“You’re cute,” Paul insisted. Before adding, “Enough—especially this late at night after he’s been drinking. He’ll be ready to take someone back to his hotel room with him. C’mon...”
Paul grabbed me by the arm and tugged me straight toward the star hockey player.
“Wait, now we’re talking about him taking me back to his room? I thought you just wanted me to?—”
“Lyds, c’mon, don’t overthink this,” Paul interrupted, his voice dropping into the patronizing tone he used when I gottoo dramatic. “Just go and talk to him. You’re exactly the type Rustanovs like. Trust me.”
But how could I trust him? Paul’s plan wasn’t just stupid—it was dangerous. What if Artyom saw through me? What if I messed up and humiliated both of us? Or worse, what if I actually succeeded and had to live with it?
“But I’m not?—”
My plan was to point out the obvious. That I wasn’t some goddess like the rest of the women in the VIP—including the literal supermodel sitting just a few inches away from Artyom Rustanov.
Paul placed a reassuring hand on my back.
And shoved.
One moment, I was arguing my case, and the next, I was flailing in slow motion through the air until I landed with a heavy plop.
Two hard ridges lodged between my ribs and hips, and cold liquid splashed against my bare skin.
And that was when I realized where I’d fallen. Not on the floor...
But right into Artyom Rustanov’s lap.
Lydia
I’d fallen.Like, fully fallen. And the only thing that stopped me from landing flat on my face was Artyom Rustanov’s wide lap.
“Unglaublich, Yom!” the model said somewhere above my bare ass with a heavy German accent. “Your brother was correct when he told me these puck bunnies, as he called them, would do anything to get your attention!”
Man, I wanted to defend myself. But that was kind of hard to do while I was squeezing my eyes closed and praying to the Universe to please, please, please disappear me or kill me now or sci-fi teleport me to any-freaking-where but lying with my booty cheeks out across Yom Rustanov’s lap.
However, when I opened my eyes, I discovered the Universe wasn’t in the miracle-granting mood that night. I was still there. And that full thirty seconds I’d taken to fervently pray for body-erasing assistance had only made the situation that much worse.
“Da, this is maybe ‘too much’ way to gain my attention,” a deep, heavily accented voice agreed.
Then, large hands closed around my shoulders like Russian jaws of life. Artyom plucked me from his lap to return me to my feet with zero effort.
“I’m sorry!” I cried out once I was back in an upright position. Then I remembered to pull down the skirt of my stupid, stupid mini dress before adding, “Oh my God, I’ve never been so embarrassed in my life. I was just coming over here to say hi, but then I, ah...”
No matter what Paul had promised about the ease of this mission, lying had never come easy to me. I struggled away from the truth to finish with, “Tripped. I tripped and fell, and I’m so, so sorry that I knocked the glass out of your hand. What are you drinking? I’ll get you another one?”
He just stared at me long and hard, those impossibly beautiful gray eyes far too piercing, before asking, “You are wanting to say hi?”
It took me a moment to realize that Artyom was actually inquiring into why a complete nobody stranger like me would want to say hi to a total hockey star like him.
“Oh yeah, we, um, actually, um, go to the same school? University of Minnesota-Gemidgee? I’m a good egg, you’re a good egg! Tap-tap-crack. Goooo Yolks!”
I raised my arms and waved both hands in the air before realizing that Artyom, the German model, and just about everyone else in the VIP area was watching me manically rattle off the school fight song.
TheUniverse, Kill Me Nowprayer promptly resumed in my head with new fervor.
A long beat of silence. Then Yom said, “Sit down.”
I glanced at the German model posed beside him, along with two goddess-in-waiting friends. “But?—”
He flicked his wrist, and suddenly, an empty space appeared beside him before I could point out that there was nowhere to sit. The pretty goddesses just scattered without a word of command.
