Dancing with a Stranger

Chapter Sixteen

"You don't want to threaten me?" I ask disbelievingly. "That's exactly what you're doing, Braden!"

"Lacey, keep your voice down," he warns, "we don't need Ian coming back."

"You're unbelievable!" I spit at him, as I walk towards the door and close it to create a barrier for privacy.

"Lace..."

"Braden, just stop. You can't tell me you love me in one breath and threaten me in the next."

Braden lets out an exasperated sigh and turns around, running his hands through his hair and over his face a few times. Taking a deep breath, he turns to face me, looking utterly conflicted. "I'm really not trying to threaten you, Lacey. I know that's how it sounds, but that's not my intent."

I roll my eyes and cross my arms. "Please don't tell me you're going to feed me the 'it's not a threat, it's a promise' line."

He fails at holding back a slight laugh. "No, I won't be saying that. I made a poor choice of words. We can't all be well-spoken librarians, you know," he says with a wink.

His attempt at flirtatious humour is not lost on me but I am not in the mood, so I simply stare back at him.

"Lacey," he sighs again before continuing, "we really are here to protect you. I should never have used the word 'disposed'."

"Then why did you?"

"I guess I wanted you to realize the gravity of the situation. We need you to do this for us." He starts to walk towards me, closing the gap between us. "It's of the utmost importance."

"What makes you think I won't just tell Nikolai? Or that I haven't already?" I throw these questions at him, hoping he will give a hint or clue that this is all one big joke, that he is just jealous that I have been able to move on from him this fast.

He reaches out and grabs my hand, rubbing his thumb along the back of it, while staring lovingly into my eyes. "One, because I know that somewhere, deep inside of you, you know that I'm telling the truth."

The sense of sincerity in his voice causes me to pause for a moment. These past few days, I have been acting out of my hurt and anger from his betrayal, in addition to my growing attraction for Nikolai. What if he really is telling the truth?

His eyes quickly darken as he drops my hand. "And two, because Nikolai Jovan wouldn't hesitate to put a bullet in your head if he knew."

I stand there, mouth gaping, at the frankness of his words. "H-he...he would...never," I manage to say. A criminal is one thing, but a murderer is a different story. I guess I just thought that if Braden was telling the truth, Nikolai was maybe involved in white-collar crimes, not that that is any better.

"Believe me," he replies, "he would in a heartbeat." He glances at his watch and then looks back up at me. "Listen, I have to get going. Please, just trust me and do the right thing. So much is riding on this." He leans in and kisses my forehead before saying, "I miss you and I love you, Lace." And with that, he opens the door and walks away, leaving me frozen in place, bewildered and confused.

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The rest of the morning goes by slowly as Emma and I gossip about our patrons while getting our work done. Ian seemed pleasantly surprised when I informed him that I would not be returning in the afternoon. "You deserve some time off, Lacey," he said. Even though it is a half-day, normally, I come back after lunch to make some headway with the different research projects I am tasked with.

I gather my belongings and prepare to meet Tiffany for our regular Friday lunch date. I feel my phone vibrating in my purse and pull it out to see a text message from Nikolai.