I open the door to his bedroom and step inside. I look all around and see through the open doorways linking the bedroom, the sitting area and the home office and library. There is movement at his desk.
He’s there.
Dammit.
King Nikolai is seatedat his desk in the study, papers spread before him, a cup of something steaming at his elbow. He wears a simple dark shirt today, no leather jacket, sleeves rolled up to reveal muscular forearms.
He looks up when I enter. Our eyes meet.
Even from this distance everything I felt yesterday floods back in a rush. The confusing, infuriating pull toward a man who insulted my entire species. He’s just as handsome as I remember. My body is such a traitor.
I lick my lips and shift on my feet, trying to relieve the heat that’s grown again between my thighs.
His expression is unreadable. Cold. He looks back down at his papers.
“You’re three minutes late.”
How can his deep voice carry so clearly across the space? Is it a vampire thing? I glance at the clock on the wall. I’m one minute early. I triple-checked the time before I left my room.
But I don’t correct him. I can’t afford another confrontation. “I apologize, Your Majesty. It won’t happen again.”
He doesn’t respond. Doesn’t acknowledge me further. Just keeps working, his pen scratching against paper.
So this is how it’s going to be.
I’m going to have to clean his entire suite while he’s here, watching me.
Great.
We’re enemies, I remind myself. This is how enemies behave. Accept it and do your job. I remind myself again why I’m staying—the pay is good, this will look great on my resume, the staff here are wonderful and I’d like to make new friends. This is a great place to work and live. A once in a lifetime experience. It’s just this one arrogant, devastatingly handsome vampire who thinks I’m either a criminal or an idiot.
Why doesn’t he just ask for me to be reassigned somewhere else? The kitchens. The guest wings. The stables he threatened me with. Why keep someone he clearly despises — someone he caught snooping — in his most private spaces?
Unless he wants to catch me again.
Fine. I won’t give him the satisfaction. I’ll be so professional, so meticulous, so utterly beyond reproach that he won’t have a single legitimate thing to criticize.
I start with the bedroom. As far from him as possible.
I makehis bed with obsessive precision.
Hospital corners so tight you could bounce a coin off them. Six pillows, each fluffed to mathematical perfection. The black silk sheets smoothed until there isn’t a single wrinkle.
I dust every surface twice. The nightstands, the windowsills, the ornate headboard. I wipe down the tall windows overlooking the snow-covered mountains. Adjust items by millimeters. Triple-check everything.
The whole time, I’m hyperaware of that sexy vampire in the next room. The scratch of his pen. The rustle of paper. The soft clink of his cup against the saucer.
My body refuses to stop reacting to his presence. Even through walls, even angry, even knowing he hates me — I can feel him, like there’s some invisible thread connecting us.
This is ridiculous. I’m being ridiculous.
I move to the bathroom.
The King’s bathroom is as luxurious as the rest of his chambers. Dark stone walls, a massive soaking tub that could fit four people, fixtures that look like they cost more than my yearly salary. There’s a separate shower with multiple heads and what appears to be a steam function.
I wonder what Nikolai looks like in here. Water streaming down those broad shoulders and that naked body. Steam rising around his?—
Stop it. Stop it right now.
