Page 12 of Mafia King's Broken Vow

“Strategic repositioning.” The same phrase I gave her last time. I watch her note it again.

“And what is your strategy now, Yakov?”

“Survival,” I say. “Followed by adaptation. Then, opportunity.”

“You speak as though your circumstances are temporary.”

“They are. All circumstances are.”

“Philosophy as defense.” She tilts her head slightly. “Interesting tactic.”

I reassess her with fresh interest.

She’s smarter than I gave her credit for. Less prone to emotional manipulation. Harder to unnerve.

The realization is irritating.

And strangely satisfying.

“What about your nephew, Damien?” she asks, slipping a new piece onto the board. “I understand you care deeply about him.”

The name alone fractures something.

I don’t mean for it to. But it does.

Flashes come uninvited. Anastasiya, pale and soaked in sweat, cradling that fragile newborn like he was made of glass. Her lips pressing to his forehead with a tenderness I’ll neverforget. Her eyes locking on mine as she whispered a plea I would carry like a chain: “Protect him, Yakov.”

I blink once. Hard. The air shifts.

She sees it—the micro shift in my posture, the tightening in my jaw. A flicker of emotion I didn’t authorize. And like any good predator, she wants to pounce on the opening. But I don’t let her.

“Careful,” I murmur, reaching out to tuck that persistently loose strand of hair behind her ear. My fingers linger against her cheek, feeling the warmth there. “You’re showing your hand, Doctor. Getting too eager.”

She freezes, caught between pulling away and melting into my touch. For a moment, we are both still. Then she forces herself back, but the damage is done. We both felt it. That spark. That want.

“Damien is innocent,” I say, my voice clipped. Sharper than I intended. “He should be kept out of this.”

“And yet your actions put his family in danger.” Her tone is clinical, not accusatory. That’s what makes it cut deeper. “His father could’ve died because of your vendetta.”

“Igor Sokolov deserved to suffer,” I snap. “For what he did to Anastasiya.”

“And what did he do?” she asks quietly.

I don’t answer.

Not because I don’t know. Because I know too well.

Because there are truths I’m not ready to hand over—not to her, not to anyone.

The silence stretches. She doesn’t push. Just waits. Calm. Still. Like she’s offering space instead of pressing into it.

It infuriates me.

She closes her notebook, the motion deliberate.

I stand again and move behind her chair before she can rise, my hands coming to rest on the back of it, effectively trappingher. “Leaving so soon?” I lower my voice, letting it rumble near her ear. “But we were just getting comfortable.”

“I think we’ll stop here for today,” she says, but her voice catches when my fingers brush her shoulder.