Annika
Adream.
That’s what the last year has felt like. My daughters are reunited with their father. The love of my life is mine. My father, the monster, the bastard, is dead and gone, and I am slowly dismantling his legacy to make way for mine.
I never planned to lead a life of crime. But in the end, my father was right about this one thing—I was born for it. I’m good at it. And as long as I’m at the helm, I know I can do it right. No one in the Bratvawill ever trade in human flesh again. For the first time in my life, I don’t have to see injustice and walk away. For the first time in my life, I can do what’s right, and punish those who don’t.
Yes, this new life is a dream. One I never had. Annika Desyatova has been many things: a gangster, a spy, a puppet, a criminal, a lover, a runaway, a mother, a captive, a killer. But right now, she just wants to be a woman. A woman in the arms of her man.
Maxim’s kiss deepens. His arms around me tighten as night falls around us, as the rain pours to soak us both. I know we shouldn’t do this out here, in the open, but I can’t stop myself. I need him in me. I need him now.
“Annika,” he growls, already unbuckling his belt.
“Fuck me,” I say desperately, pulling his mouth right back to mine. He hikes up the hem of my gown and draws me against him. In one easy motion, he lifts me by the waist and I lock my thighs around his hips. I’m soaking wet, and his cock slides easily inside of me. I moan, throwing back my head as I lower myself, taking him deep.
He turns us, shoves me against the balcony wall. I run my hands through his wet curls, pleasure coursing through me as he yanks down the top of my gown, running his hand over my breasts.
“I love you,” he says, lips against mine. “Ty moy.”
You’re mine.
“Yes,” I gasp, as his mouth trails kisses down my neck, my collarbone, to wrap around my breast. “Yes.” I rock against him, taking his cock fast and hard. His lips find my nipple, sucking delicately, his hot tongue stroking in circles. “I’m yours.”
He thrusts deep, his rhythm fast and delicious and hungry, and I remember: On the plane, as the girls slept, I admitted something to him I’d been too afraid to for much of the last year. Not because I feared his reaction—but because I feared I was asking too much of a life that was already giving me so much.
What would you say, I’d whispered,to another Volkov?
And the light that filled his eyes warmed me to my core.A family. A real family.Another thing I never dreamed I would deserve, much less get. And here he is, in my arms, making love to me like nothing else in the world matters.
“Come in me,” I whisper in his ear, riding him desperately, arching toward climax. “Like you did four years ago.”
“Fuck,” he growls, hand planted on the wall beside my head. He fucks me hard, passionate deep thrusts, his tongue in my mouth. “Annika—” he says, breath hitching.
I wrap my arms around his shoulders, thrusting in time with him as we both edge closer. “I love you,” I say, the words a gasp as my climax floods my blood like fire. I cry out, throwing my head back as he comes, his fist in my hair, breath hot against my skin. Pleasure eclipses the cold, the rain, igniting every vein in my body. I can hear myself moaning as if from a distance, too light and overcome to care.
When finally I come back down, my body is weak and spent. I let myself fall against Maxim, and he holds me up easily, as he always does, as he always will.
“Let’s hope you’re not pregnant,” he says, voice ragged. He’s panting softly, head buried in my neck.
“What?” I ask. “Why?”
“Because,” he says, brushing wet hair from my face and looking into my eyes. “I want to do that again.”
* * *
It’s Lilly who calls me that June day. I almost can’t understand what she’s saying. All I know is that I need to leave the Roza Dom immediately. I gather the girls, load them into the car, and drive straight to the hospital.
I reach the room as Maxim is stepping out. His beautiful face is radiant, sunlit. He kisses me, and then the girls. “I was about to call you,” he says, and I realize there are tears in his eyes. “It’s a miracle.”
“I can’t believe it,” I admit, still stunned and reeling. But the happiness in Maxim’s face is contagious. The girls, each holding one of my hands, are bouncing on their feet.
Maxim bends, scooping them up in his arms. They’re too big for it now, but he doesn’t care. All he wants is to have them near, to spoil them, to make sure his little princesses know their father loves them endlessly.
“Manya, Karine,” he says, grinning, “do you want to meet your Uncle Alexei?”
I watch them go into his room, too overwhelmed to follow. Through the glass I watch as Maxim’s weak, fragile brother sits up after years asleep to meet his nieces. We visit every few weeks or so, but I know Maxim still comes almost every day. He always believed that, in the end, his brother would live. That he would see the light of day again.
After a lifetime of betrayal and disappointment, I never could get behind him. But looking at the four of them now, all bitterness and cynicism leaves me. It feels ceremonious, like a rite of passage, to let it go. My father is dead. His ghosts can’t haunt me anymore.
