Mine to Keep (NOLA Knights #3) - Rhenna Morgan Page 0,44
not a free loader. I need a job.”
“Then I will give you a job.”
The statement rattled her enough to push her back a step and cleared away the sensual fog his nearness had created. “You’ll what?”
“I will get you a job.”
It had to be a language issue. Some kind of Russian to English translation thing. “Just like that, huh? You’ve got jobs just lying around ready to dole out.”
“Yes.”
“A job I can do? Me?”
“I operate a restaurant—André’s.”
“That swank Italian place in South Shore?”
“No, the new expansion in the French Quarter.”
“You own it?”
“No, Sergei does. But I run it for him and we have need of an experienced person behind the bar.”
She hesitated, replaying their ludicrous conversation in her head. When she processed the same fat zero she’d come up with before, she twisted for a gander at the boxes stacked up in the corner behind her. “And I’m supposed to live here? With you?”
“As I said. You will have my room, and you will be comfortable.”
Oh. My. God. Had he seriously just demanded that she be comfortable? Who the hell said things like that?
Before she could smack her head with the palm of her hand and see if she could wake herself up from the bizarre dream she’d found herself in, he kept going. “We will discuss what other needs you may have later. Now, you must get ready. I will carry your boxes up and you will be ready in one hour.”
“Leave for where?”
“My pakhan’s home. We have guests coming for dinner, and you will be with us.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” She backed up another few steps and held up her hands. “I’m still not good on what the heck’s happened since I feel asleep last night. You’re not gonna bully me into being social on top of it.”
“There is no bullying. There is only fact. You will be protected. By me. And I will be at my pakhan’s home. Therefore, you will be there as well.”
She couldn’t help it. Everything since she’d woken up this morning was too much, too fast and too trippy. “Why? Why you? And more importantly, why me?”
He gobbled up what little space she’d created with one step forward and palmed the back of her neck. His accent colored his words with both deadly intent and wicked promise. “Because, malen’kaya koroleva, two men tried to take you last night. Two men who held a knife to your throat and planted fear in your fearless heart. Whether you are ready to accept it or not, the life you once knew has drastically changed, and I will be the one who ensures that change is for the better.”
Chapter Ten
The life you once knew has drastically changed.
One and a half hours later and that simple statement was still the only thought knocking around in Bonnie’s head. Yeah, he’d also tagged onto the end that it would be a change for the better, but on whose scale? Did better come with strings? Expectations?
Um, hello! Did you see the hungry way he looked at you? Who cares about expectations?
She fought back a scoff and kept her sights rooted to the pretty houses streaming by outside the truck’s passenger window. Her freaking libido had zero caution when it came to men like Roman. She’d get all freaking turned on with the alpha thing, write ’em down as her dark knight in tarnished armor and then end up letting them walk all over her.
Well, this time she wasn’t going there. She did care about expectations. A lot. And the first chance she got at this stupid barbecue, she was going to corner Cassie and Evette and find out exactly what the heck was going on.
Roman slowed in front of Sergei’s house and turned into the drive. Not a single car was parked out front and the only other vehicles in the driveway were a killer looking BMW sedan she could have sworn had bulletproof glass and a sleek Audi.
“I thought they were having a barbecue?” Bonnie said.
Putting the gearshift in park, Roman nodded then turned off the engine. “They will be here soon. Kir says they landed twenty minutes ago.”
Well, that was good. No company meant she’d be able to draw a faster bead on Cassie. “Right, well, let’s get on with it.” She popped the door, hopped out of the truck and shut the door behind her.
Roman rounded the front fender before she’d made it two steps toward the estate’s backyard. “You will wait and let me help you down.”