It is not the agency’s fault. I perhaps exaggerated my real estate experience to them, so please don’t hold them accountable.
Alina.
Her hand was shaking as she signed her name and she left the note beside his computer, imagining his reaction when he read it.
He’d wasted an entire day.
Demyan Zukov, Alina was certain, wasn’t going to be best pleased.
CHAPTER FOUR
FRIDAY WAS WRETCHED!
Alina spent the day waiting for the explosion to come from the bomb that she knew she had set off.
She knew, even though they had exchanged phone numbers, that Demyan wouldn’t be the one to contact her. All day Alina waited for Elizabeth’s caustic call.
The worst thing was, it never came.
No, the worst thing was the promise she’d made to herself if things didn’t go well.
Alina pulled her paintings out of her wardrobe and some other artwork too, trying to pluck up the courage to make a booking for a stall, but when she heard how much it would cost she didn’t follow through.
Yes, it was a wretched day and a portion of it was spent hiding behind her laptop.
She didn’t look Demyan up, instead she tortured herself with another name.
Her father’s.
Alina did this fairly regularly but always, till now, it had been to no avail, but there her father was on the screen of her laptop, smiling back at her, his wife and three daughters beside him.
Two years ago Alina had tried to find him but had gotten nowhere.
Now, with her mother overseas, Alina’s need to make contact with her father had increased and at last something about him had appeared online.
It was him.
Alina stared into dark brown eyes that matched hers.
Kind eyes, she hoped as her fingers hovered over the keyboard. She wasn’t asking for support, or to blaze into his life, Alina told herself.
She was merely asking to be his friend.
Alina heard the door open as Cathy, her flatmate, popped home on her lunch break and Alina hurriedly hit send.
‘Oh!’ Cathy was there with her boyfriend and clearly a bit put out that they didn’t have the place to themselves. ‘I thought you had a month’s work lined up.’
Alina hadn’t told her that she would be working for Demyan—Cathy wasn’t exactly discreet.
‘It didn’t work out.’
‘That’s a shame. Cheer up, something else will come along.’
Not from the agency, Alina thought, picking up the house phone and ringing her mobile just to make sure that it was working. She couldn’t believe that Elizabeth hadn’t called.
‘Will you get paid for yesterday?’