“It had just happened—”
“The tracker can be number two, and the engagement can be number three.” I held up three fingers.
Max tensed at the last, and his eyes slid to the side. Ha! He couldn’t meet my gaze on that charge.
“Look, I’m happy you’re alive, but we’re not friends. You’re the man who enables a power-hungry dictator who’s taken over my life and wants to command my future. Let’s not pretend otherwise.”
Max flinched as if I’d struck him. I couldn’t let myself care about that.This conversation should be happening with Kirill, and I was perilously close to sharing too much.
I stood and made to escape the kitchen.
“He’s not a power-hungry dictator, Mallory. He’s a man who loves you more than he cares about what’s normal or acceptable. In our world, he’s far from extreme.”
“Yeah, but I wanted nothing to do with your world, and I still don’t.”
* * *
The Tower was justas I remembered. It was like no time at all had passed. I avoided Olga as best I could and curled up in the library for the day. I found my notebook on a small side table beside the chaise lounge I usually wrote on. I flipped it open, knowing that the last hands on it had been Kirill’s. He’d read it, the motherfucker.
I flipped to the last page I’d written on and stilled as I found a black cursive scroll under my last line.
It was Kirill’s bold handwriting.
It's a love story,Molly. One day you’ll see that, Princess.
I staredat the words as emotions I didn’t know how to process filled my chest. I was such a mess. I loved him, and I hated him. I wanted to escape him and run to him at the same time. I was furious about the baby, but I was excited too. My opposing feelings threatened to rip me apart.
Through the whirling maelstrom in my heart, one emotion came through clearer than the rest. Anger. It was my set point and saved me from the things I was afraid and ashamed to feel. It wasn’t Nikolai’s fault my heart was broken. It was Kirill’s. He was the one who had fucked up our love story with his secrets and manipulation. The anger filled me, and the burn soothed my wounds, cauterizing them. There, that was better.
I took comfort in the fury.
13
KIRILL
Ispent the day wrapping up all the loose ends I had been ignoring for the bratva. Everything in my life had paused while I hunted for Mallory, and it was time to get back to business. Anything more, and Viktor would be peering over my shoulder. Nikolai had been keeping him otherwise occupied, and it felt strange as hell to trust my half-brother with anything important, but I had no choice. There was no defeating the mighty patriarch of the bratva, Viktor Chernov, without Nikolai’s help.
I had a thick file on Antonio De Sanctis, the father of my arranged bride. He was a sly bastard, and I’d already discovered how he had been planning to screw us over. Armed with that information, I hoped to finish this engagement business without harm to Sofia or me.
I got back to The Tower early, eager to see Molly. My early return would probably only disappoint her, but I couldn’t stay away. I was drawn there like a moth to her flame, and even if she burned me with her hot anger, I’d take it. She could burn me to ash, and I’d still welcome her touch.
Inside, Max sat in the kitchen, playing games on his phone and looking bored as hell. Since my number two had been shot, I wanted him to take it easy, but he’d taken it as a personal affront when I’d tried to put a different guard with Molly, so I’d let him keep that position.
“Any movement?”
“She came out of her room for a bit, long enough to rip me a new one, and I haven’t seen her the rest of the day,” Max said.
“Why don’t you see if Federica wants to come and visit? Molly would like that.”
Max raised an eyebrow. “And if she implores her to call the cops on us for kidnapping?”
“She won’t. Anyway, we have Federica over a barrel, and Molly needs a friend.”
“Yeah, and apparently, I’m not one anymore,” Max grumbled as he stood and stretched.
His leg was still healing, and I knew better than anyone how the stiffness of a bullet wound could linger. Seven years after Viktor had shattered my kneecap and ended my track career in one bloody night, my leg still nagged at me in damp weather. Since then, my body had been riddled with injuries and near-death blows. It was a bloody and scarred testament to the brutal existence of a bratva boss.
“Go home and rest. It was a long night last night. It’s my turn to tangle with the little hellcat,” I reminded him as I took off my jacket and rolled up my sleeves.