Maxim had Svetlana.
I had Vitaly Vorobev.
“What’s wrong, Maxim?” I taunt. “Did you fuck it all up? The plan was to make her fall for you. Did you go and make the mistake of falling for her?”
He lifts his eyes to mine. I can see it all there, beneath his black expression. He knows he’s fucked up this meeting. He knows he’s in the weaker position.
“Fall for her?” he sneers. “She was nothing but a mark. A way for me to hurt you.”
“And what purpose did it serve? I have her now. So who’s hurting who?”
“I will get her back,” he vows.
“You just claimed she means nothing to you,” I point out. “Why fight for a woman you don’t give a fuck about?”
“The same reason you stole her from me,” Maxim says vehemently. “She’s a power play. The last move on the board before checkmate. And I plan to win.”
I laugh. “I’m afraid you’ll have to kill me first. Because as long as I’m alive, Cami is mine.”
“So be it.”
He acts almost immediately. But I’ve been anticipating this move since the moment I arrived. As soon as his hand moves to the right side of his jacket, I send my fist flying towards his face.
I whip around him and tighten my arm around his neck as I get a hold of the gun in his jacket.
“He made the first move,” I growl into my wire—just as the thundering of approaching footsteps echoes through the building.
I don’t think those footsteps work for me, either.
But like I said from the very start—it doesn’t matter to me. Isaak Vorobev always wins in the end.
By the time his men burst into the second story, I’ve already got the gun pointed at Maxim’s head. “Any of you fuckers move and I pull the trigger.”
“You’ll do it anyway,” Maxim spits, grinding his nails into my arm.
“I should. But I won’t. Consider this the repayment of a debt, cousin,” I hiss in his ear. “Tell your men to drop their weapons.”
“Fuck you.”
“Don’t fucking test my patience,” I growl, backing towards the staircase behind me.
I don’t need to buy much more time. My reinforcements are already on the way and I’m close enough to the windows to see when they arrive.
I do a quick scan of Maxim’s men and count. “Jesus,” I growl in disgust. “You brought fifteen men. Fucking coward.”
“I knew… urgh… you wouldn’t… wouldn’t keep your word.”
I roll my eyes. “Look around, Maxim. My men were stationed a mile away. And I came in unarmed. Like we agreed on.” I make sure to raise my voice so that his soldiers will hear our conversation. “We may not live by the laws of the land or the rules of society. But we have our own code to follow, Maxim. And you violated it. Twice.” I look towards his men. “Is this the don you follow? Because I find him severely lacking.”
I hear the screech of wheels. In the corner of my eye, I see my men arriving.
I watch as Lachlan jumps out of the jeep before it’s even come to a stop. Bogdan is right behind him. The two of them are the first into the warehouse.
“Remember this moment, cousin,” I tell him. “I could have taken your life. But I chose to spare you. It’s the last mercy you’ll ever get from me.”
The moment Lachlan, Bogdan, and the other Vorobev troops burst into the space, I hurl Maxim onto the floor in front of me. Where he belongs.
Then the first gunshot rings out and the best bit begins…
The fight.
31
Camila
I’ve been sitting on the terrace for hours when I hear a noise. It snaps me out of my thoughtless reverie. When I jump and turn around, though, I force myself to stifle my squeal.
“Hi,” I squeak.
Nikita regards me coolly from just inside the French doors. “Hello.”
“Sorry,” I mumble self-consciously. “I didn’t mean to—if this is your spot or something, I wasn’t intruding, I just—I can leave. I’ll go. Sorry.”
She glides over to me and bends over like a ballerina to retrieve the book that fell from my lap. It’s still open to the first page. God only knows how many hours of staring at it since I first ran here after what happened in the garden, and I still couldn’t tell you how the story begins.
Nikita fixes me with a contained smile. “It’s a big terrace,” she says. “I’m willing to share.”
I still feel antsy and uncomfortable, hands clamped on the armrests of the iron-wrought chair I’m in. “It’s really okay, I’ll leave you to—”
“Sit,” she says. Her tone is regal, confident, but not cruel or demeaning. “I told you already: I don’t bite.”
She sinks into the other chair. There’s a glass table between us, but I still feel like I’m somehow encroaching on her space.
“It’s a beautiful spot, isn’t it?” Nikita observes, looking out at the gardens that lie sprawled out before us.
“Very British.”
She smiles. “I can’t quite figure out if you mean that as a compliment or not.”
I snort with laughter. “Me neither.”
“Sometimes,” she says, “I think I love this place. Other times, I want to leave so bad it makes me scream inside.”
I shiver at her words. She has this cryptic kind of doublespeak to every word she utters. Like she’s having one conversation, but in reality, we’re talking about something completely different altogether.
She still hasn’t handed back the book I dropped. Instead, she closes it gently and examines the front cover. “Gogol?”
“I’ve never really read any of his work,” I admit, trying not to give myself away. “Thought I’d give it a shot.”
“He’s one of Isaak’s favorite authors.”
I don’t know why, but I feign ignorance. “Really?”
Okay, so maybe I do know why I’m feigning ignorance. And it’s more than a little embarrassing, so I figure it’s just easier to pretend. Especially to his mother.
“Oh yes. My son has a deep sense of loyalty to his Russian roots,” she says. “Although he is more American than he cares to admit.”
I smile. “Does he know you think that?”
“I’m no fool. I’m on thin ice with him as it is.”
I look at her with surprise. Her tone is teasing, but her eyes tell a different story. For the first time, I wonder what her life must have been like. Being a wife to a dominant and no doubt hyper-controlling man. Being a mother to boys who would grow up to take over for their father, to rule exactly as he ruled. Maybe that’s what she meant about loving something so much and wanting to scream at the same time.
“Thank you for not asking,” Nikita adds.
“It’s none of my business.”
“Still, another woman would have asked.”
I give her a small smile, still trying to get my bearings. It’s not that she intimidates me. Not quite—or at least, not totally. It’s more that I’m scared to talk too much, reveal too much about myself.
I get the feeling that Nikita is a lot more dangerous than she looks. She’s got secrets behind those clear brown eyes, and she hides them well.
“How do you find the library?” she asks.
“Amazing,” I breathe, deciding that sticking to neutral topics is the way to go. “It’s the most beautiful library I’ve ever been in. And I used to work in one.”