Deceitful Vows (Marital Privileges #2)

57. Zoya

57

ZOYA

I dip my chin in thanks to the doorman of Le Rogue when he holds it open for me. When I spot a taxi, I throw my hand in the air, signaling for him to stop before hotfooting it through the main entrance door.

I’m in such a hurry, I bump into someone entering.

“Sorry,” apologizes a voice from above before he bobs down to collect my belongings he knocked out of my arms during our collision.

I didn’t have much in my locker, but just like my bikini, I paid for them, so I’ll take them with me.

Amusement pumps out of my savior when he takes in the naughty secretary glasses and calculator I brought from home. They don’t quite match the sex toys Mars encouraged me to have delivered to work so they wouldn’t be stolen by my neighbors. They’re on opposing teams—as is my response when my savior lifts his head.

I appear to have acquired a stalker.

Bayli slowly stands like my shoulders are wider than his and my height is just as imposing.

His timid take frees me to ask, “Are you following me?”

“No,” he immediately replies, shaking his head. “I come here all the time.”

His size should make him intimidating, but it doesn’t. I met him before he was officially a man. That changes everything in an instant.

“Who’s your favorite dancer?”

His expression stonewalls before he murmurs out, “Ah… Trixie.”

It takes me a second to roll through the dancers’ stage names before I can call him out on his lie. “We don’t have a dancer called Trixie.”

“What the fuck?” Bayli replies, balking. “Every strip joint has a dancer named Trixie. Trixie, Angel, and Destiny. You’ll find one at every club.”

I laugh at his absolute assuredness before scooting past him. “You should have gone with Angel. We have three of them.”

I hear his huff before the stomp of his feet echoes off the brickwork outside Le Rogue. “What about Destiny? Do you have one of them?”

“We may, but you’ll never find out if you continue following me.” I point behind me. “The entrance is back there.”

He drags his eyes in the direction I’m pointing before returning them to me. After putting enough distance between us that all my swings will miss, he says, “I may be following you.” When I huff and walk faster, he jogs to catch up to me. “Not in a bad way.”

“There’s a good type of stalking?”

“Depends on who you ask.” He laughs at my eye roll before saying, “I wanted to ask you something, but I didn’t want to do it in front of Maksim and Doc.”

Doc is Maksim’s nickname for Nikita. It proves Bayli knows them more intimately than a random stranger, and the knowledge frees me to say, “You have five minutes. I’ve got shit to do?—”

“I don’t need to know your bathroom habits.” He continues to see my eye rolls as approval of his poor comedic skills. “And I won’t need longer than five minutes.”

“You will if you keep stalling.”

“True. Ah…” A thousand words roll through his head before he blurts out four. “Have we met before?”

His question shocks me. I’ve been told so many times that I’m unforgettable that I’ve started believing it.

“I swear this isn’t a line to get your number or anything. I just could have sworn we’ve met before.”

With my smarts too clouded with confusion to jump straight into another shit fight so soon after the last one, it leaves Bayli plenty of opportunity to offer an introduction.

It doesn’t go as planned.

“Ano. It is nice to meet you…”

Ano? Who the hell is Ano?

When he holds out his hand in offering, I accept it before finalizing his question in a way I haven’t in over a decade. “Zoya Sakharoff.”

I’m not seeking an invitation back into the Sakharoff realm. I’m trying to trip Ano up because something is very wrong with this picture.

I could have sworn on a Bible that he was Aleena’s ex who disappeared not long after her sixteenth birthday party. Even Aleena is convinced they’re one and the same.

After working my name through his head for several long seconds, Ano gestures to a bar across the road from Le Rogue. “Do you want to grab a drink?”

“I thought you said this wasn’t about trying to secure a date?”

He doesn’t give off creeper vibes, but just like Andrik last night, something is off with his demeanor.

Even Ano’s dimple-blemished grin is a match for Bayli’s shy smile. “I’m not. I just have a feeling you’ve got answers to questions I’ve been seeking for years, but I don’t see me asking them without a gallon of vodka priming my veins.”

Since he seems harmless enough, I gesture for him to lead the way, hopeful I will get as many answers for Aleena as I will for myself.