"He'll know it was me."
He takes my foot in his hand, cleaning it gently.
"Eventually. But by then, there will be nothing he can do about it." Konstantin dresses the small wound on my foot with care and precision. "By then, you'll have destroyed him so completely that even mentioning your name will be the last power you ever let him have."
The plan is vicious. Thorough. Everything poison wasn't.
Everything I should have thought of myself, if I hadn't been so blinded by the need for his death. He sets the first aid kit aside and stands.
"Why are you doing this?" I ask quietly.
Konstantin's hand comes up again, traces the line of my jaw, my throat, the edge of my dress where it dips low.
His fingers pause over my scar.
"Because you make me feel something I thought was dead," he says, and there's rawness in his voice I wasn't expecting. "And because Troskoy doesn't deserve a quick death. He deserves to know what it feels like to have everything ripped away."
His eyes meet mine.
"Just like you did."
The words break something open in my chest.
Before I can second-guess myself, I rise onto my toes and press my mouth to his.
For one heartbeat, he's perfectly still.
Then he kisses me back like I'm air and he's drowning.
Konstantin
She tastes like expensive vodka and fury.
My hand tangles in her hair, angling her head so I can deepen the kiss. She makes a sound against my mouth, surprise or pleasure or both, and then she's kissing me back just as fiercely.
This is a mistake.
I know it's a mistake even as my other hand finds her waist, pulls her flush against me. I know it the moment her fingers dig into my shoulders, holding on like I'm the only solid thing in a tilting world.
I should stop.
I should step back, give her space, remember that she's here for answers and revenge, not for this. But then she bites my lower lip, sharp enough to sting, and every rational thought dissolves into heat and want.
I walk her backward until her back hits the wall beside the window. She gasps, and I swallow the sound, one hand braced beside her head while the other explores the curve of her hip, the dip of her waist.
She's all softness over strength, curves that would make a weaker man beg. I'm not a weak man, but right now, with her mouth on mine and her body pressed against me, I feel like I could be.
"Konstantin." My name is a whisper against my lips.
The sound of it nearly breaks me.
I force myself to pull back, to put inches between us even though every instinct screams at me to crowd closer.
"We should stop." The words scrape out of my throat.
"Should we?" Her eyes are dark, pupils blown wide.
"You came here for answers. Not this."
