𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇 𝐎𝐑 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐘𝐎𝐔 ▸ After his restoration, the unthinkable happens - Dimitri tells Rose that loves fades and his has. To add insult to injury, Queen Tatiana ends up murdered with Rose's stake. Dimitri had asked Rose to give him tim...
"Oh, to be young and in love," Abe joked to Pavel and Tasha, gesturing to the scene playing out in the garden below the parlor window. Wasting no opportunity to check off one of the suggested 'dates' from his poster, the morning after Christmas found Dimitri and Rose outside in the fresh snow, bundled up with gloves and scarves, building a snowman. After clarifying that this was an activity for only he and Rose to enjoy, Dimitri upped the ante by making them a thermos of hot chocolate and bringing a large blanket for them to cuddle beneath, which they were now enjoying as they sat on an outdoor bench admiring their creation and talking. Not now snowing, it was crisp, but the two were warm enough embracing under the duvet sipping their hot drinks.
"Are you sure it's love?" Tasha scoffed, peering out the window and down to where Rose sat wrapped in the Russian Guardian's arms.
"Well, I don't see Belikov smiling at me like that," Pavel said, observing the particularly tender expression on Dimitri's face as he gazed at Rose as she spoke.
"Or kissing you like that," Abe teased Pavel. Tasha's head spun back to the window just in time to see Dimitri lower his lips to Rose's as she snaked her arms around his neck. A sweet loving kiss that quickly turned more heated, the two were fully into it.
"What are you three looking at?" Lissa asked, stepping into the parlor with Christian, Eddie, and Adrian, noting Tasha's furious expression.
"Belikov and Hathaway sucking face," Adrian said once he came to stand beside Abe.
"Are they?" Lissa squealed, stepping over to an adjacent window to observe the couple, who were unknowingly giving everyone inside quite a show.
"Oh, come on, Liss. Didn't you see them last night while we were watching the movie? If Rose had been sitting any closer to Dimitri, she would have been on his lap," Christian said, noticing an ugly expression cross his aunt's face as he did so.
"And he kept playing with her hair," Eddie added, lifting his eyebrows suggestively. A far cry from Dimitri's demeanor over the months since his restoration, everyone could see Guardian Belikov was besotted. Rose was alive, and it seemed he would not waste a moment letting her know how much he loved and cared for her. Belikov was a man on a mission.
"Whether or not he likes her, surely it's not a good idea to let anything develop during these few days on holiday? After New Year, Dimitri will be back guarding Lissa, and Rose..."
Abe cut Tasha off. "And Rose will be wherever she wants to be doing whatever she wants to do."
"You can't expect them to take her back? As a Guardian? Not after what she's been involved in!? And Lissa—would you even want her as one of your Guardians after all this? Could you trust her?" The entire group was glaring at Tasha, yet she did not appear to have a mind to notice it.
"Of course, I'll have Rose as my Guardian. We have been best friends since we were four! I trust her absolutely. Besides Christian, there's no one I trust more!" Lissa glared at her boyfriend's aunt as she delivered her words.
"Adrian?" Abe muttered, canting his head to one side to show he wished Lord Ivashkov to follow him as he moved out of the parlor and toward his study.
"Sir?" Pavel asked, noting the subtle interaction, checking whether he should follow the pair. As Abe's right-hand man, for almost two decades Pavel had been privy to Abe's plots and plans. Yet somehow, of late, Ivashkov seemed to have displaced him.
"Stay here and keep an eye on them," Abe instructed quietly, too busy ruminating to notice his Guardian's put-out expression.
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