“Take your time.” His thumb traces along my jawline, barely a touch. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Then he steps back, and I can breathe again.
“Let me know when you do,” he tells me, then walks back to his room.
I stand there gripping the counter, my heart racing, wondering if I just passed some kind of test.
Or failed one.
6
Tony
Living with Sasha Kozlov is going to get me killed.
I realize this around midnight, when I can’t sleep and wander into the kitchen for water.
She’s already there in sleep shorts and an oversized T-shirt, her hair down for the first time since I’ve known her. It falls past her shoulders in messy waves, and I have to stop myself from touching it.
The shirt clings in all the wrong ways, and I catch myself wondering what she’d sound like pressed against this counter.
“Can’t sleep either?” she asks without turning around.
“Jet lag.”
“You’ve been in Moscow for four weeks.”
“Persistent jet lag.”
She smirks and pours a glass of water from the filtered pitcher. When she turns around, I notice the way the shorts ride up herthighs, and my jaw ticks with the effort of keeping my hands to myself. “There’s melatonin in the medicine cabinet if you need it.”
“I’ll be fine.”
We stand there like strangers—like we didn’t almost kiss a few hours ago.
My phone goes off in my pocket, and when I pull it out, Adrian’s name flashes on the screen.
Perfect timing, as always.
My fingers twitch with the urge to crush the phone. Or better yet, his windpipe.
“I need to take this,” I tell Sasha.
“At midnight?”
“Could be a lead. You know this world doesn’t keep normal hours.” I head back to my room and close the door before answering. “It’s late.”
“Then this won’t take long,” Adrian assures me. “I hear you’re living in a Kozlov safehouse with Sasha. Congratulations on your rapid progress.”
“How did you—” I stop myself. Of course he knows. He probably has someone watching my every move. I cycle through seven ways I could kill him if we were in the same room. The eighth would be my preference—slow and painful. “The car bombing forced their hand. They think I’m a target.”
“Excellent. That gives you direct access to her daily routine, her habits, and any vulnerabilities she might have.” Papers rustle in the background. “This is exactly the position I needed you in.”
I sit on the edge of the bed and pinch the bridge of my nose. “What is the end goal here, Adrian? You keep talking about wanting intelligence, but you’ve never specified what you plan to do with it.”
“The goal is to make her suffer the way she made me suffer. To strip everything away from her until she’s as hollow as she left me.”
“By gathering intelligence on her family’s operations?”
