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“James?” Nasir called out, knowing that the storm was about to break. He wanted no witness to their sparring or her temper. He wanted no one else to see her like this—unraveled and glorious.
His oldest friends waved goodbye and stumbled out of the room. The thud of the double doors was a loud gong in the bitter silence.
“I’m going to bed, too.”
“No, you’re not. Not until we have this out.”
A flicker of fear flashed through her eyes before she notched her chin up in that characteristic belligerence that only aroused his baser instincts. “I’m not having anything out with you.”
“I assumed a lot of things about you, Yana. Most of them in error, to my own detriment. But I’d never thought you a coward.”
That stopped her, as he knew it would.
“How dare you? I’ve never in my life backed away from anything.”
“Then why are you so intent on running from me?”
“Because I’m tired of dancing to your demands. Because I don’t trust you.”
And because I still don’t trust myself with you.
Yana swallowed that last bit, though.
The whole evening, Nasir dancing with her, talking with her, laughing with her, arguing with her about important topics, asking her opinion—all of it had possessed a dreamy, surreal quality. His friends welcoming her as if she was a part of them, as if they were privy to the secret but well-known knowledge that there was athemthat was made up of Nasir and her, had gone straight to her head and heart. As if she’d inhaled a hallucinogen that provided her with a real-life version of her deepest hopes and secret fantasies.
She should’ve never agreed to the evening. Never dressed up for it. Never enjoyed his gaze on her. Never agreed to the truce and flirted with him all evening. Because now she was standing in a quagmire that only pulled her in deeper and deeper.
She’d never been able to resist Nasir—even when he’d misunderstood her, castigated her, loathed her—for some right and some wrong reasons. Now he had an agenda to win her over, which seemed to require her surrender, and she was definitely not ready for that.
Not again, not when this temporary fascination ended and she’d once again stand alone with her shattered heart in her hands.
“What’s there to not trust?” he asked in a low, grumbly voice, and she knew that it was his truly annoyed voice. The angrier he got, the lower his tone, as if he was turning himself into a statue, determined to keep it all inside.
“Why can’t you leave this alone? Leave me alone?” she said, and one of the braids done by Zara lashed against her cheek yet again. Having had enough of the charade, she gathered her hair and tied it into a messy knot on top of her head.
“I wish for things to change between us.”
If he’d lobbed a grenade into her face, she’d have been less shocked. Breath didn’t come to her lungs, much less words to her lips. Her entire body felt like it was seizing up on her, seizing on sensations and images she shouldn’t be feeling or thinking.
She stepped back, away from him.
It didn’t matter because he took a step forward, too, and Yana thought he truly looked like a beast then as he stalked her across the vast room, with the glittering sconces casting dark shadows on his saturnine features, iron-hard resolve etching itself around that luscious mouth.
“There’s been too many years of misunderstandings and dislike that we’ve both nurtured with a lot of care. It doesn’t wash off easily and I don’t even want it to,” she protested.
“No, you’d like to paint me as your villain for the rest of our lives.”
“I don’t have a different role for you. The die was cast long ago.” Her words came out as shaky as she felt. “It’s enough to be polite acquaintances, considering we have a child we adore in common.”
He raised his palms. All evening he’d been reeling her in with his compliments and kind words but it was a false surrender on his part. Or a fake one. “What exactly is your complaint, Yana?”
“Why do you have those nude paintings of me?”
“I told you I felt responsible that I didn’t warn you about Ilyavich. But when I saw them—when I saw how gloriously he’d captured all the different facets of you, that urge to protect you from all the other, greedy eyes only became stronger. Even without knowing then that this persona you carefully cultivate is all a mask, I felt an overwhelming compulsion to protect your true self.”
If he’d had the words scripted to cause maximum damage to her heart, he couldn’t have done it better. His reasons were why she’d felt such relief that the paintings had never surfaced again. Still, she tried to fight the spell he was weaving over her. “Why go to such lengths just so that I had a good time tonight? Why are you being so nice to me?”
If she thought he’d laugh at her irrational questions, she had him wrong once again. His frown graduated to a scowl. “That’s what’s sending you into a tailspin? The fact that I’m finally treating you as you’ve always deserved to be treated?”
