Page 104 of Charmingly Obsessed
As we leave, she fumbles with her coat, her soft laughter echoing through the empty gallery. I step in to fasten the buttons for her—my intoxicating little thief—and she rewards me by tracing her fingers over mine, her own laughter muffled against my lips.
“You’re always fussing over me,” she grumbles, her voice a little slurred, her eyes sparkling.
We step outside into the cool night air. Instead of walking towards the car where Hugo waits, she pulls me sideways into the shadows.
I catch her easily, with near-military precision, as she stumbles slightly on the uneven cobblestones. And she presses her thumb to my nose. Like a button. A reset button.
“We’re going back to the hotel now,” she explains with deliberate slowness. Her words are fuzzy around the edges, as if she thinks I’m the one who’s drunk.
Her voice is full of a happy, champagne-fueled determination. “And then,” she declares, “I am going to undress you. Slowly. Thoroughly.” She pauses to give me a hard poke in the chest, then points a wavering finger at herself. “Me,” she enunciates with painstaking care. “I’m going to do it.”
And then she bursts into laughter again. The joyous, uninhibited sound echoes through the quiet courtyard.
From the corner of my eye, I see Hugo smiling behind the wheel of the car.
Good Lord.
Diana Bilova should never, ever be allowed to drink champagne.
Or maybe… maybe she should be allowed to drink itall the time.
41
Chapter 41 Diana
So what if I’m a little drunk? Or very drunk? Actually, I’ve never felt more lucid in my entire goddamn life.
French police– more like the Ministry of Perpetual Buzzkills, am I right? All I did was stick half my head out the window of a moving vehicle to serenade the beautiful Parisian night.
And my voice isn’t even that loud. It’s more… enthusiastic. But no. After their stern, finger-wagging little lecture on public decorum and vehicular safety, Kolya and I had to abandon the warm, leathery cocoon of the Mercedes and a very amused-looking Hugo right then and there. And walk the last few blocks back to the hotel. On foot. Like commoners.
Mykola’s coat, the one he’s now draped dramatically over my shoulders, is the furriest, softest thing I’ve ever touched.
I study the impossibly plush fabric with intense, drunken focus. This can’t be right. I remember his coat from earlier being smooth, sleek cashmere. Has it… spontaneously grown a new, more luxurious pelt in the last hour?
“Just one more block, sunshine,” a warm, deep, impossibly sexy voice rumbles against my ear, sending a fresh wave of goosebumps down my spine.
God, Frez’s voice is so nice. I try to match his long, confident strides – watch out for the treacherous, uneven cobblestones – but this six-foot-plus killjoy clamps me securely to his side with an arm of solid, unyielding steel. And then he snorts. A soft, suppressed sound of pure amusement.
He’s one of them, isn’t he? A secret agent for the French Ministry of Boredom. I’m surrounded by humorless, overly cautious nerds.
There’s a strange, unfamiliar sound scraping across my eardrum, like a rusty, unoiled saw.Oh, wait.That’s me. Laughing. Loudly.
At least I got the buzzkill next to me to crack a smile. A small victory for the forces of chaos and champagne.
For some reason, in the brightly lit hotel lobby, my husband pulls all of me into the magical warmth of his enormous furry coat. Well,not all of me. I’m not the demon from that Gogol’s Christmas Eve story, the one who gets stuffed into a sack. You can’t just stuff me in a sack. Just my face. And now my nose tickles. Intolerably.
“I demand,” I announce, my voice muffled against the plush fur, “a-a-a separate seat. In first class. For my… dignity.” The private elevator is shooting upwards now – zoom! Higher and higher! I help the elevator along with my hands, making whooshing sounds, but Kolya, the eternal spoilsport, seems to want to slow down our glorious ascent to the heavens. Or at least, to the penthouse suite.
“Ugh,” I huff, wriggling slightly in his unyielding grip. “Now I get it. Now I finally understand why you were still single at thirty-seven, Mykola Frez.”
Fine. I’ll tilt my head to the side. If he keeps pressing those soft, tender, possessive kisses to my neck, I suppose I won’t file an official complaint with the CIA. Or the Ministry of Boredom.
Kolya fumbles with the key card for our suite.
Aha! There’s no escaping my embrace now, you magnificent bastard!
I wrap myself around him the moment the door closes behind us. Mostly. Well, almost. I try. He’s very large.
