But Petyr seems to hear it anyway.
Slowly, his face leans into mine. Our lips meet in a clumsy, brief contact. I’m so frazzled I barely remember what I’m supposed to be doing until Petyr takes the lead.
He tilts my head just right, and then we’re kissing. Soft, slow, sweet. A number of things I never thought Petyr could be. But he keeps proving me wrong. Every day, he proves to me how much he’s changed, how much he loves me.
Even if he hadn’t said it tonight, I would have known. This kiss would have told me. And every kiss before this one, and after.
Finally, he parts from me. Looks me straight in the eye as he finds his voice again. “I would never let that happen. Now, let’s go get our daughter.”
We step out of the car and head back into the house. The silence is welcome, for once. I used to find this place creepy, but maybe it’s finally growing on me. Probably because it’s no longer a prison to me now. Instead, it’s a home.
I let myself feel the exhaustion of the day. I should be hungry after skipping dinner, but all I want is to hug my daughter and take the longest shower in history.
“I’ll go relieve Anya,” I whisper. “She must be exhausted, too.”
“You’d be surprised,” Petyr says. “I’ve watched her go days without sleep when I was younger.”
“Then I’ll definitely enlist her help as a nanny more often.”
I’m halfway through the foyer when a door bursts open to the left—Petyr’s office. “What—” I start, but the words die in my throat.
Because, moments later, Kira appears at the center of the foyer…
… and she’s waving a huge knife.
63
PETYR
The second Kira bursts out of my office with a knife, I act.
“Kira.” I step in front of Sima, arms wide. “Put that down.”
Behind me, Sima chokes out a terrified sob. It tears through me, but I don’t let it split my focus. This situation is bad enough as it is. If I drop the ball now, there’s no telling what might happen.
So I don’t. I breathe in, slow and deep, and turn myself into apakhanagain. A soldier. Someone who can handle this coldly and professionally. Sima doesn’t need my human side, and Kira sure as fuck doesn’t deserve it.
“You brought herback?!” Kira screeches. “Are you fucking insane, Petyr?”
“Calm down.”
“No!” The knife in her hand slashes a wide arc in the air. “She’s the daughter of your enemy. She betrayed you! She?—”
“She never betrayed me,” I growl. “You did. Now, put that knife down before you make your situation worse.”
Her face goes deathly pale. She barely looks human now. A wraith would be more accurate. White as bone, her black hair wild and unkempt, screaming. All along, she keeps waving that fucking knife.
She never left the house.The realization hits me all at once. She just hid in my office. She wasn’t supposed to have a key, but she found one, or made herself a spare.
Luka wouldn’t have looked for her behind a locked door. Not when all the signs pointed to her having run off into the woods. But that must have been a distraction, too.
Which means there’s no one in the house to call for backup. Just the guards outside, but they’ll be too late. Luka is in the woods with the rest of my men, looking for a woman he won’t find, and he’s not going to come back empty-handed.
So he’s not coming back at all.
If anyone is going to fix this, it’ll be me, alone.
“Kira,” I try again, “let’s think this through. You haven’t done anything irreparable yet. I’ll give you a chance to explain yourself, but only if you put that knife down.”
