And that’s still true, but the way I felt about it had changed after Dima left. After everyone but me had coupled up.
It had become a place I avoided rather than gravitated to.
But now my kitchen has that feel. Not that alienating one. The feeling of home.
Chelle may be small, but she’s a powerful force of nature. She fills space with her personality.
I want to renegotiate our deal. Make her stay for longer. To agree to move in and brighten my kitchen for the rest of her life.
“We need some music,” she tells me.
Despite already orgasming twice today, my dick gets hard again, remembering the way she danced in her bra and panties at her house.
I turn on my speakers and pick up her phone. “Do you have a playlist on here you like?”
Her smile nearly drops me to the floor. Wide. Generous. Grateful. “Let me see it.” She holds her hand out.
Rather than offer it to her, I step up right beside her, putting an arm behind her back and holding the screen out for her to unlock the phone and pull up her playlist. “Thank you,” I say when she’s found it, and go to her settings to sync. “Also, I know your passcode now.”
It’s guilt that makes me tell her. She doesn’t know I spied on her in her own kitchen. That I had Dima do the full-stalker package on her. She at least ought to know that I’m the kind of guy who memorizes passwords when they’re used in front of me.
She shoots me a look across the kitchen, but the music has already started, and I can see it take hold of her. There’s a little nod to her head. A tiny bounce to her shoulders. “Should I be worried?” She grates the rind from a lemon onto a small plate.
“Probably,” I tell her, returning to my job at the chopping board. “My brother is one of Russia’s best hackers. I tend to assume any information is my business since I can get to it.”
“Dima?”
I like that she remembered his name. I slice all the olives and scoop them into a small bowl for her.
“Dima. He’s the most dangerous of us all in his quiet way.”
She appears interested. “So, could he hack into, like, my email?” She slices the bare lemon in half and squeezes the juice into a measuring cup.
I make a scoffing sound. “In about five minutes’ time.”
“Is that how you knew about my dad?”
I don’t particularly want to discuss this, but she deserves the truth. “From digital research, yes.”
“That’s… creepy.” I watch a shiver run down her spine. “Just how organized is your organization?”
“I won’t discuss it with you, remember?”
She absorbs this. “I guess I just… well, it seems bigger than what I thought before. I should’ve put it together with this building and everything.”
I change the subject. “So, what’s the deal with your mom? Why isn’t she here helping you with Zane?” I knew from Dima’s research her mom was remarried and lives in Dallas but nothing else about her.
She rolls her eyes. “My mom doesn’t care about anyone but herself.”
“I’m sorry.”
She shrugs. “It is what it is. She left us when I was ten and Zane was six. She remarried and moved to Texas. End of story.”
It suddenly makes sense to me why Chelle is so determined to take on the world by herself. She hasn’t been able to rely on the people in her life who should’ve had her back.
I experience a fierce need to be the guy she can count on, but even as the desire fills me, I know she wouldn’t accept it. She doesn’t want me, and she doesn’t trust me. She only wanted sex if it fulfilled a bargain.
“What can I do now?” I ask.
“Pull the bag of spinach, grapes, and red onion from the refrigerator for the salad.”
“These go together?” I pull out the ingredients and a mixing bowl.
She eyes it distastefully. “You don’t have a salad bowl?”
“I just moved in, remember? You can order me one of those, too.”
This earns me a smile. “Yeah, you need a lot of stuff for the kitchen.”
“Whatever you need,” I tell her.
She shoots me a look I can’t quite decipher, but her phone rings, interrupting our music. She stiffens when she sees the screen, which makes a violent streak of awareness course through my body.
“Hey Zane.”
I force my fists to unclench. It’s just her brother. No one to kill.
Zane’s talking loud enough for me to hear through her phone. “Where are you?”
“Why?”
“Where are you, Chelle? You have to tell me.”
“What’s going on, Zane?” She turns her back to me, which bothers me more than I care to admit.
“I need to know where you are.”
“I’m at Nikolai’s. What’s your deal?”
“At his apartment?”
“Yes. His very lovely apartment. We’re making dinner—chicken with capers and olives. I’m fine. Everything is fine,” she says firmly. “I told you not to worry about me.”
Either Zane goes silent, or he’s speaking too quietly for me to overhear now.
No, he was silent because I hear him mutter something I can’t understand, and then she holds the phone away from her ear to look at the screen and shakes her head.
She turns back and meets my eye. “Zane has lost his mind.”
“What is it?” I’m on edge. There’s a prickle of warning running up my spine, but I don’t know how to interpret it. Chelle isn’t in danger from her brother.
Maybe I am.
Well, that’s fine. I can handle Zane, so long as I see him coming. He can’t get in the building without my permission, and I’m protected at the games. He won’t know where else to find me, unless Chelle tips him off.
“I don’t know. He was demanding to know where I was. And then he cursed and hung up.”
“He may want to kill me,” I say it mildly, but her eyes go round and wide. She looks back at her phone, then her thumbs start flying over her screen as she texts him something.
I decide not to be a dick and ask to see it.
The oven alarm goes off, and she startles, then pulls the chicken out using a dishrag. “You need hot mitts,” she tells me as she sets the tray on top of the stove.
“Order whatever you like,” I tell her again. She bustles around putting the rest of the dinner together, looking tense and unhappy.
I set the table and help with the salad. “Hey.” I rest my hands lightly on her waist from behind. “Don’t worry about Zane. I’ll handle him.”
She nods but doesn’t turn around.
I want to fix it, but I can’t. I’m the one who chose to use someone’s sister to pay off his debt. The deal was rotten from the start. Of course, we’ll all suffer the repercussions.
14
Chelle
After dinner, Nikolai tells me to put some clothes on.
“Are we going somewhere?”
“Yes. Down to the lake, so dress warmly.”
Warmth and something else—excitement, maybe—ricochet through me. I go to his bedroom to put on a pair of jeans and a warm sweater. This shouldn’t be so fun. Playing house with Nikolai.