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Chapter Eight

ERIN

The back of the SUV is roomy, more so than it looked, and it smells, not new, but nice.

Not like it belongs to gun-wielding maniacs.

This thug is who, exactly?

For a second, I close my eyes. This thug’s the father of my child. And he’s the sexiest, most handsome thug I’ve met. Maybe thug isn’t the right word. What about brutal overlord? Dangerous God? Mafia? Criminal? Devil?

I shove a hand against my mouth to stop the sickened laughter.

He’s not good, whoever he is.

Is Alina even anything to him? What about Max? I can’t see Max hanging out with this man. He’s so cold and emotionless. I…

What would he do if I put my foot down or tried to call the police? Oh, that’s right, my bag and phone are back in that mess. Back… I swallow.

I don’t think he’ll let me go. Not then and not now.

He’s on the phone, speaking in a harsh tone in Russian, like he’s barking orders. And the man with the big gun is in the passenger seat in the front, talking on his. It’s like I’m in the weirdest newsroom ever.

Panic and pain flutter through me.

There’s a break in his conversation, and then something cold and wet touches my arm and I almost scream.

“Here.”

I look down. A water bottle. With shaking fingers, I take it as he then pours a whiskey—I can tell from the smell—into a glass from an open little compartment on the seat’s back opposite him.

He should look cramped, ridiculous, but he doesn’t. There’s room in here and it’s clearly custom. Part of me wants a whiskey, but I open the water and drink some.

“I tried to stop them. I thought… thought if we could get to Max or safety, then—” I shake my head. “These assholes grabbed us.” I flick my glance at him. “Max must be…”

Something in his face makes me stop talking and the words dry up. And again, I question who he is and the danger levels he represents. Maybe he’s worse or just as bad as those men.

But I’m here and Max is… Max is… not.

I wait for him to speak but he doesn’t, so I gulp in a breath, then take another, my skin both hot and cold and my insides roiling.

Trapped. In a car. With my son’s sperm donor.

That’s what he is. We had sex, and he managed to knock me up and he certainly didn’t look for me like I did him. Sperm donor.

It makes me feel better thinking about it like that.

He’ll let me go soon when he sees I know nothing about this, and I’ll swear blind I don’t know who he is. Swear I’ve never met him. What I won’t do is slip up and spill my secret.

My heart clenches tight as I grip the bottle.

Sasha… Fuck, how the hell do I let Kara know what ha ppened?

She’ll call the cops if I don’t return and no doubt the shooting’s made the news.

But my baby. I’ve never been away from him longer than a few hours.

Tonight marked the milestone of a few more.

But I’d have cut and run after the wedding, and now… now… now I’m caught.

How long is this dangerous, rich man going to hold me?

He is dangerous. My brother was right. We’re in a car with other Russians who have guns. He has a gun.

I turn to demand I go home. To tell him I have to, but the moment his gaze hits mine, I stumble back mentally and point at his whiskey. “Can I have one, please?”

He pours one and hands it to me. “Feeling better?”

“You can’t keep me,” I say. “You know that, right?”

“Got somewhere to be?”

Everything in me screams yes, but I just say work in the morning. He makes a sound and goes back to his phone, this time sending messages.

Shit. I can’t say I have to go home. Even if he let me go, he’d then know where I live. Or worse, he’d see me home. I can’t let him find out about Sasha. Because if he did, he’d see that I kept our son from him, denied him his heir or whatever, and then… then he’d kill me.

Or take Sasha and never, ever let me see him, which is the same as killing me.

Three years. I kept our son from him for three years. From the moment I found out, I was pregnant to now. Yeah, he’ll take him and punish me.

This is a brutal and dangerous man. After all, he didn’t even react to a shootout at the wedding, to the kidnapping of the bride. To… to checking me with fast and competent hands like he did it all the time.

The man’s not shocked. Not afraid. What the fuck kind of dark and deadly world does he live in?

It must be brutal and violent. Tom was right to urge me to keep away from him. Shit, I don’t even know his real name; Tom wouldn’t tell me.

And now… I’m in the lion’s den and my son’s in danger because of it. I don’t want my baby in this horrible world of his.

“Erin?”

I look at him and our gazes clash and it hits me down in the pit of my stomach. “What?”

“I was going to ask you the same. You’re shaking.”

“Oh.” I didn’t even realize. Before I can say anything else, he strips off his jacket and hands it to me.

“Put it on.” He pauses. “Please.”

I take it and slip it on, letting the heat of his body that clings to it seep in, and that whiskey, honeyed lavender scent with notes of leather surround me and make me slightly woozy with memory.

“Thanks.”

“Are you okay?”

His words startle me, and I glance at him, shrugging. “After all that? Not really. But I will be.” I close my eyes. “Poor Alina.” Then my eyes snap open. “Oh my God, Max. We need to go back and get him. “

“No.”

The dark note in his voice makes me shiver for entirely different reasons. Earlier, that look on his face… My stomach churns.

“What do you mean, no?”

He sets his phone on his thigh and rubs his eyes, then takes a swallow of his whiskey. My fingers clench around my glass. “I mean we can’t.”

“They kidnapped Alina and he?—”

“He’s dead. They shot him.” His ice-blue gaze locks on me. “He was gone when I found him.”

Not even that flatness that promises retribution, that holds the truth, can touch me. For brief, shining moments, I’m in denial. Rejecting his words and their meaning. Clearly, he’s wrong. He’s insane.

Max isn’t dead.

He’s getting married.

I swallow hard as sadness pricks deep. But I shake my head. “No. No, you’re wrong,” I say quietly, emphatically. “He can’t be dead.”

“Three bullet wounds to the chest. Probably got his heart. He’d have been dead instantly. Before he hit the ground.”

“You’re wrong,” I say again. “You made a mistake.”

This time he doesn’t say a thing. He finishes his whiskey and picks up his phone, but those ice-blue eyes are on me.

“No. I just spoke to him last night when he called to make sure I was coming.”

“And why would he do that? You’re good friends, according to you, so why wouldn’t you go to the wedding?”

A jagged bolt of heat savagely rips through the cold in me. And I bite down on my response. Because of Sasha, clearly. But this man can’t know that. Not ever.

“Max was so happy. I’ve never heard him so happy. And… and earlier, I saw him. We waved as he was caught up in conversation.” I’m aware I’m babbling and can’t stop. “He looked so happy, so full of love and his future. So he can’t be dead. You’re wrong.”

My eyes start to burn with tears, vision blurring. My heart hurts and my throat’s tight.

“Yeah, well, I’m not. I wish I was, but I saw him.”

“Used to dead bodies, are you?” I snap.

“ Ya videl svoyu dolyu .” He pauses. “I’ve seen my share.”

Of course he has. He’s a dangerous man, that’s more than clear. And I can’t lose sight of that or of who he is.

He’s dangerous, powerful, and to him, I’m no one but some girl he fucked once. Right now… it’s more than rescuing. I’ m almost positive he wants to find out what, if any, involvement I have in this.

Which is zero.

If I stay with that and don’t let anything about Sasha slip, I’ll be fine.

“How did this happen, anyway? Max is—was—a great guy. I can’t think of anyone who’d want to hurt him.”

He doesn’t answer. And I lift the glass, taking a small sip of the rich liquor, letting the burn warm me.

What I want is to down it and then another, but the numbness I’d be trying to reach carried danger, like loosened tongues. And besides, the pain of losing Max, of Alina’s kidnapping, would still be there.

“Collateral damage.” He sighs, sends a text, then puts the phone back on his thigh, his long, strong fingers holding it, and—I’m not going there. He doesn’t look at me as he continues. “He wasn’t the target. Alina was.”

There’s a burst of savagery in his tone and I study him a moment, take in the stoic, almost emotionlessness of him. I can’t help but think there might be a world teeming with all kinds of sharp and wild emotions.

Yeah, probably of the deadly kind.

“I still don’t understand. She was terrified. I don’t know her that well, but I like her. And…” I stop. “Why were you there, anyway?”

“My sister is the bride. I’m the reason they took her. Fuck.”

Everything in me goes cold and I swear my jaw drops. Alina’s his sister? I can sort of see it now, but shit. When I met her weeks ago, I had no idea I was meeting Sasha’s aunt.

The webs were getting thick and?—

“We’re here.”

I don’t ask him where here is. It’s a mansion set back on a large property, surrounded by a tall brick wall and there’s a guard box, automated gates, and beyond that, there are quite clearly men in black uniforms with guns. Big ones.

So many of them. Everywhere. And once the guard checks the driver, the gates open and we drive in.

The grounds look expansive, dark but for two or three windows glowing.

All that consumes me as we make our way up the long drive that’s clear of trees is how it offers a sightline from the mansion to the gate, removing any cover for a surprise attack.

This must be his mansion. I swallow hard and force myself to say, “How long?”

“How long what?”

He already sounds bored and I clench my fingers on the glass and the plastic of the water bottle. “How long am I here for?” The more I stare at the grounds and high wall, at the guards we pass, and the looming mansion, the more this whole thing resembles a prison.

“As long as it takes.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”