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YULIAN

The second I step out onto the west terrace, I put my fist through the wall.

Plaster cracks in my wake. It comes crumbling down like a cheap house of cards, drywall where cement should be. I squint at the gaping maw of debris nibbling around my hand, frustrated with the lack of the physical pain I’d come seeking.

Luxury complex, my ass. The laziest of the Three Little Piggies would’ve put up a stronger structure than this piece of fucking shit.

Behind me, someone whistles. “What’d that poor wall do to you?”

“Shove it, Nikita.” I draw my fist back and shake off the dust. “I’m not in the mood for games.”

“Cool, ‘cause I left my Switch in your car.”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I. Tell Maks he’s dead if he filches it. It’s a special edition.”

I tune out Nikita’s nonsense and walk to the railing.

There are people downstairs, lots of them. It’s where the party’s taking place—the upper floors are closed to guests. But I’m not just any guest, and after that conversation, I needed somewhere I could breathe. Somewhere I could think.

“Spit it out, cowboy.” Nikita slides over to my side, her bony elbows resting on the fake Carrara balustrade. “It’s no good keeping stuff like this inside. Wounds need air, too.”

“ I needed air. Instead, I got you sticking your nose into my business.”

“Isn’t that a little sister’s job description?”

“You’re not my sister.”

“And you’re much hairier than mine. But since we’re both one short, we’ll have to make do.”

Her bullshit shouldn’t work. It’s a cheap tactic, a low blow aimed right at a spot where I’ve never stopped bleeding. Nikita would know—she’s got the same gaping hole where a heart should be.

We both lost something that day.

The memory of Mia’s words digs into my skull, sharp as a knife.

Family. That’s why I’m staying.

Not that you’d know what that means.

I bared my soul to her. Told her things I’d never told anyone. Then, the first chance she got, she turned them all against me.

So why can’t I fucking let her go?

And why the hell can’t I stop thinking about those bruises on her wrist?

“She was hurt,” I end up growling, fingers curled tight around the balustrade. “That mudak is beating her again. And she still chose him.”

“Over you,” Nikita clarifies. As if I needed the reminder.

“I don’t care if it was over Ted fucking Bundy. She never should have gotten back with him.”

Nikita’s eyebrows rise. It’s half skepticism, half pity, and right now, I’m not sure which one pisses me off more. “Ted Bundy? Been up late watching Netflix documentaries again, Yul?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I know what you want me to know you mean.”

“I have no idea what that means.”

“How about this?” She crosses her arms. Her leather jacket still hangs loose, ill-fitting, a reminder of all the mass she lost last summer, when she was held captive for three months and fed through a tube.

She never got it back—not her muscle, not her strength.

Doesn’t stop her from being a pain in the ass, though.

“You miss her. You care about her. After all that’s happened, you still want her back. ”

“I want nothing to do with her.”

“Then what the hell are we doing here?”

My jaw sets. There’s a lot I can’t stand about my lieutenant, but the thing I hate most is how blunt she can be when she thinks she’s right. When she thinks she knows something I don’t.

But I do know. Not a day has gone by that I haven’t thought about it. About her.

It’s why I pretended to make nice with Baldwin in the first place. I punched a hole in his cheap-ass drywall instead of in his fucking skull for one reason: I needed to get close, to see the truth for myself.

“She betrayed me,” I grit out. “She lied to me. She picked a goddamn wife-beater over—” I take a deep, sharp breath, refusing to finish that thought. “She threw it all away.”

“Right,” Nikita says. “So the question stands: Why are we here, again?”

“Because it doesn’t make any fucking sense.”

“How so?”

Nikita’s motives are transparent. Her methods, even more so. She’s trying to get me to talk, to spit out the tangled mass at the center of my chest so she can pick it apart, thread by bloody thread.

Any other day, I’d tell her to shove her questions where the sun don’t shine and keep them there.

But this isn’t any other day. “Any other day” didn’t feature the sight of purple marks on Mia’s skin.

“She told me she got pregnant by Brad,” I say. “That she was sleeping with him all the time she was—” The words with me almost escape my lips, but I drag them back with violence. “— working for me. But that couldn’t have happened.”

“Why not?”

Because I had eyes on her night and day.

Because I never would have let that piece of shit get close to her.

Because she said she ? —

“She needs to explain herself to me,” I growl. “She owes me that. She owes me the truth.”

“The truth can be complicated,” Nikita sighs. “You of all people should know that.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that I literally held the girl at knifepoint and she got me help. She didn’t turn me in, didn’t run off screaming—she helped.

I was a complete stranger, and she still did that.

That’s the kind of person she is. Always thinking of others before herself.

” She puffs a stray strand of hair out of her eyes.

“Call me crazy, but I just don’t see her cheating.

It’s a selfish thing to do, and she’s not that. ”

The image of her pregnant belly beats behind my eyes, persistent and infuriating. It wasn’t obvious, not in any way whatsoever, but it was pretty damn obvious to me.

My hands have roamed over that body more times than I can count. Her perfect curves fucking haunt me. Every dip, every valley—it’s all mapped out in my head.

There’s no way she was faking that.

“If you’ve got a theory, don’t waste my time with riddles.”

“I don’t have a theory. I have a feeling, that’s all.”

“Lot of fucking good that does me.”

“Hey, I’m not the one who was about to marry her. If anyone can get to the bottom of this, shouldn’t it be the man who put a ring on her finger?”

Nikita’s words hit dead center. I slip my hand into my pocket and feel it: a tiny black box, full again, too-soft velvet against calloused fingers.

Three months ago, she threw it away. The ring, our vows—all of it.

And yet, I can’t stop thinking about what Nikita said a moment ago.

That’s the kind of person she is. Always thinking of others before herself.

All this time, I’ve rejected that image of Mia. I’ve refused to let it back in after it wrecked so much havoc. It’s why I haven’t pursued any “theories,” why I’ve taken her words at face value. Denial is a weakness I can’t afford.

If she betrayed me, I could be angry. I could bring myself to hate her.

If she betrayed me, I could forget her.

But that hasn’t fucking worked, has it?

And if I let myself believe she’s still that person—if I let myself trust her again—then there’s only one answer. Only one thing she could be doing this all for.

“Eli.”

Nikita blinks. “What?”

“Her son.” The memory of his Garfield plushie flashes before my eyes. It’s still in my car, stuck under the passenger’s seat. I haven’t been able to bring myself to throw it away.

I didn’t see him that night. But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t there. It doesn’t mean there wasn’t something going on behind the scenes, something that made Mia believe she had no other choice.

If Eli was in danger, she’d do whatever it took to protect him. She’d tear the world apart. She’d tear us apart.

But what proof do you have that’s why she did it?

“Fuck this.” I step away from the balustrade and fix my cuffs with two angry yanks. “I’m going back.”

Nikita trails after me. “Going back where?”

I didn’t fight for Mia that night. I trusted her words and left.

That was a mistake.

But I’m not going to make it again. I’m going to demand the truth, and she’s going to give it to me.

Whatever it takes.

“Boss!”

Maksim’s voice snaps me out of my thoughts. “Not now,” I say with a grimace.

“I’m afraid it must be now.” He’s out of breath from running. “You’ve got to see this, Yulian. You too, Nik.”

He pulls out his phone and shoves it in my face.

At first, I can’t figure out what the hell it is he wants me to see. I’m focused on Mia—on finding her and making her talk .

Then I see it.

“This can’t be.” I snatch the phone from his hand, narrow my eyes. But the image doesn’t change. “It’s impossible.”

“It’s real.” Maks leans against the wall, panting hard. “It’s him, Yulian. He’s back. And he’s here.”

The blood drains from my face. “Find Mia,” I bark. “Now.”

“Yul—”

“I said now! ”

I don’t turn to hear Maksim’s excuses. I don’t stay to see Nikita’s face turn gray as the ashes of the dead.

I just run like hell and hope to God it’s going to be enough.

Because, if that picture’s real?—

Mia is going to die.