The boy didn’t answer, just yanked backwards trying to get away from her.
“Let me go, please. I don’t want to get in trouble. Please, let me go!”
Sam reluctantly released him, knowing that keeping him there against his will wouldn’t make her any more trustworthy in his eyes.
The boy took off, pushing out of the alcove door so fast, it felt to Sam like watching a boy-sized rabbit sprint away from a possible predator—which was obviously what he now considered her, even though she’d only been trying to help.
A wave of exhaustion passed over Sam, so extreme, she knew for sure she wouldn’t be going back to the ballroom for more networking with the Richie Riches as she’d promised Josie she would. Maybe next week or next month or next year… yeah, maybe then she’d feel up to it. But not tonight. No, tonight she was taking her tired butt home.
4
“What do you mean I can’t go home?” Sam demanded, her teeth chattering. She was standing underneath a covered carport, which extended out from the brick Colonial mansion on white column legs. The structure, like the rest of the house, was extremely stately, but it did nothing to protect her from the cold night wind, thrashing against her bare arms with no mercy whatsoever.
“I’m sorry, miss,” the middle aged valet with the handlebar mustache and a nametag that said “Jose” answered. His expression became apologetic as he took in her shivering form. “We were told to keep you here for a bit when you came for your car. But why don’t you go wait back inside? I’m sure he didn’t know you’d be without a coat.”
“Who didn’t know?” Sam demanded, even though she was already beginning to suspect, even before the hockey player emerged from the house, closing its crimson red door behind him before once again coming to stand in front of her, large and imposing. It was like getting rolled up on by a tank.
“Mr. Rustanov,” Jose said. “She doesn’t have a coat. Can I go get her car?”
“Da, I will talk with her while we wait,” the hockey player answered, like he was doing her and Jose a favor by only holding her up a little bit, when he never should have given the order in the first place.
“Exactly who the h-heck do you t-think you are?” she demanded after Jose had gone. Her words would have sounded a lot more aggressive if her teeth weren’t chattering, she thought.
“Nikolai Rustanov,” he answered. “I already told you this. However, my assistant can’t find for sure who you are. Maybe you weren’t invited to my party? Maybe you, how Americans say, crashed?”
“No, I didn’t c-crash,” Sam answered, knowing it would be too complicated to explain that she came as the plus one of an Indiana football player who couldn’t attend, but used to be on the L.A. Sun’s with Josie’s husband and hadn’t minded letting her use his wife’s name to get into the event.
He regarded her shivering form with thinned lips.
“Where is your coat?” he asked, unbuttoning his tux jacket.
“I g-gave it away,” she answered.
“Why?” He took his jacket off and wrapped it around her shivering shoulders. “It is very cold.”
The large jacket was surprisingly heavy and even though she probably should have told him straight away that she didn’t need it, Sam found herself reflexively pulling its front panels across her chest like a blanket. It was just so warm, radiating heat like it’d just come off a furnace.
“How about you?” she asked him with a worried look.
He looked back at her, confused. “How about me, what?”
“Don’t you need your jacket? Like you said, it’s very cold outside.”
“Da, but I am Russian,” he answered, as if that explained everything about everything.
“Okay, well, maybe I should thank you for loaning me this jacket, but I would have been fine if you hadn’t made sure I had to wait here outside for my car.”
He frowned down at her from his great height.
“Tell me why you gave away your coat.”
She shook her head with a sad sigh, thinking of the poor boy she’d met in the alcove. Who had he belonged to? Someone who worked for the man standing in front of her? One of the fans who had been milling around the front gates at the bottom of the long hill when she arrived?
“Do you know any little boys?” she asked. “Like one who’s maybe a tall seven or eight years old?”
Another confused look from the big guy. “Why would I know little boy?”
“Because…” she trailed off, her instincts telling her a man like this probably didn’t have any children he was close to in his life. And even if the boy had belonged to someone on his staff, Nikolai didn’t seem like the type who would ask after his employee’s families.
“It’s nothing. Nothing you’d understand anyway.”
With a bracing breath, she took off his coat and held it out for him to take back.
He just stared at her. Hard. “You should come back inside my house and explain to me your missing coat.”
She gave him a sad smile. “No, I don’t think so. It’s been a long night and yeah, you’re really hot. So hot, part of me is very flattered you went through all this trouble just to spit some more game. But I can already tell. You…” she circled the palm of her hand in his general direction, “…you’re the kind of guy who would chew me up and eat me for breakfast. So as cute as you are, I have less than zero desire to go there with you.”
To make her point final, she waved his jacket towards him, clearly signaling he just needed to take the damn thing, already. “I’m calling it a night. A really long night.”
But he didn’t take the jacket. In fact, he stepped closer to her, his hard tank of a body pushing the arm holding the jacket back. So close, she could feel the heat coming off him.
“I only agree with one thing you said.” His eyes bore into hers. “The part about eating you for breakfast. But I think you will like the way I eat you for breakfast.”
A hot chill ran over her, despite the cold, and she felt herself clench down below as the image of his face between her legs barged its way into her mind without invitation.
And suddenly he was no longer high above her. Suddenly, his mouth was coming down on hers, a hot shock of an invasion on a cold winter’s night.
Her first thought was that his lips, which she remembered thinking were set in harsh, cruel lines, were actually much softer than they appeared. Her second thought was that he was kissing her. Kissing her! Why was he kissing her? And why wasn’t she stopping him?