I happily snuggled up against his cozy warmth. Wrapped in his arms, I relaxed and let sleep take me. This was strangest start to any relationship I'd ever had but damn if it didn't feel promising.
Chapter Eight
"I don't think I've ever seen anyone type that fast."
I glanced over at Yuri as we drove to his estate outside Houston. My thumbs paused over my phone's touchscreen. "It's a learned skill. You should practice more."
He shook his head. "I hate cell phones. I’m old enough to remember what it was like to not be tethered to the outside world twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week."
I rolled my eyes at his age remark. "Please, you're not that old."
"I'm older than you. I'm older than Ivan and Dimitri. Hell, I was a teenager when you were born."
"And?" My eyebrows arched expectantly. "Is that a problem?"
"I don't know. Is it?"
"It's not an issue for me."
The worry lines around his mouth visibly relaxed. "Then it's not an issue for me. Now—what are you doing?"
"Trying to salvage last night's cringe-fest," I said with a grimace. "When I was getting dressed and packing my overnight bag, it occurred to me that an apology for getting blitzed and making an ass out of myself was just going to draw more attention to me."
He narrowed his eyes with interest. "So what's your brilliant plan?"
"I'm tagging these photos and adding funny, witty captions. I'm drawing attention to all the fantastic places I visited last night. Clearly, I had a damn good time. I'm sure my followers will too."
His lips pursed as he leaned over for a better look at my screen. "Clearly."
I laughed and considered the dancer. The low-slung leather pants hugged his spectacular ass so nicely. "Don't be jealous."
"There's a lot I'm willing to do for you but wearing leather pants isn't one of them."
I giggled and finished typing in the last caption on my photos. Switching to Twitter, I came up with a few quick lines including the night's specials at each club and set them to post throughout the evening.
"Will you get paid for those?"
I shook my head. "I don't have any kind of understanding with the places I visited last night. I'm pretty sure Ty gets paid to promo most of the gay hotspots in town. I wouldn't cut in on his action."
"Not even after he dragged you out and let you get drunk and take all those wild pictures?"
My gaze flicked to Yuri's face. "He was trying to be a good friend by helping me forget how craptastic I felt last night. Things just went a little too far."
"A little? You drunk-dialed me and ended up dancing on a bar sandwiched between two men sweaty, half-naked men."
"Are you really going to sit there and chastise me? What am I? Five?"
He glanced toward the window. I watched his jaw tensing and relaxing. "I don't want lecture you but you put yourself at risk last night. If Vivian and Nikolai hadn't found you and brought you home, you could have been hurt."
I wasn't sure what annoyed me more. That he was giving me a verbal hand-slap for being a bad girl or that he was right about the precarious position I'd been in last night. Annoyed, I crossed my arms. "Yeah, well, we all make mistakes."
His warm hand grasped mine and his serious, somber gaze searched my face. "You have to be more careful, Lena. When you're with me, it's complicated. There are people out there who would see you as a target for all types of schemes. If you want to go out and have fun, go out—but do it at Faze where I know Big V or Kelly will keep an eye on you or let me arrange a bodyguard to keep you safe."
My eyes widened. "A bodyguard? Yuri, come on! Nobody is going to bother me. I don't have anything they could possibly want."
"You are important to me. People will look at you and see dollar signs. It's an ugly fact that goes along with dating me."
I heard the regret in his voice and placed my other hand over his. "That's okay. I'm willing to deal with it."
Smiling, he lifted my hands and kissed my knuckles. Hand in hand, we rode the rest of the way in silence. When we pulled through a gated entry, I got my first clue that this was an incredibly exclusive enclave. Ivan and Erin lived in a fabulous gated community but this place? Holy hell. It was jaw-dropping.
The huge mansions were set far back from the main road and accessible down private roads. Most were hidden by lush trees but a few had visible facades. We turned down a paved road and drove almost two minutes before I got my first look at Yuri's home.
My jaw dropped. The place was massive. "Jesus, Yuri. Do you think you have enough space in that museum?"
He looked chagrined. "It's a little bigger than I'd initially planned."
"I don't even want to imagine what your electricity bill is like in the summer!"
"After seeing Vivian's sticky notes on all the light switches, I'm tempted to invite her over to let her label all of mine too. I bet I could cut twenty percent off my bill if I could get my staff to turn off lights when they leave a room."
Considering the size of the house, a twenty percent cutback would probably be more money than I earned in an entire month. "Do you have a large staff?"
"I haven't hired a full staff yet. There's only Feodor at the house full-time."
"Feodor?"
"He's an older man that I've known since I was a boy. He used to run my Moscow house. I don't spend much time there anymore so I brought him here to take care of this new place. Other than Feodor, there are the bodyguards who live there full-time. Tony and a couple of other drivers on contract come by every morning. I also have a handful of housekeepers and landscapers on contract with a staffing company. Eventually, I need to find the time to sit down and find permanent staff."
"So you're not living here all the time?"
He shook his head. "When I'm in Houston, I spend most of my time at the penthouse downtown. It's centrally located to my business interests and closer to the airport if I need to leave at a moment's notice."
Hoping I didn't sound too pathetic, I asked, "How often are you in Houston?"
"Typically? Three weeks out of the month. I travel to London and then Moscow the first week of every month to handle business affairs there."
"Oh."
"We'll make it work." He brushed a few wisps of hair from my eyes. The intimate touch made my tummy swoop. "You could always come with me."
I started to turn him down by reminding him that I had to work but then I remembered that I no longer had a job. Other than keeping my blog and social media platform active for the advertising money, I had nothing going for me. "That's a tempting offer."
"Have you ever been to London?"
I shook my head. "That farthest I've traveled is New York on the east coast and Seattle on the west coast."
"Do you have a passport?" When I nodded, he smiled and gave my hand a quick squeeze. "Then you will come with me next week."
Taken aback, I hurriedly protested, "Yuri, I can't just drop everything and fly to London. I mean—that's expensive."