bear and House Beaver. Together we can accomplish anything between our rivaling families.”
“Must I remind you that they died in the end?”
“Eat the damned curry already.”
Nala shook his hand off her and leaned back in her booth, picking up a large spoon and dipping it into the curry. I hope I don’t regret this. Under Vincent’s watchful gaze, Nala put a small amount in her mouth, swallowing it as quickly as possible.
“See? It’s not that spi…”
“Fuck!” Nala nearly knocked over Vincent’s water glass as she grabbed her own, downing it in record time. When she polished that off, her tongue continued to burn, forcing her to grab his water and make short work of it too. “Fuuuck.”
“Amazing.” Vincent scooped some curry in her spoon and ate the whole thing in one bite. He didn’t even wince, let alone take more than one sip of water remaining in his glass. “It’s barely spicy at all, and yet here you are.”
“Shut uuuuup.” Nala yanked her spoon back and scooped up plain rice, hoping the bland taste of it would take over any spice left in her mouth. “I do not want to hear it.”
“You know, I had some Russian food once. It was fairly spicy, even by my standards.”
“Shut up. Shut up!” Nala collapsed across her leather bench, rousing the attention of a group of friends dining out late nearby. One of them began to laugh. Probably because Nala’s breasts were about to spill from the top of her corset. Vincent’s baggy jacket could only cover so much from this angle. “My mother cooked the blandest Russian food in the universe. My father was always dumping stuff in it at the dinner table.”
“I’m sure.”
Nala sat back up. When Vincent pulled up to this late-night eatery on Burnside, she did not expect to be dying on the bench – from food that was too spicy, no less. Yet when Vincent insisted that she try some traditional Indian cuisine offered at the restaurant, she didn’t want to say no. After all, she was Nala Nazarov, a woman who never said no to a challenge. Not usually. Vincent’s food challenges may be too much for her.
“Dare I ask you to take me to a Mexican restaurant one day?”
“Only if you can handle real Mexican food.”
“I might surprise you.”
“Doubtful.”
He said it with a shit-eating grin that Nala didn’t often see on his face. She picked up her napkin and tossed it at him. Naturally, it only made it halfway across the table before dying an honorable death on top of the curry.
“Aw,” Vincent said, plucking it off so he could eat more food. “Should I get you something else? I’m sure they have crackers for a palate as delicate as yours.”
She didn’t take his bait this time. “I want another beer.” She pointed to her empty glass. “The only calories I need right now.”
Vincent tracked down a waiter and got Nala her refill. This interruption to their good time meant she had a few seconds to regroup and think back on the past hour. Vincent brought them here, a hole in the wall by billionaire standards, but he was familiar enough with the menu that he was probably coming here to eat by himself long before he became an official billionaire. There was something endearing about his continued patronage.
Once her refill came, Nala put on her serious face and pulled out her cell phone. Vincent took an immediate interest, returning his countenance to his usual grim features. Is it bad that I think both sides of him are hot? “Here,” she said. “These are the pics I took in his office. I’m gonna show you now before I forget later and you’re at work or something.”
Vincent glanced around the sparse restaurant before taking her phone and swiping through her gallery. His brows furrowed as he stared at the paper Nala uncovered and the various pictures hanging on the wall. “Not surprising, but weird. That guy is weird.”
“At least now we’ll know what he’s doing if he wants a picture of us next time.”
“Indeed.” Vincent forwarded the pics to himself before handing the phone back. His own phone buzzed with a message in his pocket, which made Nala stifle a tipsy giggle to rival one of Robin’s. “Speaking of next time, I have it on a few of the guys’ authority that we’re going to Mexico for a weekend. You better clear your schedule.”
“Mexico? Holy fuck, dude, I ain’t got a passport!”
“I know. You need to apply for one tomorrow.”
“Don’t those things take like… six months to process?”
“Turns out that Sebastian is wrapped up in that sort of thing. I talked to him about it, and he said if I use his name when I call up the department to talk about your application, they can put you at the top of the processing list.”
Nala frowned. “Is it wrong that I kinda wish I couldn’t get a passport in time so we wouldn’t have to go?” Nothing sounded worse than dealing with The Aviary in the air… and in a foreign country, even if it would be a billionaire’s cocoon. Nala would officially feel trapped, and there was almost no worse feeling than that. I would really be a bird in a cage. She ran her fingers along the collar around her neck, searching for the security the nightingale pendant provided.
“It’s not wrong, but it won’t help us any. If we have to bow out because of something like that… it would look suspicious.”
“Why?”
“Because Crow might wonder why I’ve never taken you abroad, especially if we’ve been dating over six months now. We have to keep our lies in order.”
“I guess.”
“Besides…” Vincent took out his phone and looked at the photos he sent himself. “This must be the couple who moved abroad and had to quit The Aviary because of that. The ones mentioned in that paper you grabbed.”
“Yeah. Looks like they moved to Germany.”
“That’s not weird in itself. What’s weird is Crow and whoever he’s corresponding with talking like this.”
“What does it mean?”
Vincent squinted, as if that would help him decipher the words better. “I don’t know, but if I read between the lines, it sounds like Crow instigated the move himself. The funds could refer to the couple’s payoff to give Crow a wide berth, but it seems awfully low for people as rich as them. I am more inclined to believe the money is for the person he’s talking to in this letter. Who is probably a…”
He didn’t say it. He didn’t have to. Nala was frozen in her seat, beer hovering against her lips. An assassin. The same person he paid to kill Desirée? Tasha? Any other number of people? Or did he have a network of assassins? How did that even work?
“Let’s not talk about this right now.” Vincent took her hand and rubbed his thumb on top of hers. “I brought you out here to help you cheer up. Is it working at all?”
Nala shrugged. “Well enough. Thanks. Beer always helps.”
She said that, and yet the thing helping her most was Vincent’s casual presence. Spoiling her. Cracking jokes that were so unlike him. Doing everything he could to take her mind off things – and probably his too. I guess we do need each other like that. The more they came to depend on each other, the more Nala worried things were growing deeper between them.
“So I have a question,” Vincent said, folding his napkin ala origami. “Your last name is Nazarov. Shouldn’t it be Nazarova?”
“Ugh.” Not the first time Nala had been asked that. She pushed her hair behind her ears and pretended that she wasn’t annoyed. “Yes, but when my parents immigrated they decided to standardize their last names to keep the US government happy. When my mother left the Motherland, her last name was Volkova. When she signed documents in America, however, she suddenly had the same last name as her husband. Well, almost. She still goes by Nazarova because Nazarov was too weird for her. She would rather see herself as her father-in-law’s daughter than a man. Or something. Whenever she ranted about it, it was in Russian and I didn’t really understand it.”
“And you and your sister?”
“We didn’t have those preconceived gender and naming notions when we were born, right? So I was a Nazarov from birth and my sister’s A was dropped from her last name when she was brought over. She only remembered Nazarov.”
“Fascinating.”
“I guess.” Nala shrugged. “I guess I should be impressed from a feminist perspective, but it’s still your father’s name and patriarchal. Plus, I’m glad my mother almost had the same last name as me. She had a hard enough time communicating with school admins when I was a kid. My father was fluent in English when they came over, but she had to learn almost from scratch.”
“My parents are the most Anglo-Saxon you can get. Although I hear Koreans use similar naming conventions in their culture.”
“I honestly have no idea.” Nala had heard that before. Because people always mentioned that as a way to sound smart. She wanted them to drop this nonsense right now – she was too tired, and now too tipsy to deal with it.
“Never mind then.” Vincent put his hand on her again, this time stroking the top of her knuckles. Was that supposed to calm her? Maybe… “I’m taking a day off two days from now. I’ll be between projects and I like to take even a small break to reset my brain. I was thinking… why don’t we do something together?”
“You mean like a date?”
“Sure. Nothing fancy… well, nothing fancier than going to the Japanese gardens the other day.”
“I, well…” Nala stared at the crane Vincent created from a paper napkin. “Why do you want to go on a date with me? I thought we weren’t serious like that.”
“Who said a date is serious? Okay, don’t think of it as a date. Think of it as hanging out for a day.”
“While you pay for everything, I’m sure.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Because you’re still paying me a grand a week to be with you. Nala wasn’t super into blurring their lines. It made her feel less like a partner in crime, and more like an escort. A prostitute, if she wasn’t mincing words. “Sure. I guess. Nothing fancy, though. Hanging out. I have that day off.”
She grabbed her phone off the table and opened her satchel to put it away. Time for another neurotic check. Wallet. Tampons. Change. Old cell phone. Key…
Wait.
Key?
Nala started pulling things out of her satchel, piling them on the table while Vincent continued to eat their curry. He watched her with mild interest, but once Nala emptied the whole contents of her satchel and still couldn’t find the spare key to Vincent’s loft, her stomach somersaulted into her throat.
“What is it?” Vincent sounded way too lackadaisical.
“Your key… the key you gave me to your loft isn’t in here…” Nala turned her satchel upside down and hoped the key would come falling out. “What the fuck!”
“Don’t worry about it. It was tiny and you didn’t have a key ring on it yet.” Why was he shrugging? Didn’t he understand what a big deal this was? “I’ll get another one made for you.”
“You better change your locks too!”
“I will. Do you know what the odds are of someone even knowing where it goes, let alone trying to break into my house?”
“Doesn’t matter. You’re rich. You should get your locks changed.”
“I will. Sheesh.”
They left shortly after, Nala still uptight enough to question whether or not Vincent should be driving, let alone down Burnside at night. He reminded her that he had two sips of her beer and usually drove more intoxicated than that thanks to all the contact highs one got wandering through downtown Portland on a regular basis. “Most of my clients come in high as shit now,” he explained, starting his car. “It’s like going to the Netherlands for a ton of people here.”
This time they actually entered his loft after pulling into his parking space. Nala clung to Vincent’s arm to keep her body steady. She wasn’t drunk, but she was tipsy enough that walking up in those boots made life more uncomfortable.
Like brother and sister they took turns showering, the hot water refreshing Nala so she no longer thought of the night or tottered about on tipsy legs. She suddenly had the munchies and came out to find Vincent heating up leftovers in the kitchen to snack on.
It was too late to watch TV or see what it was like playing video games with this guy. Instead, Nala announced she was going to bed, not sticking around to see what Vincent had to say about that as she went upstairs and curled up in his bed.
She faced away from his side, but she still smelled remnants of that cologne and the way he naturally smelled. Is it so bad? Not according to her addled brain.
Within the half hour, Vincent climbed in next to her, turning off every light before lying down with a heavy sigh. They were both quiet the first five minutes. Perhaps Vincent thought that Nala was already asleep, but in truth, she stared at the dark windows, trying her damndest to not think of what happened earlier that night.
She didn’t protest when Vincent’s arm looped around her midsection and drew her into his embrace. Why didn’t she protest? Because this is the safest I’ve felt all day. How dangerous was it that the only way she could feel safe now was in some man’s arms?
Not just any man’s. Vincent Lane’s.
“I’m sorry about today,” he muttered into her ear. Rumbles of desire took her over, and it was all she could do to keep from turning farther into his arms. “I wish I could make things easier.”
You already do. Nala ran her fingers along his arm, feeling the hairs growing from his skin. She touched his wrist, where he was always fiddling with something. I couldn’t do this without you. She clamped her mouth shut before she accidentally said it out loud.
“If there’s anything I can do…”
Nala thought of how she felt that night… before discovering Hawk outside their assigned room. Aroused. Powerful. Like she was in control of her own destiny and half the world by extension. If only it really worked that way.
She turned over, feeling Vincent’s body move slightly away from her to accommodate her movements. “You’re already doing it.”
He held her tighter, letting her retreat deep against him, feeling his strength, his heat, the aura emanating from his heart as it beat against her cheek.
Vincent began with a kiss to her head, fingers massaging the back of her neck until she was lulled into serenity. Then he kissed her nose, pushing her away far enough to bury his hand beneath her shirt and feel the bottom of her breasts. Nala whimpered, but did not protest once more. She looped one leg over his and felt him press forward, lips on hers and fingers pinching her nipple.
It was the gentlest thing he had ever done to her. Nala wrapped her hand around his neck, holding him to her, waiting for the real Vincent to erupt and take her as he always did.
Except he never did. Because this was also the real Vincent, a man who could be as tender as he was rough with a woman he cared for.
I’m the first woman he’s probably been this way toward since… Nala couldn’t think about it. Thinking about Desirée dragged up too many bad memories. Memories as old as her childhood. Memories as old as when she first met Vincent only a month ago.
“Don’t worry, Nala. I’ll make sure you don’t think about anything else tonight.”
She laughed against his lips. “Idiot. I’m going to be thinking about you.”
“Is that bad?”
Nala tightened her legs around him. “Not at all. Just make sure I’m only thinking good things about you, Mr. Lane.”
“Ms. Nazarov, you flatter me.”
“Mmhmm.” She muffled any further sounds against his mouth, inviting him to taste the inside of hers – and perhaps the back of her throat, where he had been only a few hours ago.
But this wasn’t quick. This wasn’t powerful. This wasn’t even the slightest bit rough. This was everything on the opposite end of the spectrum. This was real lovemaking.
The thought should have scared Nala. Yet as Vincent slowly undressed not only her but himself as well, she came to realize that, yes, this was exactly what she needed right now. She needed to feel his strong, protective body overtake hers, gently, but so assuredly that she would never have to worry about a thing again. Or at least for that night.
I am doing the most dangerous thing possible. Snooping around Crow’s office, going up against possible assassination attempts and having her identity discovered was nothing compared to making love to Vincent, a man who had the power to completely uproot everything she ever thought about herself and what she wanted to achieve in her life.
A blip of her heart realized that she was falling in love with him, and no matter how much she tried to quash it, she knew it was impossible. Nobody could stop love. Nobody could have stopped her from loving her parents, from adoring her big sister who always watched out for her… and now not even the force of the world could stop her cold heart from thawing under the heat of Vincent Lane’s body.
“You’re…” It was the only thing Vincent said. By that point he was halfway inside her, taking his time, biding his time until she was completely ready to accept him. Once she was, however, she felt the sky split open and reveal a chasm of stars she had never seen before. Because I never bothered to look up before now. Tasha the romantic scientist would have told her that was because she had a different outlook on life. Not anymore.
Nala held him close, feeling him roll gently into her over and over again. She was falling in love. She loved how rough he could be with her. She loved this tender side too. Vincent was learning exactly what she needed, and when. If that didn’t say something about the way he felt for her… but they were both the most unlikely people to ever admit it. That session in the car earlier was the first time Nala had cried in weeks. When was the last time Vincent cried?
Crying out in ecstasy didn’t count. Yet that’s exactly what they both did when their climaxes came together, Nala reaching up to touch those blissful stars out of her reach.
She wouldn’t be allowed to wrap her hand around one of those until what she set out to accomplish was over. She knew that, and yet she wanted to race ahead of herself anyway.
I love this man. It was one of the only times she would allow herself to think it without a drop of guilt or shame. She wondered if he thought the same way about her.