Since he was having trouble forming words with the image of her bullet ridden body in his mind, he grabbed her arm and dragged her towards the palace where they could have some privacy. Unfortunately, the obviously fearless woman didn’t understand the danger she was in.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Nikki demanded, pulling back and glaring up at him. “I’m not going anywhere with you!”
He spun around and glared down at her, leaving almost no space between their bodies. “Nikki, you either walk into this building with me where we can discuss this latest insanity on your part in private, or I toss you over my shoulder and bring you to my bedroom where I spank you for putting yourself in such horrific danger.”
She pulled back slightly, but that didn’t help stop his fulminating glare. “I’ll go, but you don’t have to drag me,” she said in an angry whisper, not wanting any more of their arguments to be overheard by the guards that were now surrounding the two of them.
“That is certainly up for debate,” he came right back. But instead of grabbing her arm, he stepped back and, with a sweeping gesture, allowed her to precede him into the air conditioned palace. “This way,” he said when she kept going forward instead of turning in the direction of his private suite.
Just before he was about to close the doors, he turned to his body guard. “Find out how she got in!” he commanded with finality. He slammed the door right when the guard was about to say something.
When he turned around, he looked down at the now-angry woman. “Nikki…” he started to say but she interrupted him.
“That was very rude of you,” she told him, crossing her arms over her chest in a defensive move. She was braving it out because she didn’t want him to know how truly terrified she was. She didn’t think he would shoot her or do her any harm, but she suspected that she was in his private area. That meant that his bedroom was very close and she didn’t want to be near him when a bed was near. She didn’t understand it, but she didn’t have much willpower when it came to this man.
“What was rude?” he demanded, moving closer to her.
Automatically, she backed up, not wanting to be close to him. She’d done that, knew the impact and wasn’t going to fall into that trap once again. “Slamming the door when that man was trying to say something to you.”
“He was going to tell me that you needed to be imprisoned,” Nazar retorted.
“Oh,” Nikki replied, stunned by that news. “Well, then…” her mind scrambled, never having come close to even getting a ticket before so the idea of being arrested and imprisoned was shocking. “In that case, he was being rude.”
Nazar stepped closer, measuring the distance until she couldn’t move any further back, calculating how long until she would be in his arms. “Rude doesn’t begin to describe it.”
Nikki tried a different tact. “Nazar, you’re very angry, aren’t you?”
He shrugged one of his massive shoulders and continued to follow her, step for step. “You could actually say that I’ve never been angrier.”
Wow! She wasn’t sure she liked having that distinction. “Why are you mad?” she asked, thinking that talking about it might help him diffuse some of his fury.
“Why? Let’s see,” he said, still advancing. “You ran out on me the last time we met and I haven’t been able to contact you. Nor have any of my very highly trained security guards been able to locate you. And in the midst of all of this, you somehow not only sneak into my country, but you also manage to slip by the guards at the gate, the motion sensors on the walls, the guards in the monitoring room that are supposed to be alert enough to see anything that even approaches the palace walls, then you even got through the heat sensors and who knows what other kinds of security measures that have been installed.” He watched her, seeing her eyes widen in alarm. He was certain that she hadn’t even been aware of all those security measures, which made it even more astonishing that she’d bypassed every one of them. “And you dared to enter into my private garden which caused about fifty guards to be alerted to your presence, all of whom wanted to be the hero who caught the intruder which would earn him a very valuable reputation.”
She licked her lips nervously, trying to smile in the hopes that he would see how unreasonable his anger was. “You’re looking at this the wrong way,” she said, frantically trying to calm him down. His elaboration of all of those things he says she got through was only making him angrier.
“And how would you suggest I look at this, besides you putting your life in danger on so many levels and in so many ways?”
She thought hastily, trying to see the bright spot in all of this. “Well….at least you know that your palace security isn’t up to snuff!” she explained with a bright smile.
He blinked at her words, stunned that she would dare offer such an outrageous “silver lining”. “You succeeded where many others have tried and failed.”
Her eyebrows drew down low over her eyes. “Are you telling me that others have tried to get in like I have?”
His anger only increased again. “That’s exactly what I’m telling you! Why did you even attempt something so outrageous?”
Nikki was tired of being cornered and scared. She hadn’t had much sleep all night, nor had she slept well for several nights because of her worry over Brianna’s disappearance and some strange emotions she was feeling at the idea of what this man might be doing to her friend. “Look,” she snapped, poking him in the middle of his chest. “If you’d just tell me where my friend is, I would be more than happy to get out of your life. I don’t know what you did with her, but she’s a good, sweet, kind woman and I care for her very much!”
He was astonished by her outburst. “You still think that I had her kidnapped?” he practically growled at her.
Nikki had no idea if his staff had done the actual kidnapping of he just knew the person who had her. But there had been something in his eyes that day at the press conference when she’d asked about the markets. That was the key to all of this. She didn’t know how all the dots connected, but she was just sure they did somehow. “Yes!” she exclaimed, desperate now.
He threw back his head and laughed. He laughed so hard that Nikki was starting to get genuinely irritated. When she tried to step away, he grabbed her arm to hold her in place. Unfortunately, because his grip wasn’t hard or hurting her, she made the mistake that his grip wasn’t very firm. So when she tried to slip away, he tightened his hold and laughed harder.