Page 125 of Twisted Pact

“Oh, Alexei.”

“After Natalia, I swore I’d never let anyone close enough to hurt me again.”

I prop my elbow on my pillow and rest my chin in my palm. “But you’re letting me in.”

“I’ve tried not to. God knows I’ve tried to keep you at a distance. But you got under my skin anyway.”

“And now you’re terrified that I’m going to do the same thing she did.”

“That fear lives in the back of my mind. Whispers that trusting you is stupid.”

I slip my index finger under his chin and kiss his forehead. “I’m not her. I’m not gathering intelligence or building cases. I’m just trying to survive in a world I never wanted to be part of.”

“I know that,” I assure her, “but the heart doesn’t always listen to logic. It just remembers being shredded and tries to protect itself.”

“Is that why you push for marriage so hard? Because legal ties feel safer than emotional ones?”

He considers the question. “Probably. But it’s also real, Mila. What I feel for you is real, even if I’m too scared to say the words out loud.”

Understanding Natalia’s betrayal explains so much about the control issues, and the need to always know where I am.

“Thank you for telling me. For trusting me enough to share something that painful.”

“You deserved to know why I’m so fucked up about this.”

“I’m fucked up, too,” I concede. “Between my mother’s abandonment and my father’s regrets and this baby growing inside me, I’m a disaster.”

He kisses the tip of my nose. “Then we’re disasters together.”

I smile despite everything. “Yeah. We are.”

34

Alexei

Three weeks in this bunker, and I feel like a caged animal.

I walk the edges of the main room while Dmitri sits at the conference table reviewing security reports. Mila is in what has become her father’s room, and they’re both on the phone with her mother.

“You’re going to wear a hole in the floor,” Dmitri comments without looking up from his tablet.

“We can’t stay down here forever,” I complain. “She’s going to go insane, and I’m going to follow her.”

“No one’s suggesting forever, but rushing out before we have a solid plan gets people killed.”

I stop stalking and kick my foot up behind me on the wall as a brace. “Novikov’s still out there. We’ve eliminated three of his safe houses, disrupted two supply chains, and frozen accounts in four countries. He should be scrambling by now.”

“Heisscrambling,” my brother confirms. “That’s what makes him dangerous. Cornered rats bite hardest.”

“Then we need to stop cornering him and start eliminating him.”

“Patience—”

“Fuck patience. Mila’s pregnant and living in a concrete box. Her sister’s in protective custody. Her father can’t walk without wincing. How much longer are we supposed to wait for the perfect moment?”

Dmitri sets down his tablet and steeples his fingers, giving me his full attention. “What do you propose?”

“I propose we stop playing defense and go on offense. Real offense. Not these surgical strikes that chip away at his resources. I’m talking about ending this once and for all.”