“Is that—is that thefool?”Nicolai whispered near my ear.
My lungs were full of razor blades as I tried to breathe. I couldn’t say anything. I couldn’t even croak.
“That’s the fool, isn’t it?” Nicolai demanded.
Shakes started in my ankles and then rattled my whole body. “His name is Jimmy.”
“That’swhat left you at the altar?” he muttered to me.
Terrified shakes rattled my body and flopped my head as if I were nodding.
“Seems like you traded up,” Nicolai whispered.
My pathetic attempt at laughing turned into a snort and a sniffle. “Let’s just go.”
But my feet didn’t pull up from where the soles of my shoes seemed gum-stuck to the flat carpeting.
“They don’t look particularly fashionable,” Nicolai said, his voice low like he was musing about it.
That was a hell of an understatement. “They’re engineers.”
“How industrious of them. Perhaps I’ll buy the company he works for and fire him.”
Nicolai’s snark broke the horror logjam in my head, and I snickered a little.
Before I could even figure out what Nicolaiwas doing, he reversed his hold on my hand and turned my wrist, spinning me to face him.
I was instantly off-balance, falling sideways as my weight went over the side of my high-heeled sandal, but Nicolai’s strong forearm behind my back gathered me against his chest before my ankle even tweaked.
As close as he’d held me all evening, this full-frontal embrace from toes to nose, my thighs pressing against his legs, my chest smushed against his suit, wasmore.
Jimmy looked up from his poker chips in his palm, twisting his head to look for the motion that had caught his eye, andhe saw me.
Nicolai’s gaze dropped to my lips and then back up to pour into my eyes. He announced to everyone around us, “Have I told you thishourhow much I absolutely adore you,Mrs. Romanov?”
His words caught me off guard, and I snapped my gaze to him. Happiness and hope filled me like light before I had a chance to stop it because he was obviously playing with me. “I—I?—”
While I was trembling in Nicolai’s arms, he pivoted and, with firm pressure on my hand that assured me this guy knew how to lead,he dipped me.
I’d had enough dance classes in high school to hang on and point my toe.
Nicolai grinned. His delighted smile was absolute mischievous joy, the first time I’d seen that smile in a while. He whispered, “Touch my face with your left hand to show himmyring on your finger.”
My eyes started to slide right because Jimmy would be absolutely horrified at this public display of affection. HehatedPDA, derided it, sneered at it, for himself andeveryone else.
Nicolai whispered to me, “Don’t look at him. Eyes on me, because I’m only looking at you.”
I looked into Nicolai’s eyes, the calm, teal Caribbean water of his eyes, and he smiled. “That’s my girl. Now show him the ring, claiming you asmine.”
I did it.
I lifted my left hand bearing those diamond-encrusted wedding rings that weighed on my finger, and I caressed his cheek. The slightest dark stubble shaded his jaw.
“Good girl.” Nicolai’s mussed dark strands were dangling around his temples and forehead, and that mischievous sparkle still glimmered in his teal eyes. “You’re okay with this?”
I nodded, vibrating my skull up and down to try to be subtle but to assure him that I was absolutely okay with being petty as far as Jimmy Johnson was concerned.
As petty as possible, actually.
