Page 210 of Wicked Proposal

“I did. And that was my mistake.” She passes a hand through her hair. There’s white in it now, sprinkled into the black like midnight snow. “Look, I’m not here to make excuses. I fucked up. That’s on me. My whole team is dead—that’s on me, too.”

Dead.That’s news to me. Though, to be fair, I didn’t exactly stick around for damage control. “How?”

“Single bullet to the head. We were surrounded before we even took up our posts.”

“How’s that fucking possible?” I growl. “We checked the perimeter. We re-checked a dozen times. We?—”

“There were holes in the ground,” she whispers. “They’d buried themselves, Yulian. With tiny tubes to breathe, hidden in the foliage. They were everywhere.”

The image sends a cold chill down my spine.Buried.I try to picture it: an army of corpses, rising from the earth, turning my worst nightmares into reality. And Nikita, in the middle of it all, reliving it all over again.

Suddenly, my anger at her fizzles out. I promised Kira I’d take care of her sister, that I’d keep her away from the monsters that took her. Instead, I shoved her right into their gaping maws.

“How many?” I ask, exhausted.

“Seven.”

“Blyat’.”

“Yeah.Blyat’is right.” She finishes her second drink and pushes away her glass. “I woke up because of the screams. I’d passed outin the brush—that’s probably the only reason they didn’t get me, too. When I tried reaching out, there was only static on the line.”

Jammed comms.“And then?”

“Then I crept through the orchard and took them out one by one.”

Despite the disaster that was tonight, I can’t help the spark of pride that flickers through me. “I got the one in the trees.”

“You got his shoulder. I blew his brains out when he fell.”

“Good job.”

“Not good enough.” Her nails dig into her palms, short and bitten. “That girl got hit. Mia’s friend.”

The mere mention of Mia is enough to rip my wound open all over again. “And Maksim’s girl,” I whisper, trying to focus on literally anything else. Anything that isn’ther.

“Damn.”

“Yeah. Damn.”

“I saw the ambulance. How’s she doing?”

“I don’t know.”

“You didn’t ask?”

“His phone’s off.”

“And Mia’s?”

Cracks snake up the glass in my grip. “She’s no longer our concern.”

“What does that even mean?”

“It means she’s done with this.” I grind my teeth and set my jaw. “With me.”

“I don’t believe that.”

Without a word, I fish out the engagement ring and set it down on the counter.