“Like this.” Sacha put two fingers to Jonah’s lips and pulled them down into a comical pout. “Or I will think you are maybe hungry too.”
“I am hungry. If you stop yanking my face around we can do something about it.”
“You don’t like me touching your face?”
“I shouldn’t. I don’t know you.”
“But?”
Jonah’s smile returned full force. “How do you know there’s a but?”
Sacha let his hand drop, disproportionately pleased he’d distracted Jonah from whatever had upset him. “I do not know you either and somehow I like touching your face. Perhaps you feel the same.”
“I’m not confirming either way—shit, hang on.”
They were interrupted by someone who seemed to know Jonah, and for the next hour or so, they just kept coming while Sacha drank more champagne and watched, occasionally rescuing Jonah from awkward questions about his existence.
It was late by the time Eleanor reappeared and towed Sacha away.
Jonah shot Sacha a panicked look.
Sacha smiled and hoped it translated to the three words Jonah so desperately needed to hear.Ya poluchil eto.
I got this.
“So…” Eleanor grasped Sacha’s arm tightly, the way only mothers could. “I’m so sorry my son didn’t see fit to tell us a thing about you before tonight. His father and I would’ve liked to spend more time with you before we leave the city for the festive season.”
“Where are you going?”
“To our estate in the Cotswolds. We like a country Christmas. My husband misses the farm he grew up on.”
“My father grew up on a farm too. It made him happier than his castles in the sky.”
“Yes, it’s the simple things, isn’t it? Of all our children, Jonah perhaps knows this the most.”
Sacha wanted to ask her how many children she had, but to do so would’ve given him away. Instead, he nodded and searched his brain for what little knowledge he’d gleaned about the advertising firm in the offices opposite his own. “He is very grounded. Works hard. You have to when you are the boss, no?”
“Indeed. Jonah doesn’t enjoy life without a challenge.”
This time, Sacha’s nod was from the heart. “I do not understand a man that does.”
“Or a woman, I hope. This world is for more than men.”
Sacha chuckled. “I know. My mother was a strong woman.”
“She’s not with us anymore?”
“No.” Sacha glanced away from Eleanor, searching for Jonah. He found him still surrounded, men and women both fawning for attention Jonah plainly didn’t want to give, though his eyes remained kind.
Sacha did not possess such patience. He pondered what he might’ve done if this night had been something else. If Jonah really was his date, his lover, his…person. And he didn’t have to look far for the answer. Sacha would’ve rescued him in a heartbeat, hustled him back to their quiet corner so they could drink in peace, share morsels of tiny, pretentious food, and then bid the room goodbye so they could go home and—
“Oh dear.” Eleanor’s voice broke into Sacha’s musings. “There goes William Ratner. He always seems to make a beeline for Jonah at these things, and Jonah doesn’t care for him at all. You must rescue him.”
Sacha didn’t have to check to know the insistent man was the same as the one whose very presence had rattled Jonah so earlier in the evening. And he didn’t need Eleanor to tell him to put himself between them.
He left her and strode across the ballroom, not giving a single fuck what anyone thought of him.I don’t know these people. They don’t know me. Neither did Jonah, but the relief on his face when he saw Sacha coming was all Sacha needed to see to know he’d made the right call.
Smiling, he stepped between Jonah and the man with the bad hair, cutting off any interaction before it could happen. He took Jonah’s hands. “Come with me,luchik.”
