She spent the rest of the evening trying to distract herself with work. She downloaded all her pictures and organized them on the computer. She spoke to Parker back in the States. It was a girl, a beautiful and healthy baby girl. He was gushing with joy and pride. He expressed some guilt over leaving her alone and she assured him without going into detail that she was fine. She issued her congratulations and told him to take all the time he wanted. She had lots of work to do, but she couldn’t completely keep her mind off of the dashing Russian who had invaded her life. She came across the picture of him at the Cathedral. It really was quite lovely. He was leaning casually on the car, staring off into the distance. She lingered over the picture, studying the sunlight on his hair, the set of his jaw. He’d been right. He left her with a lot to think about. She couldn’t stop thinking about that kiss. She couldn’t stop thinking about the taste of him, the softness of his lips, the way his whiskers rubbed her chin, the firmness of his body as he crushed her to him, how strong and incredible his arms felt around her. She let out a deep sigh. I could be having more of that right now, she thought. But no, I had to be a good girl. She shook thoughts of him out if her mind and went back to her work. She worked well into the night, hoping that she would be too tired to linger on thoughts of him. It didn’t work.
The morning sunshine woke her after a restless night. She had two free days before she was supposed to go to St Petersburg. She’d hope to spend them seeing things in Moscow that most people didn’t see. The tourist attractions were great, beautiful in fact, but there was more to Moscow that just that and she wanted to experience it all. She showered and dressed, tamed the waves in her hair and sat on the bed with a map, deciding on what to do. She tried to make a plan, but finally had to admit to herself that she was hesitant to leave her room because she was hoping to see him. After wasting as much time as she could stand, she ran out of patience and gathered her bag and room key and opened the door to leave.
He was standing there, in the process of knocking on the door when she swung it open. She gasped.
“Hi,” she said breathlessly. He grinned at her.
“Leaving without me?” he teased.
“Well, I … didn’t know when… uh,” she stumbled trying to find the words.
“Go back inside,” he ordered.
“What?” she said bewildered and a little anxious.
“Go back inside and pack a bag, one night. We be back tomorrow. Do you swim?”
“Well, uh, yes I do, but where are we going?”
“Bring swim suit, no need anything else, just one night. I take you to country. My dasha.”
“Your house?” she asked in shock.
“Yes, come on, get stuff, let’s go.”
“But Alex, I don’t know, I …” she wasn’t sure it was a good idea to go running off with him to the country and overnight no less.
“You have fun. It will be okay. You be safe. Your, what is word,” he thought for a second, “virtue will be safe, unless, you change mind, of course.”
He grinned at her slyly and she had no doubt he could easily make her change her mind.
“Come on, let’s go,” he shooed her back into her room and she put a few things in an overnight bag. He herded her quickly around so that she wasn’t even sure she got the things she wanted.
He drove so fast, but after a few minutes she got over her nervousness. He said he slowed down for her though she couldn’t really tell. She watched the city quickly fade away into the Russian country-side. The summer grass was still so green and the area was littered with fir trees. The air was a little cooler than in the city, but it was still warm. Alex had the windows in the BMW down. She wasn’t sure if it was the wind created by his driving or the way he looked at her that gave her goose bumps. After about an hour, he pulled the BMW into a lovely, red brick country house. There were three other cars in the drive.
“Do you have other people here?” she asked, afraid she might be meeting a bunch of new people.
“These mine. I like cars. I have lots of cars,” he said matter-of-factly. She smiled at him, relieved and also a little glad that she had him all to herself. She followed him inside watching him move as he carried her bag and set it down in a small bedroom. She could see the muscles in his back flex as he moved. He had a strong, broad back and chest. She licked her lips in anticipation of swimming with him and being able to see what it looked like without a shirt.
“What?” he said, questioning the look on her face, with a grin.
“What?” she said coyly, acting as if she hadn’t just been undressing him with her eyes. His smile widened and he motioned her to follow him on a quick tour of the house.
Right, she thought sarcastically, her virtue was completely safe.
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