Two men I can’t trust. Two men who might wish to harm me. It wasn’t the best life decision to sleep with one of them. Oh, how I want him, though.
He’s still beautiful. I believe, deep down, he has a good soul. I believe, deep down, he’s still that boy who protected me from the bullies. Life, though, has roughened him, knocked him about, and now his surface is hard.
When I saw those scars, my God. The pain must have been immense. He was only young still, just nineteen. A boy really, and those bastards did that to him. They’re animals. I always told him to get out, but he said his uncle would protect him. Seems like he didn’t do a very good job.
I can understand why he’s blamed me all these years. He got the beating after I found him cheating on me; only days later, I left. He’s spent all this time thinking it was me.
Why is he here?
Why take my case when he’s hated me for so long?
Because maybe he loved you a little bit too, a hopeful voice whispers.
At least the shaking is subsiding. I’ve never done anything so reckless. I’ve never had such amazing sex either. It was intense, harsh, passionate. I felt alive. Really alive. I felt things I normally only get to experience when dancing.
Despite it being the stupidest thing I’ve ever done, I already want to do it again. What a rush. A high like no other.
Bohdan is danger and sin in one pretty package, and I know I won’t be able to resist him even though my life might, very literally, depend on it.
My phone buzzes, and I take it out of my bag and glance at it. My blood runs cold. Talk about a reminder of why this was such a bad idea.
I’ve had a call from Lilliana. I’m on my way to a meeting, but I’ll swing by you and fill you in. See you in five.
Jasper is coming here, and Bohdan is wearing his too-small jumper because his own shirt is ripped. I glance at the floor and fall to my knees, picking up the scattered buttons. Shit, shit, shit.
I rush to the door, open it, and pull Bohdan inside again.
“If you want round two, you only have to ask,” he says with a sneer.
I want to slap that sneer off his face. Or maybe kiss it off; I can’t decide.
“Jasper is on his way. He’s going to be here in five minutes.”
He glances down at the jumper and raises one brow. “Well, shit. He’s not going to like this, is he?”
“Bohdan, this is deadly serious. My husband is not who you might think he is.” I take a deep breath and trust in the universe because I’m as lost as I’ve ever been right now, but I need someone on my side. Will Bohdan be that person? “He’s dangerous.”
“I’m not scared of him,” he says.
“No, Bohdan,” I say softly. “But I am.”
Something steals across his face and if I didn’t think it were ridiculous, I’d say it almost looked like triumph.
“Why?” he asks.
“He hurts me. Abuses me. Honestly, you have to know two things. I did not tell anyone about what you and your uncle were doing. I swear it on the Virgin herself. I will take a damn lie detector if that’s what it takes to make you believe me.”
“Why does it matter if I believe you? I’m leaving, aren’t I? It’s what you want. I’ll get someone else to cover you.”
“It matters to me. Even if you walk out of here and I never see you again, I can’t bear thinking you believe that of me. I’d never have done that to you. No matter what.”
He narrows his eyes but blows out a breath as if he’s been holding it for the longest time. “You said there were two things.”
“The second is that my husband is quite capable of putting me through the fires of Hell if he thinks he’s been cuckolded so publicly as this. I doubt he cares if you and I have had sex, he’s not been near me in years, but he will hate we did it here. I’m taking a huge risk in telling you this, but you can’t be here in his jumper when he arrives.”
“I can’t not be here, though,” he says. Then he thinks for a moment. He looks back at me. “Did you tell him you were here?”
“No, I mean this morning when I left, but not since.”
“Fine, grab your bag, we’re leaving.”
“What?”
“We’re going to buy me a shirt.”
“But I need to rehearse.”
“Yeah, but you don’t have a set time, right?”
I don’t; that’s true enough. I nod my affirmation.
“Fine, so we get out of here now. Head to a shop nearby where I can buy a shirt and you can phone or text your husband and tell him you’re shopping.”
“He’ll think it’s really weird. I never go shopping. I hate it.”
He leans into me, takes something out of his pocket, and the next moment, my leggings are ripped right down the thigh.
“Damn pesky nails sticking out of things and ripping your clothes,” he says with a wink. “Come on, grab your bag; times-a-wasting.”
He pockets the army knife, and I follow him out the door.
As we walk past one of the dancers, she gives me a knowing look, and I die a little inside. “Ripped my damn leggings, and I need a new pair,” I say lamely.
“Wow, they call it ripping leggings these days. That’s a new one.” Barry, one of the more senior male dancers, who dislikes me, makes the joke.
One moment he’s laughing, the next he’s up against the wall, his shirt bunched in Bohdan’s fist, the material right against his throat. “What do you mean?” Bohdan asks.
Barry’s eyes go wide, startled like a deer who has heard the hunter in the woods. Too late for Barry that he only just realized there’s a predator in his midst.
“I don’t know what you mean?” Barry splutters. “It was a joke, dude.”
The hold on him tightens, and he coughs. One of the other men walks over to Bohdan, but Bohdan puts out his other arm and holds him off. “What. Are. You. Insinuating?” Bohdan asks.
Barry shakes his head. “Nothing, man. Nothing. Honestly.”
“Good.” Bohdan lets go, arranges Barry’s t-shirt, then slaps him, pretty damn hard, on the cheek as if he’s patting his cheek but with added fury. “Good, because if I hear any of you have said a word of innuendo about Mrs. Felix here, I’ll fucking ruin your spoiled little lives, got it?”
“You don’t get to threaten us,” one of the girls says. “Who do you think you are?”
He turns to her, blue eyes cold as glass. “Who do you think I am?” he says, voice low. “Or rather, maybe I should ask, what do you think I am?”
Her expression falters at his words.
“Let me tell you what I am not. I am not someone who makes idle threats. I am not someone who puts up with gossip raging about them, ever. Or about their client. There is a life or death security threat against Mrs. Felix, and you lot gossiping could make my job a million times harder. If you think I will hesitate to get into your life and fuck it up, just because you’re a nice upper-class girl, you’re dead wrong.”
On the words dead wrong, he taps her forehead with his pointer finger.
Oh my God, what is he doing? No one behaves this way here. Clearly not caring that he’s crossed all sorts of lines with my co-dancers, he grabs my hand and shoves his way past them and out the side door.