Page 92 of Taken By My Grumpy Pakhan

‘Don’t be late. I have a meeting at nine and I need the Hendricks file before then.’

I’d made the mistake of admitting to Kazimir that I felt better when he called later at night, and now I was waking to work messages. So much caring.

Ordinary enough, the kind of message he’d sent me a hundred times before. Except this one came with a second text, sent four minutes later, that hadn’t been part of the old pattern.

‘Also, take your meds and eat something, and if you can’t make it, let me know in time.’

I stared at that second message for longer than was reasonable, turning it over. Sure, the message came from his phone and was worded exactly the way he typed, except it sounded nothing like him. Also, when did we switch from emails to texts?

‘I’m fine,’ I typed back. ‘I’ll be in time for the meeting.’

The option of staying home was tempting, but after years of always working, a part of me was beginning to itch. Plus, I knew if I stayed back, I’d spend the whole time reviewing yesterday and stuck in a loop. I needed a clear head, and nothing cleared me faster than work.

I read it three times, waiting for a response before I finally pulled myself to the bathroom.

When I returned, another text was waiting.

‘Told you my soup did wonders.’

Against my better judgement, I found myself smiling as I picked up the phone and perched on the edge of my bed.

‘There’s this thing called medicine, I think that’s the word you were looking for.’

His reply was immediate. ‘Nonsense. Bet you already took some earlier.’

A sound I refused to admit to left my lips as I decided to throw him a bone.

‘The soup helped. Don’t let it go to your head.’

‘Too late. I’m already insufferable about it.’

A laugh forced its way out, but it died when I caught my reflection in the mirror.

I was sitting on my bed, still damp from bathing and giggling over a text like a schoolgirl.

Awareness shot through me and I immediately tossed my phone to the side, schooling my expression to a neutral one.

However, the shift followed me into the office. It followed me through the morning, through the file handoff that came with an actual smile instead of his usual distracted nod, through the rest of the day in a hundred small ways I might have missed if I hadn’t been paying such embarrassingly close attention.

His texts came more frequently now, less monotonous and more teasing. A sharp contrast to the short, straight-to-the-point messages I was accustomed to.

At some point during the meeting, I had relaxed my head on my palm and he sent a gif of a kitten falling off a chair.

Kazimir made jokes?

I hadn’t realized I’d snorted out a laugh till I caught a frown from one of the executives and a tiny smirk from him.

I straightened, ignoring my phone for the rest of the day despite the occasional pop of notifications.

I told myself not to read too much into it. I failed almost immediately and spectacularly, the way I always did when it came to him.

By Thursday, the pattern had become impossible to ignore, especially because he apparently had no intention of containing it to private conversation.

We were in a meeting with Nikolai and a prospective client, a stiff, silver-haired man named Voss who ran a logistics company Kazimir was apparently interested in folding into one of his legitimate enterprises. I suspected it had something to do with what we talked about in Moscow, but I didn’t ask questions. The topic was still a landmine for me.

I sat at the end of the table taking notes, doing the job I was actually employed to do, while Kazimir presented numbers and projections with the same cold, commanding precision he brought to everything.

My phone buzzed against the table.