Alexei And Grace

25 | All It Takes

"Excellent. Now take your top off..."

I COULD BARELY RAISE MY voice enough to say a breathless, "excuse me?"

Viktor didn't flinch. "Off," he repeated calmly, gesturing to the top half of my dress.

Even if for some crazy reason I wanted to comply—which I didn't—it would have been a near impossibility. Sure, my dress had a zipper at the back which meant it could be pulled down to my midriff, but there was no way in hell I'd be able to unfasten that myself.

As the air in the room seemed to still around me, I went through each potential explanation I could think of for such a bizarre request. The first thing that popped into my head was sex. Was this some sort of strange foreplay? Had Viktor brought me into his home for something other than business? My heart thumped anxiously at the thought. But the way he was looking at me, cold and clinical, like a science project, told me that pleasure was not on the agenda. Thank god.

Now my mind was coming up blank. I couldn't fathom any reason as to why I'd need to get undressed.

"Miss Perne." Viktor pushed away from the desk. Took a step closer. Too close. "I don't like to be kept waiting," he reminded.

"I...I don't understand," I admitted.

"I thought you were a clever girl, Grace."

"I don't understand why," I corrected harshly. This whole situation was utterly sick and utterly beyond my comprehension.

Viktor opened his mouth as if to reply but then he stopped abruptly as his eyes shifted behind me and his lips folded into a grim line.

I turned to see what had caught his attention and found Alexei throwing open the door. "Grace," he hissed urgently, gesturing for me to stand by his side.

I glanced nervously between both men.

          "If I required your presence I'd have informed you," Viktor said to Alex dismissively.

          But Alex didn't budge.

          "Grace has dressed your wound," he pointed out. "She doesn't need to be here anymore."

         "She isn't leaving until she's complied with my request."

          Alex grabbed my hand and suddenly I felt heat rushing up my arm. "We're leaving," he spat as he pulled me towards the exit.

          "You're making a mistake, Alexei, and you know it."

          With his hand on the door handle Alex paused. Viktor had finally caught his attention, and I didn't like it one bit. Surely he wouldn't agree with his father's ludicrous  demand...and yet, at the mention of a mistake, he seemed paralysed. Of course I knew by now that Alex hated being wrong; admitting to his own mistakes was not an activity he often—or ever—engaged in. Yet despite all that, I couldn't imagine him stooping so low in order to impress his father.

          Once Viktor had caught Alexei's attention he continued, "you let her walk and we'll never know. One mistake is all it takes, son. To bring our empire down."

          "She's not working against us," he hissed.

          "Then make her prove it."

          I was completely lost, stuck on the outside of a conversation I didn't understand. Alex turned to me and I could see that he was torn. His brows were crinkled, eyes softened by the bright office lights to the point where they almost looked pleading. Although no words were exchanged between us, it felt like that glance alone conveyed a thousand of them.