Page 6 of Savage Little Secret

“Dmitri?” I choke out. “Wh-what are you doing here?” I ask him, my voice wavering.

He frowns. “Are you okay? You look like you’ve been crying.”

Damn it.

“Allergies,” I blurt out with a fake sniffle. “Who knew they existed in the desert? Do you…do you need something? I didn’t get any texts from you.”

Dmitri eyes me for a second before lowering his gaze. “I don’t really know what I’m doing. I was driving around to clear my head, and I ended up here.”

Oh wow. He’s drawn to me just like I’m drawn to him. That’s either something great or a recipe for disaster.

“It’s been strange not going to work, not seeing you,” I say. He told me not to bother coming in yesterday and today, and that hasn’t made me feel any better about things. Finding out that I had lied about my real name ruined his trust in me.

I didn’t expect that to hurt me so much.

“You’ll still be paid for those days,” Dmitri replies.

I shake my head. “I don’t care about the money.”

Silence trails my words for a few moments before Dmitri sighs. “Things are just rocky right now. Honestly, it might be safer for you to stay away from me.”

A sharp ache pierces my chest. It’s just as I suspected. “You don’t want me around you?”

“For your safety. I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore,” Dmitri mutters as he pinches the bridge of his nose. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

I understand that feeling.

“Just come in,” I tell him as I reach and grab his arm, pulling him inside. I head to the kitchen, my blood running cold at the sight of the wine glass. I actually forgot about it for a second.

“I shouldn’t have come over uninvited,” Dmitri says as he leans against the kitchen counter.

“You can always come by,” I reply as I turn to face him. “I just wish I knew how to make things better for you. I feel…powerless.”

“You’re not,” Dmitri assures me. “You have more power than you think.”

I’m not exactly sure what he means by that, but it’s nice that he believes that. All my life, I’ve felt so weak. Just how my father sees me.

“What can I do?” I ask him.

Dmitri shrugs. “I don’t know. Just…stay with me. Don’t let anyone scare you away.”

I want to ask about his men and how cold they’ve acted toward me lately, how he pulled the guards from watching over me, but maybe that’s something that I don’t need to bring any attention to. If they’re suspicious of me, but he’s not, then I don’t want to make Dmitri feel the same way.

“I’m not going anywhere,” I tell him as my hand brushes his arm. The weight starts to lift from my body just being around him.

The corner of his mouth turns up. He then glances at my glass of wine and reaches out for it. “Drinking all by yourself?”

My heart jolts to a stop as I watch him pick it up and lift it toward his mouth.

“No!” I shout as I grab the glass from him, being careful not to slosh any cyanide-laced wine anywhere. My heart slams around so hard in my chest I can barely breathe. “Don’t…you don’t want to drink that. It’s disgusting.”

Letting him drink it would have been the easiest way to prove myself to my father. But I don’t want to make that monster happy. I love Dmitri more than I need my father’s approval now.

Dmitri side-eyes me in confusion as I hurry past him to the sink.

I dump the wine down the drain and rinse out the glass, my stomach twisting as the last traces of my plan disappear.

I couldn’t even do that right.