Dominik would come after me every time I tried something ridiculous, not send one of his guards to drag me back, because for some reason he cares about me.
Speaking of guards…I know they must be lurking nearby, worried about their injured boss. I glance around and find one standing against the wall of the living room, silently staring at his phone.
Apparently, I’m no longer as much of a flight risk.
There are deep voices coming from the study, probably Viktor and Petrov who rarely left the other side of Dominik’sbedroom door last night. I take a few steps closer to the door once I have a full mug of steaming coffee. It’s wide open, so they must not be discussing anything too secretive. Still, my ears strain to hear their words, which are just a grumbling whisper. They must not know I’m lurking around or I’m certain they would be speaking in Russian instead of English.
“…doctor said no exertion for a week, but we have to find him and the guns now, today,” one says, accent thick.
“He’ll move anyway,” the other answers. “You know he only sits still when he’s plotting how to ruin someone.”
“ThePakhanwill not like that he bled for anything other than the family,” the first says, and then lowers his voice even more. “He’ll like it less if the week passes without recouping the money and guns and she’s still here.”
A thin shard of ice slips under my skin. I stand absolutely still, breath tight. Gavriil expects results from Dominik by the end of the week, not just for the money but the sold guns too. The deadline to provide an update on Archer is about to expire. I know all that, I tell myself. I overheard Gavriil say it yesterday. But hearing it again from someone else makes it more real, like a date being carved into stone.
When my hands tremble, I clutch the warm mug to my chest and let the heat seep into the cold places inside as I make my way back to the kitchen before I’m caught eavesdropping.
I return just as the elevator dings on the other side of the apartment door, and then the air changes. It’s a small thing—one set of footsteps in the hallway—but my body registers it before my ears do. I brace my spine against the counter, the island in front of me, as if it’ll provide a barrier to protect me from the storm about to blow through.
Gavriil strides into the apartment like he owns every inch of the room. He’s not wearing a pristine suit jacket this time, just a crisp gray button-down that fits like it was made specificallyfor his hard chest, and his wide shoulders. The sleeves are rolled once to show forearms carved with muscle and marked by a trail of white circular scars. His gaze moves over the space and lands on me just as I hear the footsteps of the men leaving the study. When our eyes meet, there’s some sort of intensity there, not interest, but friction. An involuntary pull, like gravity that I didn’t agree to.
“What are you doing here so early?” I ask as if it’s my penthouse he’s crashing. As if he’s a bum off the street and not the head of the Bratva.
“Why do you think? I came to see my little brother,” he says. His voice is calm, deep, commanding, the kind that makes men straighten without meaning to.
Regardless, I step into the hallway entrance to block his way, with only my coffee mug full of hot liquid as a potential weapon. When Viktor and Petrov come up behind me, I expect the guards to physically remove me from their boss’s way. Instead, they’re silent brick walls at my back—choosing neutrality like men caught between two dangerous loyalties.
“Dominik is fighting off an infection and shouldn’t be disturbed,” I tell him, forcing my fingers to unclench around the mug before I break it and scald my own hands.
The flicker of surprise in Gavriil’s blue eyes is so fast I might have imagined it. People don’t refuse him and stay breathing long enough to repeat the mistake.
“Move,” he says. It isn’t loud, but the single word is a demand full of all his authority. I lock my knees to keep them from buckling, from obeying the man who doesn’t have any power over me. I hated the way danger makes my spine straighten.
“No.” The word is much smaller than his and not as certain, but it exists in the air anyway. “Dom needs to rest. Yelena said?—”
“Yelena works for me,” Gavriil’s words are clipped.
“Then you should listen to her,” I reply, and then want to bite my tongue since it may have been the final inch too far. My heart slams into my ribs so hard it hurts, as if I’m experiencing sympathy pains for Dominik.
Gavriil exhales, not quite a sigh, and steps closer to me. He doesn’t crowd; he doesn’t need to. Up close, he smells like expensive cologne and gun oil. It’s a powerful scent that somehow elevates him from handsome to striking. Since finding out they were brothers, I’m starting to notice little similarities to Dominik—the broad shape of his nose, the fullness of his lower lip. And I hate that his sky-blue eyes are just a touch prettier than his brother’s stormy gray ones.
I’m sure he has an army of men downstairs waiting for their ruthless leader, but up here he’s currently outnumbered.From the way Viktor and Petrov watch him, I’d bet Dominik’s men answer to him, not Gavriil. At least I hope that’s true.
“Well, aren’t you…feisty,” he eventually says breaking the silent standoff, head tilting as if to study a new painting from a different angle. “That explains a few things.”
Dominik told me not to ask him questions, to only answer with brief responses when dealing with his brother. My mouth is going to get me killed, and I can’t seem to make it stop running.
“What things?” I ask him, even though I know I shouldn’t push.
Gavriil’s gaze flicks down the hall to the bedroom. “Why my brother bleeds for you.”
Heat explodes under my skin from an inferno of shame, as if he knew where I was weakest, and wanted to use my guilt against me. “Dom got shot because my brother?—”
“Because your brother is a thief,” Gavriil says evenly. “And becauseDomthinks he’s an impenetrable shield that can take unnecessary hits. It’s a poor long-term strategy for an organization that needs its shields to fucking last.”
Something tightens in my throat at hearing him swear, seeing his right eye twitch afterward. I don’t think the mob boss often allows himself to show such emotion, and he probably hates that he broke that rule in front of me. I fucking love it.
Shoving those ridiculous thoughts aside, I try to get myself back on track and to the obvious message behind his metaphor. “You think my life is unnecessary?”
