“You don’t half talk shit, Jared!” Nikoli snapped. I noticed his hands tense tighter on the steering wheel and I could feel his eyes on me again, silently penetrating through me, enticing me to look up at him.
“Between you and I,” Jared whispered, leaning towards me, “Mona said he’s taken, quite smitten with her apparently.”
“He is?” I whispered, leaning closer. A small giggle caught in the back of my throat at the fact we were whispering like two conniving children in the back, afraid of being overheard.
Nikoli slammed on the brakes causing our heads to jolt towards each other, we couldn’t avoid the inevitable collision that left us both holding our foreheads and grumbling. “Out,” I heard Nikoli demand. I turned to grab the door lever when he spoke again, “Not you, Raine. Just Jared, you’re coming with me.”
My open mouth slammed shut as I turned to look at a perturbed-looking Jared. “Uhm, where is Raine going?”
“It doesn’t matter where she is going. Just tell Petra I’ll be back before the lesson ends, and I appreciate you coming with me. Cheers, man.”
Jared let out a deep sigh and ran his hand over the top of his head, clearly showing his confusion over Nikoli’s reason for kicking him out of the car at the studio. “Alright, I’ll see you later,” he said quietly. As Jared shut the door, Nikoli tore away from the sidewalk, forcing my body to slam back into the seat. My breath left my mouth in a grunt as I tried to straighten myself up and discretely tie up the scarf that was still draped over my shoulders.
I chewed on my bottom lip nervously, Nikoli’s whole demeanor and attitude seemed off. He’d barely spoken two words to me other than to ask if I was okay and as I sat trying to rack my brain, trying hard to think of something to say, something to break the heavy atmosphere that was sucking the air from the car, he pulled to a stop and killed the engine.
I narrowed my eyes and pushed my face up against the cold, glass sheet of the window and tried to work out where we were. Mentally, I knew we were not far from the studio, but I had paid no attention to my actual surroundings. Something Max always berated me for. My door swung open and Nikoli’s hand was there waiting for mine, grabbing my bag with one hand, I placed my other in his and allowed him to help me out from the back seat.
I smiled when my face drew level with his, but his features didn’t flinch from its impassive and unreadable expression. “Nikoli?” I whispered, trying to break the invisible barrier he seemed to have erected between us, but he didn’t respond. Instead, he silently pulled me away from his car, down a narrow alleyway and through a glass door. My eyes adjusted to the harsh bright white light shining like a beacon above us, there was a set of concrete steps to my right that curled upwards into a spiral, it seemed never-ending as my eyes slowly followed it upwards. We came to a standstill and Nikoli pressed for the button to call the elevator.
“Where are we?” I asked quietly, my eyes darted from left to right, intrigued. Still he didn’t respond, he didn’t even look at me and his continued silence was beginning to grind on me. The elevator door slid open and Nikoli stepped aside to let out a couple, he smiled and said hello and they responded by his first name, so I had to surmise that wherever we were, the people here knew him. It went a small way to taking the edge off my fraught nerves.
He pulled me into the elevator and pressed number 6. When the doors had slid shut, he rounded on me. His hands grasped either side of my face, his lips molded against mine dominantly, his tongue poked and teased around the inside of my mouth until my mind abandoned me entirely. I could feel his hand move from my cheek and slide effortlessly to the back of my scarfed neck where it then took a stroll down to the small of my back and he pushed me against him, hard.
I became vaguely aware of voices when the elevator doors retracted. I broke the kiss with a large gasp and my head turned to take in the four sets of eyes staring our way. My lips were left tingling and burning and I tried to express a smile of apology.
“Come on,” laughed Nikoli, grabbing my hand. With my head bowed to the floor in embarrassment at such an outward display of affection in a public elevator, I shuffled past them.
“Where are we?” I asked again, hoping this time I would get an answer.
“We are at my place, Myshka,” he replied, as he pulled out a set of keys and opened the door.
“Your place? But…but why?” I stuttered foolishly as I followed in behind him and shut the door.
“Don’t panic, I’ve not brought you here to make moves on you. You are going to sit down with a stiff drink and you’re going to talk and open up to me,” he replied.
I looked around at my surroundings and let out a loud whistle of appreciation. I was impressed to say the least. It was big and spacious, a typical bachelor pad but it was clean, tidy, warm and welcoming.
“You like it?” He called over his shoulder. I watched him move around his kitchen taking what looked like a bottle of vodka from the fridge and two glasses from a cupboard then motioned me with a nod of his head towards the couch. Slowly, I made my way over to it and sat down, placing my dance bag at my feet. He poured out a large neat vodka and held it out to me, “Knock it straight back,” he ordered.
Grasping the glass, I indeed knocked it straight back. The crisp, clean, cold liquid slid down my throat easily causing the warm feeling inside to erupt almost instantly. “Can’t beat a good vodka,” I whispered, passing him back my empty glass.
“Well I’m Russian after all, only the best,” he smirked. “Why are you wearing a scarf?”
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I fingered the silk material adorning my neck and I shrugged, “It’s the fashion,” I replied, knowing he was going to ask me to remove it, knowing that he has weird fascination with my neck. But to my surprise he never said a word, he just stood stoic, eyeing me suspiciously.
“What happened tonight, Raine?” I shrunk down further into the couch. He continued to loom over me and pierce his interrogating stare my way.
“Nothing. Time just seemed to run on legs and before I knew it, I’d missed three quarters of the class,” I replied as I tried to keep my tone casual like we were just discussing the weather or tomorrow’s dinner.
He bent towards the floor and lifted my feet, dropping them onto his lap as he took a seat next to me. “You can try and shrug this off, Raine and act like everything tonight was nothing, or you can start by telling me the truth.”
I watched him pull my trainers and socks from my feet and then he began to dig the pads of his thumbs in to the soles, massaging them. I’d always been turned off by feet and couldn’t stand mine being touched, but as I watched his hands glide across them, his thumbs pushing across the skin, kneading them with expertise, I found it strangely erotic. But then when it came to Nikoli, everything he said, everything he did, the way he looked at me, the way he made me feel, the way he touched me, it was all erotic to me.
I sighed and rested myself back into the arm of the couch and closed my eyes, enjoying the sensual way his fingers danced across my feet. “How long has it been going on?” He asked quietly.
“Has what been going on?”