And she’d definitely be out of a job.
“Thank you for your help,” she said again. She felt like a broken recording, but what else could she say? Paige tried her best to smile as if she wasn’t still raw inside. “I suppose this is goodbye then.”
Alexei’s smile was wolfish. “Ah, but this is not goodbye, is it? We will see each other again, Paige Barnes. We will see a lot of each other, I promise you.”
Paige hurried from the car and dashed inside the hotel lobby without looking back. Her skin was hot, in spite of the frigid weather, and she stripped off her coat in the elevator as it sped to her floor.
Why did Alexei Voronov rattle her so much? Yes, they’d skipped a few steps with that meeting in Red Square, but a kiss was a kiss. Wasn’t it?
Paige’s ears were hot. No, it definitely wasn’t. That kiss had been molten hot, and so had the kisses later, in his apartment.
That didn’t make the kisses extraordinary, however. And, really, how would she know? She had very little to base it on.
Paige fished her key from her coat and slipped into the room she shared with Emma. A pang of feeling pierced her heart, but she pushed it aside. So what if Emma was with Chad? Paige was so over it.
“Oh my God, where have you been? I’ve been so worried!”
Paige stopped dead in the midst of trying to close the door silently, in case Emma was in bed after all, and turned very slowly to face her sister.
Emma’s pretty face was lined with worry. Paige’s heart squeezed in her chest.
“I’m sorry, Emma. I couldn’t sleep and went for a walk.” The lie slipped from her tongue with ease, but guilt followed in its wake. She didn’t like lying to her sister, but it was easier than explaining what had really happened.
And safer, too, since Emma could be a chatterbox. She would innocently let slip the information that Paige had been with the evil head of Voronov Exploration, and that would be the end of Paige Barnes’s career at Russell Tech. She’d be on the next plane home with her tail tucked between her legs and no reference to find a new job.
She couldn’t even think about the potential repercussions to Emma and her budding romance, if that’s what it was, with Chad.
Emma tossed her glorious blond hair, her face shifting into a pout that Paige knew only too well. “You could have left a note.”
“Why would I do that?” Paige asked. “You never wake up before eight anyway.”
Emma had the grace to look sheepish. “Well, I did today. And you weren’t here. I was about to call Chad to help me find you.”
Déjà vu. Paige casually laid her coat over the back of the couch in their suite, thanking her lucky stars she’d returned when she did. The last thing she needed was Chad trying to find her.
“I’m here now, so you can stop worrying.”
“You’re wearing the same clothes as yesterday,” Emma pointed out.
Paige felt her face grow hot. “I put them back on when I woke up. Now I’m going to shower and get ready for the meeting.” She was almost to the bedroom door when she stopped and turned back. “You didn’t come home last night, Emma. Where were you?”
Emma’s face split into a grin. Typical of her sister that she wouldn’t see a parallel between her actions and Paige’s. It simply didn’t occur to her that Paige might have panicked when she hadn’t returned. She expected Paige to always be there for her, but she didn’t seem to think it was a two-way street.
“I was with someone,” Emma said. “And I think I’m in love.”
Paige forced herself to remain calm even though her heart was pounding a million miles an hour. “That’s fast,” she said. “You can hardly know this man.”
“Oh, Paige,” Emma said, her face glowing with happiness. “I wasn’t going to tell you just yet, because I knew you’d worry, but it’s Chad.”
Paige blinked. “You’re in love with Chad? But you barely know him—”
“I’ve been seeing him for a month.”
Paige sank onto the closest chair. A month. One month of lies, obfuscations and going behind her back. No wonder Chad hadn’t needed her to send flowers or make reservations.
And she was beginning to understand why he’d taken her for lunch.
“I had no idea,” she said numbly.
Emma came over and knelt before her, took both of Paige’s hands in her long-fingered elegant ones. “I’m sorry, but Chad thought you might be upset if you knew. We wanted to keep it a secret until we knew how we felt about each other.”
Paige’s hands were so cold inside Emma’s warm ones. One sister had all the life and heat while the other was cold and empty. It didn’t seem fair. “Isn’t a month awfully quick to know if you love someone or not?”
Emma’s smile said that it clearly was not. “Sometimes you just know.”
In spite of her pain, it warmed Paige to see her sister so happy. She’d always wanted the best for Emma. Though there were only five years between them, she often felt more like Emma’s mother than her sister.
But Emma’s beatific smile worried her, too. Paige squeezed her hands. “I’ve worked for Chad Russell for two years, Emma. He dates a lot of women.”
“I know that. But he loves me. He wants to marry me.”
Her heart was splintering into a million jagged pieces around her. She hadn’t realized until that moment that she’d been living for Emma. What would she do when Emma was gone?
And what should she say now? Emma was looking at her so hopefully, but all Paige could do was worry. Was Chad serious? Would he really put aside his playboy ways and make her sister happy? Or was he merely leading Emma along with no intention of marrying her? He was so rich. He moved in different social circles, circles that Emma had never been in before. Was this real, or was it simply another affair?
“Have you set a date?”
Emma shook her head as she stood. “When we get back to Dallas, we’ll start discussing it. He’s just so worried with this deal right now.”
Paige’s heart flipped. But whether it was from her misgivings about Chad’s true intentions or about the deal that held Russell Tech’s future in the balance, she wasn’t sure. Because when she thought of the reason they were here in Moscow, she also thought of Alexei. He’d helped her when she needed it, held her while she cried, and kissed her so expertly that she’d practically begged him to take her to his bed—though of course she hadn’t done it right since he had not complied.
But he wasn’t just any man. He was Prince Voronov, and he was out to destroy Russell Tech. If he succeeded, then he also destroyed Chad and Emma’s possibility of a happy future together.
Paige stood and hugged her sister tight. “I’m glad you’re so happy and I hope Chad realizes how lucky he is to have you. Because if he doesn’t,” she continued, pushing Emma back to look at her, “I’ll castrate him.”
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