The Agreement (Darkest Lies Trilogy Book 1) by Bethany-Kris (motivational books for men .TXT) 📕

leading to sitting areas at the edge of the pool, and the light inside this conservatory seemed to make everything magnificently brighter than it needed to be. Everything appeared magnified, and the sun’s heat was trapped because of it, making the air hotter than it already was. Every breath he took was accompanied by the taste of chlorine.

Roman blinked, glancing up to stare at the sun through the curved glass roof. He was about to shade his eyes when he heard a splash. His first clue to the fact that he wasn’t alone in the space.

He was too far away to see the pool clearly, thinking so far that he had been completely alone. Finally rid of the men who were milling about the place, and seemingly watching him from a safe distance, he moved toward the edge of the crystal clear, cerulean water. All he could see of his unknown companion in the pool was the flash of an arm—wet, cream-toned skin—and a dark head of hair bobbing below the surface.

The closer he got to the pool, the more certain he was that the person swimming in it was a woman. She sluiced through the water expertly, traveling with impressive speed from one end of the pool to the other without once showing any sign of fatigue. She only came up for air just quick enough to dip back down in the water, and not for long enough to notice that she was no longer alone.

One lap.

Then a second.

Roman came up to the edge of the pool, watching all the while. She still hadn’t noticed him because she hadn’t once looked up. Whatever was motivating her to keep swimming wasn’t about to slow her down yet. He couldn’t take his eyes off her even though he didn’t know who she was, and if he was even supposed to be watching her in the first place.

There were definitely rules in the Yazov home he wasn’t aware of, and he wasn’t in a position to break them. All things considered ...

But Roman knew he wasn’t going anywhere. Not until he had seen this woman’s face. At the end of the third lap, when she was on the other side of the pool, she finally stopped to reach up and grab the ledge, straightening herself slowly while she wiped her face with the crook of her elbow.

He hadn’t seen her face yet, but her slender back was on display for him now, distracting his attention as his gaze traveled over the curves of her shoulders and the water dripping down her spine. She appeared to be wearing a bra instead of a proper bikini top. The semi-sheer, white lace was nearly the same color of her pale skin.

Finally, she looked over her shoulder, and the biggest, bluest eyes he had ever seen found his. At first, all that stared back from her was distance—or rather, it was like she saw right through him. As if he wasn’t standing there at all.

But goddamn.

He had never seen eyes like hers before; shockingly beautiful from so far away and yet entirely blank at the same time. There was something striking—and haunting—about them.

Because he couldn't seem to look away. Even though she was in the water, he was the one drowning.

Only her voice broke the daze.

“Did they send you to come get me?”

She called out to him from the other end of the pool. Her voice had a slow and dreamy quality, like she was taking her time with each word before she let them escape her lips, a careful consideration of the things she chose to say. It made her voice all the more melodic because of it, too.

She turned to the side ledge of the pool then, and began to drift towards him. Her slender shoulders bobbed gently in the water, small waves kissing the column of her neck with each rise and lower.

A woman moving through water shouldn’t be an entire experience, but there Roman was ... fucking experiencing it. Whatever it was.

“Well, are you?” she asked him again.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She paid no mind to what he said, almost as though his words passed right through her. Her mind was elsewhere entirely—he could still see that distance in her gaze as it drifted from him to the doorway, and then back again.

But when she finally did stay focused on him, though—she truly saw him. For a brief second, he watched those big eyes of hers open further, and her stare looked him up and down. She tipped her head to the side a bit, a small grin playing at the edges of a plump, but tiny, mouth.

She didn’t know him.

Well, he didn’t know her, anyway.

But she looked at him like they did—like they knew each other very well.

Had they met before—was he supposed to know her? He was damn sure he wouldn’t have forgotten a face like hers, not even on his wildest of nights when his memories were left more fragmented than consistent. Even from this distance, he could see the tenderness of her small features, her sharp nose and bow-shaped lips. Dainty came to mind—she looked like delicate fragility come to life, but wrapped in the sensual package of the body of a woman.

The sunlight streaming harshly through the glass dome reflected brightly on her face, spilling over her shoulders and through the water as she passed through a thick ray. It bathed her in a golden hue, making her damp skin glisten and adding a bit more color to her porcelain tone.

She couldn’t have been older than twenty, the smooth face that spoke of youth said life hadn’t quite taken her that far, yet. Although, he couldn’t forget that gleam he first saw in her eyes—that distance that spoke of an old soul.

They existed.

His grandfather swore it.

You have one, Anton told him once. You can see it in others, too—so look.

Apparently, he’d finally found another. Why didn’t she look at him the way other women