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His small smile does nothing to lessen the weight of his words. They settle inside me like stones, crushing the breath from my body.

“Oh, I’m sure that’s not true.” I force a smile, keeping my tone light. “Isn’t Miami where all the college girls head for spring break? You’ll forget about me by Easter—”

“Stop avoiding the question.” Dimitry isn’t smiling anymore. His huge body is hunched over the small table, eyes piercing mine. “You’ve been dodging it for weeks. Iunderstood it at first, when I was still helping clean up after the war.”

The war in Miami happened several months ago, when the Orlovs, a rival clan, kidnapped Roman’s two goddaughters in an attempt to blackmail him and Darya.

But long before Darya met Roman, I knew her as just plain Lucia Lopez: my best friend.

For two years, we’d worked together as waitresses in the same shitty Malaga café. Bonded by laughter, long hours, bad tips—and the secrets we both kept.

Even from each other.

And hard as those days were, I miss their simplicity.

Now Lucia is living under her real name, Darya. And her husband is a bratvapakhanwho rules over an empire—and my boyfriend’s life.

“I understood why you wanted to stay in Spain until after Darya’s wedding.” Dimitry’s hard tone pulls me back to the present. “But since then you’ve found a thousand excuses to stay in Malaga, none of which make any sense. You only came to Madrid today because Roman was sending Ofelia here by car—”

“Yes,” I cut in, helpless to stop the sharp edge to my voice. “And because he made it extremely clear that I had to accompany his daughter, whether I wanted to or not.”

Dimitry’s eyes narrow. He sits back in his chair, mouth set in a hard line.

Fuck. Why do I always say the wrong thing?

It’s all I seem to do lately, whether on the phone or in person.

Given that Dimitry is most definitely a man of action, he’s shown more patience than I knew he had. But I can tell that it’s wearing thin.

Unfortunately, so is mine.

“He practically ordered me into the car this morning.” Idon’t attempt to hide my annoyance. “You might be happy to spend the rest of your life taking orders from Roman Borovsky, Dimitry, but I never signed up for that. I might work at Pillars, but I’m not Roman’s puppet, to be pulled here and there at will.”

His fingers drum the white linen tablecloth in a silent rhythm. The restaurant is in a small side street off the Plaza Mayor in the old historic center of Madrid. Normally I would adore the carved wooden furnishings and chipped marble floors, eating exquisite tapas while soft lighting turns the cobblestones gold outside.

But tonight everything seems melancholy instead of cozy. The night feels sad, rather than intimate.

I shiver, pulling my pashmina tight around my shoulders despite the warmth of the restaurant.

“You know how my world works, Abby.” Dimitry’s tone is calm and measured. “You’ve known for a long time.”

I want to slap the calm right out of him. Want to scream and claw at his skin, throw myself at him in a fit of insane tears and make him feel all the confusion I do.

“Oh, I know exactly how it works. I know exactly what you are.” I’m as unable to soften the brittle edge to my voice as I am to craft a less sarcastic response. “You’re Roman’s chief brigadier. His mainvor. Isn’t that what you Russians call it in the bratva?Vor?Warriors?”

My voice has risen, and a few people are surreptitiously glancing our way, as people do when they can smell a domestic argument in the making.

“That’s enough.” Dimitry pushes back his chair, his face set and hard as he gestures for the check. “We’re leaving.”

No argument from me.

The restaurant feels claustrophobic in a way that has nothing to do with air quality.

It’s the future that’s closing in on me.

I can’t run from this conversation anymore.

And I’m terrified of what that means.