“All right.” I suck in a breath. So much betrayal, so many sins. My own included.
“Hey. What he said, it was bullshit.” He ducks his head to keep his gaze in line with mine. “You need to understand that. He’s wrong.”
“He’s right, Nikolai. I traded my body for his life.”
Hurt touches his eyes. “You protected your brother when he needed protecting. And your father would have been proud of that.”
I can’t help but laugh. “I don’t think he would like how I did it.”
His gaze slips. “Everything you did was because I made you. I gave you no choice and that’s my fault.”
Nikolai Romanov is taking the blame for something? He’s admitting to being wrong?
“You have a choice now.” He stands up straight. “Come home with me, Charlotte.”
I stare up at his face. He hasn’t shaved, and his beard is longer. I remember the looks he gave me when he climbed into bed at night. The little grins he tried to hide after I gave him a smart-ass response in the mornings, the way he arched his eyebrow when I treaded too close to the line.
“I can’t.” It breaks me. Two words have never been so hard to say. “I just can’t.”
His shoulders drop. “You can.”
I shake my head. “I can’t, and if you’ve come to care for me at all, you won’t ask me to.” My throat tenses around the words, but I manage to get them out.
The front door opens and a few seconds later, Yogi is in the kitchen.
“All right,” Nikolai says with a curt nod. “Yogi, let’s get his ass to the car.”
Nikolai turns his back on me. My throat closes around the plea for him to let me change my mind. But I know it’s best, my decision is the right call.
I leave the kitchen and go to the bedroom, softly closing the door and lean against it. I’m a coward. I can’t watch them carry my brother away. I can’t stand there and witness Nikolai walking out of my life.
So, I hide in the bedroom.
And let my heart shatter into pieces.