Sergei knocked on the door once. “I’m coming in.” He didn’t wait for an answer but took his time opening the door. The muffled shriek coming from the bathroom made his lips curve in amusement, and when he stepped inside he saw Fredericka frozen next to the sink, wide-eyed, a toothbrush hanging from her mouth.

“Mind if I brush my teeth next to you?”

She sputtered incoherently in answer, which the billionaire took as an affirmative since it was what suited him. Moving forward, he stopped the moment the sides of their bodies brushed and was rewarded by a muffled whimper.

Sexual inexperience had never been a turn-on for him, but with Fredericka, it had turned into an aphrodisiac. The way she reacted so quickly and powerfully to his every movement made his own body tighten in arousal, and he could only imagine how magnificently responsive she would be when he finally got to fuck her.

Beside him, Fredericka had bent down to rinse her mouth and he gazed at her lazily, admiring the elegant length of her neck. She had already changed into pajamas – white cotton with pink polka dots. His type in the past could be summed up as beautiful and shallow, the kind that he would always be able to control. But ever since meeting Fredericka---

Practical but feminine was his new type now, the kind that wore cotton pajamas with cute pink polka dots.

“Excuse me.” Fredericka’s mumbled words drew his attention back to her, and his amusement grew when he saw how she studiously avoided his gaze.

Taking a step back to let her pass, he waited until she had taken a step forward before moving again, deliberately bumping into her.

She gasped, her gray eyes flying to him.

“Why are you so nervous, pchelka?” he teased huskily.

“I’m not,” Fredericka couldn’t help lying. In the years she had been living in her smaller-than-average apartment, she had never wished it could be bigger and more luxurious but at that moment, she did wish her apartment had more space.

More space meant she wouldn’t be constantly forced to be in close proximity with Sergei Grachyov. More space meant she wouldn’t be constantly subjected to an up-close look of the billionaire’s impressively muscular body, which was built like one of those a-hoo-shouting Spartans in 300.

And most importantly of all, more space meant she wouldn’t have to constantly feel like she was in heat, with the craziest urge to tear clothes off.

His.

Hers.

It didn’t matter.

Someone just had to be naked and then---

Shit. Fredericka ducked her head again, heat blooming in her cheeks at the appallingly lewd direction of her thoughts. “I g-gotta go.”

Watching Fredericka rush out of the bathroom like a criminal on the run, the billionaire thought, There’s nowhere for you to run, pchelka. She was the woman he wanted, and there was nothing – no one – he wanted that didn’t ever become his.

Fredericka was in the middle of pulling the covers up when she heard Sergei walk back into the bedroom. A moment later and he was standing in front of her, and her eyes widened when he started unbuttoning his shirt.

“What are you doing?” she demanded shrilly.

“I never sleep with my clothes on.” As he spoke, the billionaire had already dispensed with his shirt, leaving him bare-chested.

Her throat went dry, and her heart started hammering against her chest again.

Abs.

Too, too much abs.

“You’re staring at me again,” Sergei drawled.

Shit.

She whipped her gaze away, muttering, “It’s because you’re so ugly.”

But the billionaire only laughed, his ego immense enough to be insult-proof.

“You’re doing this to torment me, aren’t you?” she accused him.

“Not at all,” the billionaire dismissed as he placed his neatly folded shirt on the bedside table. “I’m just ticking another item off our bucket list.” Dark eyes gleaming, he looked at her, saying silkily, “See each other’s naked bodies and not be grossed out.”

Oh!

She remembered reading that line from the bucket list---

And then she saw the billionaire reach for the buttons of his pants.

Shit.

Fredericka quickly turned around and switched the light off, the same time she heard the faint but distinctive sound of a zipper being pulled down.

Shit.

Shit, shit, shit.

Fredericka scooted to the edge of the bed as she felt it dip, and her body tensed when she felt the billionaire get into bed with her.

You asked for this, Fredericka Spears.

Darkness prevented her from seeing anything, but the thought that Sergei Grachyov was lying next to her, without a stitch of clothes on, was tortuous and made her barely able to breathe. Swallowing, she asked in a small voice, “ Are you really naked?”

Instead of answering, Sergei started moving closer.

She stiffened. “Stop.” She was already lying at the very edge of the bed, and there was nowhere for her to go.

But the billionaire continued to move closer, and the bed continued to dip towards her side, forcing Fredericka to clutch the edge to prevent herself from falling. “Sergei,” she protested. “Stop---”

But it was too late.

Every inch of his hot, powerful body was suddenly pressed against her, and she bit back a whimper.

Oh God.

“Does that answer your question?” Sergei’s rough, accented growl made Fredericka shudder, the involuntary response causing her belly to come into full contact with his cock.

Ah!

Sergei sucked in his breath, his plan to arouse Fredericka backfiring as his own control over his body threatened to snap. Lust so powerful had struck him the moment he felt her womanhood rub against his erection, and now the mere scent of her fed his arousal.

Blyad.

With near-inhuman strength, Sergei managed to pull away from her and rolled to his back, breathing hard.

As soon as the billionaire pulled away, Fredericka quickly flipped on her back as well, staring into the darkness as she tried her best to calm her still-hammering heartbeat.

The bed shifted, the billionaire moving, and she swallowed hard as she sensed him locking his fingers behind his head.

Oh God.

She could easily picture how sexy he looked at that moment, with his hand behind him, his hard, naked body in full display.

Fredericka squeezed her eyes shut.

This was going to be a long, long night.

And it was.

It was almost five in the morning when sheer exhaustion made her fall asleep, only for her buzzing alarm clock to wake her up an hour and a half later. Her head pounded like the devil, and sleep beckoned like an addictive drug.

But when she turned to her side, Fredericka became wide-awake in the next second.

The other side of the bed was empty, and she sat up, looking around her, searching but finding no sign of the billionaire.

“Sergei?”

She felt silly saying his name out loud, but what was sillier was the way she actually hoped he would answer back.

But only silence answered her.

Getting up, Fredericka stepped out of her bedroom, and the little hope she had left of seeing Sergei disappeared when she still didn’t see any sign of the billionaire.

He really was gone.

The thought made her feel heavy with emotions she couldn’t and didn’t want to name, and she forcibly reminded herself that there wasn’t any reason for her to feel bad in any way. He’s just a friend, dammit.

A friend, the way Alyx and Anneke were her friends.

The other girls slept over her place, too, and there were also times when she completely missed them the morning after. That hadn’t made her cry, so the billionaire leaving her before she woke up shouldn’t bother her either.

Right?

Fredericka nodded determinedly to herself. I’m not bothered. I’m not bothered. I’m not bothered. She repeated this line over and over in the shower and on her way out. She chanted it to herself while buying herself a croissant and coffee, but by the time she made it to the office, her mental pep talk had done her no good.

She still felt like she had been dumped.

“Good morning, Ms. Spears,” Selena, Fawkes & Rogers’ nineteen-year-old receptionist, greeted her with a frosty smile.

“Morning, Selena.” She forced herself to smile politely even as she privately wondered why it was that all the women these days seemed to hate her. First, there was Sergei Grachyov’s secretary, and now it was the law firm’s receptionist, who hadn’t ever bothered to greet her in the past.

She was about to walk past reception when Selena called out to her, saying, “You have a delivery.”

Halting mid-step, Fredericka turned to face the receptionist, more surprised than anything by Selena’s disgruntled tone. “What is it?” she asked, and her confusion deepened when the younger woman’s gaze slowly moved over her from head to toe.

A moment later, and Selena flipped her hair over her shoulder, as if saying that she didn’t find Fredericka any kind of threat. “I had it sent to your office,” the receptionist murmured offhandedly. “It was taking too much space, I couldn’t work.”

“Oh. Okay.” Turning around again, Fredericka wondered what kind of work Selena was talking about that it would require the entire counter space. As far as she knew, all Selena had to do was take care of the logbook and answer calls.

When she made it to her floor, Fredericka was bewildered by the looks that went her way. In Fawkes & Rogers, connections meant everything, and since Fredericka had none to speak of, her stellar performance in the courtroom had meant little to the law firm’s senior partners. She was still a nonentity as far as they were concerned, and she had never figured in anyone’s radar---

Until now.

“Good morning, Attorney Spears.”

“Good morning, Attorney Fawkes.” Fredericka managed to keep her voice steady even as she wondered if she had somehow stepped into another dimension. In every meeting, the senior partner had always referred to her as Attorney Smith, and no one had ever found the courage to correct him.

As she made her way to her office, the same thing happened over and over, with other lawyers going out their way to talk to her.

By her count, she had been waylaid fifteen times---

Fourteen times more than the people who remembered to greet her on her birthday last year, Fredericka thought disbelievingly. And at that time, only the janitor had remembered to greet her.

When she finally reached her office, she quickly closed the door and shook her head to herself. That was incredibly weird---

And then she saw it.

An elegant arrangement of white roses on her desk, its long stems visible within the crystal vase, and a pristine white envelope tucked between the flowers.

Her heart started hammering, and her hands were trembling hard as she reached for the envelope. It was unsealed, and she had a feeling that Selena had already taken a look at its contents. When she pulled it out, the first thing she saw was the golden insignia embossed on the card---

Grachyov Enterprises, Fredericka thought. In California, the logo representing the Grachyovs’ corporate empire was as familiar to locals as Nike’s check mark was to the rest of the world, and she knew that this was the reason behind everyone’s unexpected change of attitude towards her.

Her gaze moved downwards, and she gulped at the billionaire’s one-liner message.

Have dinner with me tonight.

Your friend,

S.G.