“Good. Do that.” Nyx underhand tossed her a single cashew, which bounced off Nikolett’s forehead. “You were supposed to catch it in your mouth.”
“I’m not a dog!”
“No, you’re not. A dog would have caught it.”
“I could have you removed from this room,” Nikolett declared with a dramatic wave of her hand. A voice in the back of her mind was warning her that if she tried to sit up, she was going to find out that she was past tipsy and fully drunk.
Nyx snorted. “By whom? My husband? He might do it if he thought you really needed rescuing from me, but this was partially his idea.”
“Getting me drunk?”
“No, getting you to talk about your feelings.”
“I could get Iacob. Or Maxim… Wait, did you see him and Elena?”
“We should put them in a trinity. Just to see what happens.”
“Forming trinities is a sacred duty,” Nikolett declared seriously. “We can’t form trinities just because they clearly like each other but are being awkward and will never figure out the attraction is mutual and we want to see what happens if we do…” She stopped, having lost control of the sentence. “If we did, it would be…” Her mind was blank. “What’s the trope called?”
“Forced proximity.”
“Forced proximity! Yes, that. We can’t form trinities just to do a forced proximity trope to see if we can make people fall in love.”
“That is quite literally one of the better reasons for a marriage I’ve heard. Far better than old asshole wants to fuck a younger woman.”
Nikolett winced, but Nyx’s expression didn’t change as she popped another cashew into her mouth.
Once more, Nikolett held out her hand for a nut. Nyx hugged them against her chest. “Talk or you get no snacks.”
“But I want snacks.”
“Talk.”
“I need food. I’m weak from hunger.” Nikolett rested her wrist on her forehead and sighed dramatically.
Nyx snorted, then placed exactly one cashew into her hand. Nikolett popped it into her mouth.Mmm, salt.
“Why do you love him?” Nyx’s tone was softer, more serious.
Part of Nikolett wanted to beg her to go back to teasing and banter. This was the most fun she’d had in…well, she couldn’t remember.
But maybe if she answered the question, she could stop loving him. Maybe Nyx could help her counter every reason for loving Eric until she thought and reasoned her way out of loving him.
“I have to sit up for this.”
Nikolett carefully lowered her bad leg down and sat up. As predicted, the world tipped and tilted. Once the earth returned to its normal horizontal position, she scooted back, resting against the arm of the couch. She could have half-turned to look at Nyx, but instead stayed as she was, both legs stretched out in front of her, Nyx in her peripheral vision.
Three large windows across from her gave a view of the skyline of Bucharest. The original design for the house hadglass walls along most of the southern and eastern sides to take advantage of the slight rise her home sat on and the view it provided.
Even when the house was being built, the glass had been declared a security risk and Dimitri had the plans edited from floor-to-ceiling glass to large windows.
Since then, they’d been upgraded twice—once to bullet-resistant glass with a privacy coating that made the windows almost like mirrors from the outside, and more recently to smart bullet-resistant glass that was wired into the security system. With the click of a button, liquid crystals within the glass could turn it from clear to translucent and then to fully opaque. If the security system was activated, all the windows in the house that didn’t have shutters went white completely, obscuring the view inside.
This room didn’t have metal security shutters, just the smart, bullet-resistant glass. Vadisk had made her run drills—seeing how fast she could get from this room into her bedroom and then activate the lockdown of that room from the inside. They’d run the drills until it was instinct—if the windows went white, even if the audio alarm wasn’t sounding—Nikolett ran for her bedroom and locked herself in.
“Do you think Vadisk is happy?” Nikolett asked abruptly.
“Vadisk?” Nyx pursed her lips as she thought. “Yes, I think he is. It sounded like he was already in love with his Americans. Are you worried about him?”
