I saw the moment Nicolai understood, his slow blink and the lowering of his head.“Oh.”
“Yeah.And I was so caught up in everythingJimmywanted, everythinghis familywanted, everythinghis churchwanted me to be, butit didn’t matter.He fell in love withsomeone else,in a heartbeat.No matter what I tried to do,it didn’t matter.”
“Oh, Lexi.” Nicolai wrapped an arm around me and pulled me against his warm shoulder. His voice was quiet, soft, when he asked, “Did you love him?”
I laid out the evidence like a cop. “I changed my whole life for him. When I was in high school, I wanted to be an actor. Stage, not screen, though I would have done anything I was cast in. But when Jimmy and I started dating during sophomore year, when I met his family, they didn’t like that I wanted to be an actress. I wantedhim,I wantedthem,so I dropped my drama class halfway through senior year when things got serious. I converted to their church. I took business and accounting courses so I could work in their HR department because that’s wheretheyhad an opening. Didn’t I doall thatbecause I loved him? Isn’t that love?”
Nicolai didn’t look at me, just held me in his arms. “Changing yourself so entirely? Giving up a future you wanted? I’m not sure.”
“Itmusthave been love, right?” My eyes burned. “I thought I was going to die when he walked out of our wedding. He didn’t even look back at me. My chest hurt like my heart had been shredded, like there was no way I could go on being alive without him. That’s love, right?”
Nicolai’s arms tightened around me. “Don’t be upset over that fool. He didn’t realize what a prize he had, and therefore, he isn’t worthy of your love. He even has a stupid name,Jimmy. No adult man calls himselfJimmy.”
A pathetic, stupid sound clogged my throat when I tried to laugh.
“Do you want me to destroy his life?” Nicolai asked, his tone offhanded, but then his voice lowered, just slightly. “Because I will. Say the fucking word.”
I stopped, startled.“What?”
The glare in Nicolai’s eyes as he turned to stare at me was the incinerating depth of a blue-hot star. “I’ll discuss the matter with a few friends. His university will revoke his degree. The banks that do business with his parents’ construction company will call in their loans and refuse to issue more. The same for their mortgages, car loans, and credit cards. News sites will insinuate terrible things about him, and those articles will rise to the top of search engines like fucking magic. I could have him and his whole family destitute in a week, pariahs in two.”
My chuckle was a nervous rasp in my throat. “Okay.”
His mouth curved into a small, calm, terrifying smile. I think he’d stopped blinking. “In the old days, I would have had him tortured to death and his family sent to Kharp or Vorkuta gulag, where they would slowly die of hunger, scrounging in the dirt for black potatoes.”
“Wow, that’soddlyspecific.”
He shrugged. “But that was the old days. Times are different now.”
Yeah, okay. “Do you think about the old days a lot?”
His smile dropped. “No. Of course not.”
“Right.”The conviction in Nicolai’s voice was the scariest thing about all that. “You’re a little on the ruthless side. Remind me never to get you angry at me.”
“It runs in the family. Being ruthless is the only way to rule Russia.” He brushed his thumb over my knuckles. “But I’d never do that to you. Indeed, the whole rest of your life will be a charmed existence, one easy day after another. I’ll make sure of it.”
“Eh, you never know. I might blow the whole ten million bucks on dirt bikes or a boat.”
“Ten,” he scoffed.
“What are you going to do if I run through it? Set me up with one of your rich friends to marry?”
Nicolai’s arm stiffened around me like he was grabbing me against his side, but he just looked around the hotel bedroom and cleared his throat. “You won’t need a rich man. You’ll have plenty of money.”
I huffed a laugh. “Yeah, if we ever sign that pre-nup.”
His arm relaxed some, but I was still a little mashed against his dress shirt and his firm body underneath. “We’ll hash it out. The lawyers will undoubtedly have their say tomorrow. They have an opinion on everything. I suppose they must earn their retainers somehow.”
The high-end lawyers, his rich friends, all those guys at the party.
Heck, all the guys in all the exotic places Nicolai had said we would travel to.
“So, how about this?” I offered, finally spitting out my proposition. “I get it that you want to make sure the annulment is valid, to be absolutely sure that no one can mess things up later for you. So,wecan’t.”
Nicolai nodded, his head bobbing sideways a little like he was allowing it, not agreeing with it.
“And, there really isn’t a virgin test. It doesn’t really exist.”
