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8
Nikandr
Iwake to her curled against me, her head on my chest and her hair spilling across my shoulder like silk. For a moment—just one perfect, stolen moment—it feels real. Normal. Dangerous.
Her breathing is soft and even, and she makes a small sound in her sleep that goes straight through me. I allow myself the luxury of studying her face in the morning light filtering through the bulletproof windows. Without the wariness and fear that have defined her expressions since I brought her here, she looks younger. Peaceful. Beautiful in a way that has nothing to do with her resemblance to Irina Volkov.
The full weight of what I’ve done crashes over me like ice water. I kidnapped an innocent woman because she looked like someone else. I held her prisoner for days, threatened her life, and then last night, I made love to her like she was mine to take. The fact that she wanted it, that she kissed me back and cried myname when she came apart in my arms, doesn’t change the fundamental wrongness of the situation.
It makes it worse.
She stirs against me, flattening her palm against my chest, and my heartbeat accelerates at the simple contact. This is dangerous territory, the kind of emotional involvement that gets people killed in my world. As I watch her eyelashes flutter against her cheeks, I can’t bring myself to care about the danger.
A sharp knock at the door shatters the moment.
Sabrina jolts awake, her eyes wide with confusion and something that might be panic. The reality of where she is, and what we did last night, crashes over her features like a wave.
I slide out of bed and reach for my jeans. “Get dressed. Quickly.”
She doesn’t argue as she scrambles for her discarded underwear and dress while I put my clothes on. By the time I unlock the door, she’s sitting on the edge of the bed trying to look like she wasn’t just naked in my arms.
Maksim enters without invitation, his expression grim. His gaze flicks between Sabrina and me, taking in our disheveled appearances and the unmistakable evidence of what happened here. His jaw tightens, but he makes no comment about the fact I was clearly sharing Sabrina’s bed. He crosses his arms and stares at me directly. “We need to talk.”
I glance at Sabrina, who’s watching our exchange with attention. “Give us a minute.”
Maksim’s voice carries an urgency that makes my stomach clench. “Now, Nikandr.”
I meet his stare. “What is it?”
He looks at Sabrina again, then back at me. “We found her.”
I blink and steady myself against the doorframe. “Found who?” Somehow, I already know what he’s going to say though.
He pulls out his phone and shows me a photograph. “Irina Volkov. She’s in Prague. Confirmed identity and confirmed location. Our contact sent photos an hour ago.”
The room goes very quiet. I hear Sabrina’s sharp intake of breath and feel her stare boring into the side of my face, but I can’t look at her. Not yet. Not until I process what Maksim just told me.
I take the phone from him and study the image. The woman in the photograph is unmistakably Irina—older, with her hair a different color, but the bone structure is identical. More importantly, there’s something in her expression that was never present in Sabrina’s face. A hardness. A calculation. It’s the look of someone who’s spent years running from the consequences of her choices.
Still, I ask, “You’re certain?”
He points to a detail in the photograph. “Facial recognition software gave us a ninety-seven percent match. She’s been living under the name Eugenie Kozlov, working as a translator for a private security firm. She has the same bone structure, same mannerisms, and even the same scar on her left hand from when she cut herself on broken glass at your brother’s apartment.”
The scar. I remember that detail from the police reports. If this woman has the same scar, there’s no doubt. Irina Volkov is alive and living in Prague.
Which means the woman sitting on the bed behind me is exactly who she’s claimed to be all along and innocent of everything except looking like someone who destroyed my family ten years ago. I already knew that in my heart, but now, I can’t pretend otherwise.
I’ve been wrong this whole time. Sabrina isn’t a threat. She’s just collateral damage from my obsession with finding my brother’s killer.
Maksim crosses his arms. “What do you want me to do?”
I hand him back the phone. “Send a team to Prague. I want her brought back here alive.”
He nods toward Sabrina without looking at her directly. “And her?”
That’s the question I’ve been avoiding since almost the moment I impulsively kidnapped her and brought her here. What do I do with an innocent woman who’s seen too much, knows too much, can identify too much? Aspakhan, there should be only one answer to that question, and it’s not one I’m prepared to consider. I straighten and meet his stare. “I’ll handle it.”
Maksim’s expression doesn’t change, but there’s concern in his posture. “Nikandr?—”