Her Rogue Russian(26)

 

"Take a shot with me," Maxim said. His voice was rough, his mouth ghosting across the downy-soft hair of her temple. "Before we say and do things we both regret."

 

He didn't want her talking to him like that-didn't want it, because he had no idea what was truth and what was fiction anymore. If Savannah struggled to color code good and evil, then Maxim struggled to know where to draw the line between fact and fabrication. If having every off-limits inch of her pressed this close to him wasn't helping his clarity, then maybe an attempt to chase his feelings with vodka would.

 

They linked arms, tipped their heads, and threw back the shots in the same instant. Two empty shot glasses rang hollowly on the table as the couple slammed them down with a thunk in the same instant. Maxim relished the burn in his throat, the warmth of the alcohol a welcome distraction from the heat of having her in his lap. He could feel himself starting to rise to the occasion, his erection stirring and stiffening beneath her.

 

Savannah made a small noise of acknowledgement and tried to shift aside, but Maxim held her fast against him, burying his fingers in the silk-slick material of her dress and pressing hard into the skin beneath. He trained his own dark eyes on hers, and she didn't disappoint him by looking away. He wanted her to feel what she did to him. He wanted her to think twice before putting that wall up a third time.

 

He thought the drink would make things easier, but he was wrong. Her mouth was wet and glistening, and the pulsing lights from the dance floor played in her dilated pupils. Was she aroused? He trailed his fingers up her thigh and slipped them beneath the hem of her dress. He was on his way to finding out.

 

"Maxim!" a gregarious male voice interrupted them then, cutting his exploration short. Maxim let a low growl of frustration escape through his teeth as he retracted his hand; Savannah's own quickly came up to pull the edge of her dress back down over her thigh.

 

"Excuse me, gentlemen, I have to …  powder my nose," Savannah said hastily as she slid from Maxim's lap and moved off from the booth. Maxim watched her slender body sway with hawk-like intensity, until the man who had interrupted them came into focus and eclipsed his view.

 

 

 

        

          

        

         

 

It was Rebecca's father, Vasily, the proprietor of the night club. Maxim saw that the older man was carrying another tray of shots, likely on the house; he turned to follow Savannah's quick exit as well, bushy eyebrows drawing together in puzzlement.

 

"What, no introduction?" Vasily boomed in his thick Russian accent. "Rebecca has told me much about her! I can see that rumors of her are not widely exaggerated. She is very beautiful."

 

"She is. That's why I have to keep an eye on her." Maxim was already hauling himself out of the booth after her, before he realized the dismissal might come off as rude, if not a little suspicious. He grabbed two of Vasily's offered shots and winked. "We both know what happened to the last woman I let out of my sight."

 

"Da! She found a better man than you!" Vasily laughed uproariously as he waved one gnarled, ring-laden hand. "Go! Go get her! I want to meet this woman for myself!"

 

Maxim nodded and moved off onto the pulsating, pounding dance floor of the club, adjusting himself discreetly as he went. He passed through grinding, gyrating bodies, breaking apart couples with a single look. Soon enough he had gained the hallway; he saw Savannah slip inside the women's restroom and disappear.

 

He downed one shot, then the next, planting them face-down on an empty table in quick succession.

 

Then he started down the hallway.

 

 

 

 

 

6

 

 

 

 

 

Savannah

 

 

 

 

 

Not good. This was definitely not good.

 

"Pull it together, Casillero," Savannah hissed under her breath as she pushed her way into the bathroom. A gaggle of female club-goers clustered around the sinks, passing around a tube of lipstick and laughing at something one of them said in Russian; one look at Savannah and they packed up the party, striding past her to make a quick and collaborative exit.

 

Or so she thought.

 

They were right to run. She was a storm of sexual frustration with no thunder or lightning for an outlet. She made her way over to the still-running tap and cupped her hands beneath the streaming faucet, collecting and splashing cold water on her face. It wasn't enough to make her mascara run, but maybe it would be enough to shock her back into reality.

 

Maxim Karev is at best a Russian thug, and at worst, a suspect in an ongoing murder investigation. You're an FBI agent who sure as hell hasn't busted her ass for years at the academy only to be derailed now.