have extended this deadline by three weeks to accommodate your adjusted timeline. These children cannot remain in these overcrowded sleeping conditions for much longer. These renovations must be completed by next week.”
The contractor started tripping over his words, offering his excuses and apologies, blaming the worker’s union for the delays in the renovations I hired him to complete on the Red Gate Orphanage.
Located in a severely neglected and rundown area of Moscow, the building itself needed a lot of maintenance work and updates to the interior. The staff had taken in more children than the building could really hold, hence the new renovations I’d personally raised the money to pay for. While the construction work continued on the new addition, these children were practically sleeping on top of each other. Which, in that part of the city, was just asking for the spread of disease.
I was a patient person. Usually.
But this was the third time Zarsky had pushed his completion date back. I’d waved bye-bye to my patience weeks ago.
“Next week, Mr. Zarsky,” I told him in a stern voice. “If they’re not finished by then, I’ll bring someone in who can actually get the job done.”
I listened to him offer one last assurance before I hung up. He was probably wetting his pants, terrified that I would sick my mobster father on him if he didn’t do what I said. But I would never do that in a million years. I ensured that Batya stayed out of all my business with the orphanage, as well as the work I did with various non-profit organizations around the city.
I walked into Batya’s study where I’d left my laptop, muttering a string of curses in Russian, when a very deep, masculine voice said in English, “I guess it’s true what they say about the Russians having such warm, cheery dispositions.”
Startled, I spun around, my phone slipping through my fingers.
A man I didn’t recognize sat in one of the wingback chairs on the other side of the room, near the large bay windows. Dressed in an impeccable, crisp navy blue suit, he looked the type who dominated whatever room he entered. Or meeting, for that matter, since he was obviously there for business with my father. Though what kind of business was unclear.
Vodka business.
Or mafia business.
This man with the chiseled jawline and longish brown hair pulled back into a low man bun at the nape of his neck could have been involved with either one. Despite the bespoke suit, he looked big and built enough to handle himself in intense situations.
Where the hell is Batya?
“I apologize,” I said, sounding out of breath. Because I was. Most of the oxygen in my lungs fled the second my eyes fell on the gorgeous man. “I didn’t realize anyone was in here. You are meeting with Sergei?”
His eyes gleamed with curiosity as he nodded slowly. “I am. And I’m glad it’s with him and not you.”
“Pardon?”
“I think you had that man in tears by the end of your conversation.”
He’d heard that? Der’mo. Shit.
I’d probably sounded like a ballbuster on a power trip.
I shrugged. “Incompetence requires a firm hand, no? Leniency yields results only up to a certain point.”
His lips parted, as if I’d surprised him.
I began to squirm when he still hadn’t responded after several moments.
Eventually, he agreed. “My thoughts exactly. I need to hire you to come work for me.”
That got a smile out of me. “I might not be available.”
His gaze darkened as it crawled down my body. His eyes narrowed on my T-shirt, one I completely forgot I was wearing. Blasted laundry day. In giant black letters it read, “DO NOT READ THE NEXT SENTENCE.” And in smaller letters beneath that it read, “You little rebel.”
My cheeks flushed with embarrassment.
Here was this GQ model-esque Adonis who was dressed like a million rubles. And here I was, dressed in my off-the-shoulder, ratty laundry day shirt and hair in a topknot.
To my astonishment, he actually chuckled.
When his amber eyes lifted back up to mine, heat blazed in them. “Pity.”
By the next afternoon, I had married that man.
It didn’t make a difference that I had been attracted to Nico in that study. It didn’t matter that I’d felt a spark of something as his gaze had lingered on my chest. That his fingers had tightened on his phone when I’d said I might not have been available. And it definitely didn’t matter that I still wanted to know what he looked like underneath those suits.