NATASHA
As I walked out of my last class for the day, I turned my phone off silent and saw I’d missed a call from Nic. I returned it, hoping he wasn’t putting me off about dinner that night. I’d made all the adjustments to the bond and I was looking forward to seeing how he reacted to them all.
“Finally,” he said as he answered the phone. “I need to see you. I have my driver waiting in your dorm parking lot. Bring your notes or whatever you wanted to discuss. Just grab those things and come on. No need to change clothes or primp for me or anything. Just hurry and get to me. And talk to no one. Promise me.”
“Why?” I asked as I got to my car and got in. “And I have those things in my car. Why don’t I drive to wherever you are? It’ll save your driver the time taking me back home later.”
“No!” he said, already sounding pissed. “Wait! Yes, do that. Come straight to me, Natasha. Don’t stop anywhere, please. Come to my home.”
“Jeez,” I said as I got behind the wheel. “You sound a bit dramatic.”
“Don’t,” he said, sternly. “Don’t do that right now. I need to see you and explain things to you. So be careful as you drive but try to hurry. No dawdling. Understand?”
His intense tone had me thinking maybe something really was wrong. So I decided to put on my good girl hat and be the woman he seemed to need me to be at that time. “Yes, sir. I am on my way to you as we speak. See you soon.”
“Thank you. Goodbye.” He ended the call and I tossed my phone on the passenger seat.
I had no idea what could have the man so riled up. I did think it might get in the way of us having a real discussion about the new rules for the bond. And I desperately wanted to discuss those things with him.
The car ride took nearly an hour with traffic and when I made it up to his penthouse, I was met by the doorman who wore a wide smile. “Hello, Miss Greenwell. What a pleasure it is to see you again. And so soon. Please come in, the master is in his office. Have a seat and I shall get him.”
I took a seat on the white leather sofa and placed my purse and the box on the coffee table in front of me. The way the doorman, or butler, or whatever he was, called Nic, the master, had me laughing inside.
That man liked to have the entire enchilada when it came to the lifestyle he was a part of. Even down to living his home-life like an eighteenth century Lord.
Gazing around the eloquently furnished living room, I noticed even more about the way he liked to live. Old paintings, of what looked to be his ancestors, lined one wall. The man in the middle of them had to be his father.
It was larger than the rest and much newer. Such a distinguished looking group of men, I don’t recall ever seeing. His roots were deep. I supposed he could follow them straight back to Germany. His accent was American with the slightest hint of German to it. It was one of the many things that made him so damn sexy and dominant.
That curt way he spoke. It jolted me almost every time when he’d bark a word at me.
“Natasha!” he said from behind me. Jolting me yet again and I jumped to my feet and turned to see him making swift strides to get to me.
I walked towards him to close the distance and found his arms around me, holding me close. His hand cupped the back of my head and held it to his chest where his heart was thumping like mad.
Wrapping my arms around him, I felt him relax a little. “Nic, what’s wrong?”
“My father is coming over in just a little while.” He let me go but grabbed my hand and led me out of the room. I looked over my shoulder as we passed the things I’d laid on the table.
“Nic, I shouldn’t leave that lying around,” I said as I gestured to the white box.
“Nonsense, they’re fine there. I want to talk to you in private.” He continued to pull me with him until we came to a hallway and he opened the first door on the left.
A massive bed sat in the middle. Dark oak wood made up the canopy. Ornate carvings ran down each square post, matching the canopy. The room was all him. Manly, dark, and exquisite.
“Your bedroom, I suppose,” I said as he sat me down on the comfortable bed. I ran my hand over the jacquard print on the deep green fabric which covered the bed. “Is this made of real down?”
“Yes, now I need to tell you about what happened today. I met your father,” he said, making my head snap up.
“Why?” I asked in near horror. My father would never approve of what we were doing. Surely, he didn’t track my father down for some reason.
“He came to one of our warehouses. He’s taken on the case the FBI is struggling to put together on my family’s company. Nearly my entire family makes their living from that company. If we lost it, it would devastate so many people who mean everything to me.” His hands moved over my head, stroking me like a puppy in an effort to calm himself.
“Are you doing anything wrong?” I asked. If he was, then my father would catch him. My father was like a bloodhound. He didn’t stop until his cases were solved.
“No, we’re clean as far as I know. My father has always kept things extremely kosher where the business is concerned. It affects too many people in his family to mess around with after all. I’m not worried about that. I’m worried about your father figuring out about you and me,” he said then sat on the bed next to me.
So there it was. He was breaking things off with me because of my father. I understood but I wasn’t happy about it at all. “I see what you’re saying, Nic. I understand your position. I will leave you alone.”
“Leave me alone?” he asked. “No, that’s the last thing I want you to do.”
I was relieved. “Oh, so what do you want?”
“I want you to tell him about us. I want you to tell him you and I met at that interview and we hit it off and are madly in love. I want you to tell him you’re moving in with me and that we are very serious about one another. You can be the person who gets our company off the FBI’s hit list.” His smile was huge and I found it incredible for him to ask such a thing from me.
“You want me to lie to my father?” I asked as I nervously twisted my hands in my lap. “He’s like a human lie detector, Nic. You don’t know the man. He’ll see right through me and when he does he will go after you harder than he would if I was never brought into your little game.”
“I don’t think so.” He looked at me with those dark eyes and took my hands in his. “I think you do love me, Natasha.”
I choked with his words. I felt something for the man but love was too strong of a word. I wanted more than only sex from him but I wasn’t sure I’d ever get that.
The sound of the doorbell ringing had me looking away from him. “But you don’t love me, Nic. And I’m not sure if I love you or merely lust after you at this point. We will never be able to pull such a thing off. It’s better if we stop going any further with our bond until things are settled between you and the FBI.”
“My father is here.” He got up and held out his hand. I took it and went with him. “I’m not stopping things with you now. I can’t. This will work. I am pretty good at acting. And we can still have our agreement, we’ll enjoy that in private, and in public we can be a couple of star-crossed lovers. It will work. And you working for the company is the cherry on top.”
I knew he was wrong. I knew it but he was so sure and upbeat and it felt whimsical as he took me down the hallway to meet his father.
“Father, I’m so glad you made it. I have great news for our company. I do believe we’ve found us something to finally end our battles with the FBI,” Nic said as he took me into the living room.
His father was standing at the bar, swirling his finger around in a short glass of clear liquid. Vodka, I guessed. His light blue eyes penetrated mine as we looked at one another.
“Are you bringing home people you should not be, Nicholai?” he asked his son as he continued to stare at me.
I never let my eyes fall away from his. I held them on him until Nic pulled my face to his and kissed me on the mouth. I was shocked he’d do such a thing. “No, Father. I am not bringing home people I shouldn’t. My good fortune was found at the BBC one night a couple of weeks ago. I had no idea who I was branding that night. The daughter of an FBI agent. The man who has taken over the investigation of our company.”
“I don’t see that as a good thing, Nicholai. I see that as a thing that should end, immediately.” His father took a drink from the glass and moved to sit on the sofa.
Nic grabbed two beers from the mini fridge at the bar and opened them both, handing me one of them. He took my hand and led me to sit on the love seat across from his father. He pointed at the white box. “She and I have a bond. We’re about to sign it.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” his father said as he shook his head. “I doubt her father would approve of such a thing. Most don’t.”
“Her father doesn’t need to know about this part of us. He only needs to know about the part of us that is a happy couple. And she is an intern at the company already so it will work out perfectly. You’ll see,” Nic said with a certainty that his father nor I felt at all.
But I kept my mouth closed as his father was an intimidating man. “A happy couple?” he asked. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean we will come out as a real couple,” Nic said, as his father frowned.
“She is your whore, Nicholai. She is not the material wives are made of,” his father’s words were harsh and I was appalled.
“You do not know her, Father,” Nic defended me. “She was duped into going to the club by Daniella Day, who is her dorm mate.”
“You branded her that night, Nicholai. I was there too if you recall. She allowed you to fuck her that night. I noticed it wasn’t even long after her arrival. That is a whore, son.” He leveled his eyes on me and I looked right back at him with anger in mine. “He may not know what’s best for our company but I do. You and he are through you little bitch.”
“Father!” Nic shouted as he jumped up. “That’s not up to you and I will not stand for you calling her names.”
His father didn’t bother to get up as he took another drink then said, “You are CEO only because I am allowing that, boy. Now sit your ass down and confer with me as a gentleman would or I will have your job.”
I pulled at Nic’s hand and he sat down. His entire body was shaking and I had no idea what to do about anything. “It’s okay,” I whispered to him.
“Okay?” his father asked with a deep laugh. “It’s most definitely not okay. So you have an internship at our company, do you, girl?”
“I do, sir,” I said in an attempt to get him to see I knew some of the rules the kind of man he was required.
“Perhaps that could be of use to us. Perhaps you could tell your father you’d be a spy on the inside for him,” his father said as he looked up, thinking. “If he thought you were taking care of his dirty work, he’d back off and end our troubles. But if your father is anything like most, he will find out everything he can about my Nicholai and he will find out he’s in the BBC and he will come at us with a vengeance only a father can.”
I looked at Nic as I knew what his father was saying was true. “He’s right you know.”
The look on Nic’s face went straight to my heart. He was devastated. And I got the feeling this loving couple he was saying he wanted us to portray was anything but a lie. I thought he was falling in love with me and thought that might be a great way out of the bond and all that went with it.
“I’ll quit the club,” he said as he looked at me. “I’ll end my membership today. How could your father come at me for anything I did in the past? All I have to say is that I was a troubled man until I met you and you pulled me out of a sinful life and into one that was good and wholesome.”
His father and I asked at the same time, “You’d quit the club?”