Blyad. No one is going to believe this bite-sized girl can take me down! Boris Grekov thought in annoyance, glaring at the fine-boned Asian woman standing across the room.
Something about her body language got on his nerves. She hadn’t even glanced up when he and Claudia strode into the training section of the security floor. She stood with her back to the wall, as any good bodyguard would, talking to Daniel Mercer and Tyson King. If she made it through the hand-to-hand combat portion of her interview, then Mercer, and by extension King, would become her employer. It looked like Mercer was drilling her on techniques. His face gave none of his thoughts away. Not that Mercer ever gave anything away. He was one tough motherfucker. Which was saying something, given Boris’ reputation as a lethal Russian mob enforcer.
Laney Paul should have noticed him. He was 6’7” of solid muscle. It didn’t matter where he went, people stopped to stare at him. He was well over a foot taller than the woman he was supposed to engage in hand-to-hand combat, and he probably outweighed her by 200 pounds. The absurdity of the situation should have warranted at least a glance from her, not to mention the fact that he was covered from head to foot in tattoos and generally considered one scary looking son-of-a-bitch. Hell, the first time Claudia Cantore, the woman standing at his side, had seen him, she’d nearly wet herself and scaled a fence to get away from him. Though she hadn’t in actuality moved a muscle. But he could see the impulse in her eyes.
Yet, this fairly nondescript woman hadn’t so much as twitched in their direction. Boris could feel his temper rising, along with his curiosity. He crossed his arms, making the massive muscles bulge ominously, and glanced down at Claudia. She grinned up at him sheepishly and whispered, “I thought she might be a little bigger.”
Boris grunted. He didn’t bother to respond. In reality, the woman would have to be built like a tank to take him down. Even then, it wasn’t a likely bet. Daniel Mercer was the only human in the western hemisphere likely to take Boris in a fair fight, which was why Claudia had begged him to help today. She desperately wanted a female personal bodyguard, but Mercer wasn't having one on staff that couldn’t prove herself in hand-to-hand combat. Apparently, none of Daniel’s men would touch a woman, which left Daniel himself to fight her.
Boris bit back a grin. Daniel wouldn’t break a sweat either, literally or figuratively, over beating up a woman. He would do the deed and move on to the next applicant. So, Claudia had called in a favour and asked Boris to come let a woman beat him up so she could have female protection. How the fuck he was going to convince Mercer that this bitty little mouse was able to take him on might prove to be interesting.
Boris was about to tell Claudia it wasn't going to work and that she should ask the Russians for something else, like an arms shipment or a small country, when Laney finally turned to face him. Her eyes flared slightly as she finally took him in. His eyes narrowed in return. Her look hadn’t been one of fear or even surprise. It had been recognition.
At a young age, Boris had learned to look out for himself and a brother that couldn’t keep himself out of trouble, which meant reading situations and people. Each nuance could mean the difference between life or death. He would stake his entire inheritance on the fact that Laney Paul knew exactly who he was. But she was a mystery to him. And Boris didn’t fucking like mysteries.
