Page 75 of Taken By My Grumpy Pakhan

Anna snatched my laptop from the bed. “What is her name?”

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. It suddenly struck me how she had known virtually everything about me and I didn’t even know her name.

“Yup. She’s definitely full of shit.”

“I wouldn’t say so.” I tried to recall the exact details of our conversation. “The woman I met was anything but full of shit, and she was definitely not jealous."

Anna began typing. “Remind me of the gala you saw her at?”

I gave her the details and in less than a minute, she pulled up an image. “Is this her?”

“Yes,” I affirmed, staring at the woman in Kazimir’s arms.

Unlike the women on the magazine site, she wasn’t clinging to him. Kazimir had his arm around her waist, resting casually on the small of her back while they spoke to an older man with a walking stick.

“They do look cozy together.”

“Thanks, Anna,” I said, falling back on my bed.

“On the bright side,” she lay next to me. “She said they were old friends and there are very few pictures of them together. Most of them were in work settings, so I’m guessing they’re probably connected through family businesses.”

“Okay?”

“And the other women,” she shoved the screen in my face. “No multiple appearances and none lasted more than a month.”

“What exactly is your point?”

“That you’ve been with him longer than any of them.”

I stood up, pacing the room. “That’s the problem, Anna. We’re not together. I am not with him. I am just another girl he’s fucking, and if he’s kept me longer, it’s because I work in his office.” I looked at the screen. “Svetlana was right. Don’t try to pacify me.”

Anna’s face softened as she watched me. “So what are you going to do?”

I stopped mid-track. “I don’t know. I don’t know what this is, I don’t know what I want from it. The man scares me shitless so I hardly know what to do with him, but he also turns me on so bad. All I know is, it hurts seeing these pictures and hearing what Svetlana had to say.”

“Then you have to figure it out,” Anna said softly.

She rose from the bed, gave me a long hug, before silently walking out of the room.

I remained standing for a long time, Svetlana’s voice in my head, flashes of the pictures I’d seen in my mind's eye.

Kazimir and I were hardly together. Bluntly put, we were nothing. Just two people fucking, but for some reason, I couldn’t stomach what I discovered.

Today revealed the layer beneath our relationship that I’d been ignoring, and I also realized I was the only one on that layer.

The next line of action was clearer than the daylight outside my windows.

Chapter Eighteen

Genevieve

Today was the day Richmond had to present the office with what he discovered and how he fixed it and frankly, I didn’t feel sorry for him.

After Collin was dismissed, Rose mentioned overhearing him telling one of the interns how he thought I must’ve lured Collin into the bathroom and played victim.

He said a couple of things about how I always tried to flirt with him when I was a receptionist, which was very odd because his assholery started the moment I declined going to lunch with him.

Caroline had insisted I report the matter to HR, but I refused. I’d long learned Collin was a kid with an overgrown ego who craved attention in any shape and form, and I wasn’t going to give it to him.