His other hand rose to my cheek, and I closed my eyes as a shiver ran through me at the warmth of his skin.Everythingelse disappeared, there was only him. His warmth. His scent. His voice. “I don’t give a damn about the things you had to do to get here, Sienna. To survive. To reach me,” he whispered near my ear. “I want you as you are. With your flaws and your strengths. With your stubbornness and your tenderness. With your anger and your joy. With your messy habits and your pure heart Sienna”.
I opened my eyes, stunned. How… how had he known that was why I was pushing him away? A bitter heat burned in my throat.Kenji.
Sasha stepped back slightly, his thumb brushing my cheek. “You don’t know what you’re saying,” I burst out, trying to push him away, my hands pressed to his chest. “You don’t know what I’ve done. You don’t even know who I am!” He didn’t move. His gaze remained gentle, his gestures calm, so different from the storm tearing through me. “No one is pure, Sienna. No one is completely innocent. We all carry darkness inside us” but I shook my head, lowering my eyes. Darkness? No. Everything about me was dark. I had simply learned to hide it, no, to bury it.
I buried it so deeply that sometimes I forgot it existed. When I was with my nephews. With my sister. With the girls. With the Ivanovs. With him. I forgot. But it always came back, because that was what I was. A monster. His hand slid from my cheek to my neck, his thumb lifting my chin gently until I had to meet his gaze. “I will wait, Sienna,” he repeated hoarsely. “But know this, when you reach out your hand, I’ll take it, Sweetheart. I’ll be there. I’ll take it, and I won’t let go for anything in this world.”
His eyes burned with determination as they traced my face, and my hands itched to touch him, to tend to his wounded eyebrow, to smooth his messy hair, to curl into his warmth. Instead, I clenched his shirt in my fists, holding myself back. Controlling myself. He leaned closer, and I closed my eyes as the urge to cry surged through me. “I’m a patient man, Sienna. But when it comes to you, patience becomes difficult. Everything becomes harder when you’re not here” he murmured, his lips brushing mine. A trembling breath escaped me as he kissed my cheek and pulled away, his hands left my body, and the cold that followed was almost painful. I opened my eyes, forcing myself not to move toward him, not to chase his warmth.
His gaze never left mine, and I knew that if I took even one step toward him, if I reached out now, he would never let me go. And worse, I wouldn’t want him to. He saw my hesitation. With him, I was an open book; my emotions spilled from myeyes, my breathing, my movements. He finally shook his head and stepped aside. “Go. Kenji’s waiting,” he said, turning slightly away. I pressed my lips together, unsure what to say. So I said nothing. I picked up the first-aid kit I hadn’t even realized I’d dropped and walked past him.
“Sienna,” he called, I stopped but didn’t turn around, my body tense. “When you come back to me, it will be without a single doubt”.
I closed my eyes. I couldn’t. There were hundreds of reasons why we were impossible, starting with what I was. A prostitute. Unworthy of the Ivanov name. Unworthy of him. Then there was the fact that I worked for Vassili, their greatest enemy. And the parallel business I knew inside out, one I was deeply involved in. The lies. The blood. And above all, I could never give him what he wanted most. What the Ivanovs stood for. A family.
So I lifted my chin, darkened my gaze, and walked out of the house, trying to ignore the feeling his words had awakened inside me, an emotion far more dangerous than any threat surrounding us.Hope for a last chance.
Sasha
“I have one of the girls ready to infiltrat one of Vassili’s brothels. She’ll try to get close to him and gather information about that parallel prostitution business,” Sergei said, sliding a file across my desk at HQ, long after the sun had set. I flipped through the folder quickly, reading the details about one of the many young women Sergei trained to serve the Bratva. Training usually fell under Roman’s responsibility, but he delegated, it was impossible for him to be everywhere at once. “Are you sure she’s competent?” I asked, closing the file, “if she gets exposed and gives up our name, we’re all fucked.” If Vassili managed to prove we were investigating him without the Council’s approval, we’dbe finished. He could turn them against us easily, with Yelsky’s support.
“Alix is one of our best, Sasha. A natural. She’ll manipulate them with her eyes closed,” Sergei replied without hesitation. “And she was trained in Serbia. No one has ever seen her face.” I nodded, rubbing my temple before grimacing as pain flared, damn Korean and his left hook. No one hit that hard. A fucking Korean I’d started to appreciate despite myself.
Five hours earlier
The car stopped a few meters from me as I crushed my cigarette under my shoe. The villa gate stood farther behind me and would remain closed, he wasn’t coming in this time. He looked at me from behind the wheel, one eyebrow raised, as I approached with my fists shoved into my pockets. He cut the engine and stepped out, leaning against the hood with his arms crossed. “So, what is it? You want to pick up where we left off?” he asked with a crooked grin that pulled at his scar. It wasn’t pretty, must’ve hurt like hell. I still didn’t know how he’d gotten it. He was referring to Sochi, to the time we’d locked him up after he tried to help Sienna and Selina escape. We’d released him after days of interrogation that led nowhere.
“Who are you to her?” I asked bluntly. I was done with the secrets. My fists itched. I wanted to hit that bored look right off his face. “And you?” he shot back, straightening to face me. “Who do you want to be to her?” The tension spiked instantly. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Samy move behind a tree.Idiot. I’d told him to go inside. Duty always outweighed orders with our men, that was something I respected. Kenji noticed him too; the corner of his mouth twitched.
“I’m going to be the only man in her life,” I said, forcing myself not to grab his jacket. “So whatever you are to her, you’re aboutto disappear.” He tilted his head slightly, studying me. “You’re not good enough for her,” he said calmly. “She deserves better.”
“What? You?” my blood began to boil. But I forced myself to breathe, I needed answers. I needed to understand who Sienna really was, even if what I already knew was enough to drive me mad. She was a zephyr in the heat of summer, cool, gentle, soothing. But I wasn’t naïve. I knew that breeze could become a storm. I had seen it. And I felt there was more, something darker, something violent beneath the surface. A hurricane. Destructive. Bloody. And I wanted to know it. All of it.
I refused to let her push me away. There was no turning back for us, not for me. I inhaled deeply and forced the words out, even though they scraped my throat raw. “Maybe she is just used to you fucking her, but she’ll forget you soon enough once I’m inside her.”
I barely had time to blink before my head snapped sideways, pain exploded at my temple as something warm trickled down. That bastard had landed a left, hard. “Don’t talk about her like that,” he snarled, his face twisted with cold fury, “Sienna was right. You’ll never understand. You don’t belong in her life.”
To hell with self-control.
My right hook slammed into his jaw, snapping his head aside. I had a damn good right myself. “What won’t I understand, huh?!” I shouted, grabbing his jacket. “What is she hiding from me? Why does she push me away?! What is she afraid of?! Why does she act like a fucking coward?!” I shook him, rage flooding my veins. I was sick of the secrets. Sick of being kept in the dark while this bastard knew more about my Sienna than I did.
“Coward?!” he shouted, eyes blazing. “You have no idea what real fear is, Sasha Ivanov ! Do you know what it’s like?!” his voice cracked with fury, with something dangerously close to tears.
“Real fear is sleeping with one eye open because your roommate might stab you in your sleep. Real fear is going days withouteating because you’re terrified of being poisoned while suffering from a disease that can kill you if you don’t eat. Real fear is watching your friends being tortured and being unable to do anything. Real fear is trusting men when every man you’ve ever trusted betrayed you. Real fear is killing to survive, even when they’re innocent. Real fear is being locked in a room…” he stopped abruptly, breath ragged. My heart pounded so loudly I could barely hear anything else. “What?” I roared, “locked in a room doing what?!” The air left my lungs, my hands trembled. He clenched his jaw, exhaled slowly as the rage draining from him. He grabbed my wrists to force me to let go, then shoved my hands away.
“I’ve said too much. This isn’t mine to tell. It’s Sienna’s,” he said, turning away and wiping blood from his lip with his thumb. His hand was shaking. Kenji was shaking. The man I’d interrogated and tortured for two days without getting a reaction was shaking. Whatever Sienna had lived through was so terrible it reduced him to this. I grabbed his shoulder, needing answers, but he twisted out of my grip, pointing a finger at my chest. “No. I won’t say more. Stop. If I do, she’ll hate us both,” he growled. He looked deeply uncomfortable, he had crossed a line. Betrayed her trust. And strangely, knowing that didn’t bring me any satisfaction. Not after what I’d just heard. Seeing me calm down, he exhaled and ran a hand through his hair. “Let me tell you one thing, Ivanov. There is a coward in this story, and it’s me. I spent eight years watching her suffer without being able to help,” he murmured, “I was powerless. I still am.” His fingers brushed his scar absently, then he straightened, facing me fully. “That’s why I’m telling you this. Because you might succeed where I failed. Where I abandoned her like a coward” he said his eyes dark. “Don’t let her go. Don’t abandon her, you are… her last chance.” I stared at him, trying to understand.Her last chance?
“But sometimes,” he added with a crooked smirk. “That idiot has a thick skull. She needs a push to admit what she really wants. What she really needs.” He sighed meeting my gaze with a challenge burning in his eyes. “Do what she asks. If she pushes you away, let her. If she ignores you, let her. Sometimes you have to lose in order to win her back.” Let her go? Ignore her? The very idea made something twist painfully inside me. The absence already hurt.
But Kenji knew her. And the sincerity in his voice was unmistakable. Or he was the devil himself, playing a perfect role. Still, my instincts told me he was telling the truth. That those around Sienna could only be good, like her. I finally nodded, against every instinct screaming inside me. Against the echo of her scent, her warmth, her voice.
Lose her to win her back.
Chapter 6
Sienna
I clutched the first aid kit on my lap as silence reigned in the cabin. Kenji's tense body behind the wheel stressed me out, but I ignored him. I ignored him completely. I couldn't believe he had betrayed me, that he had talked to Sasha about me. "Sienna..." he began, but I cut him off. "What did you tell him?" I asked, keeping my face turned toward the window. "Did you tell him how I get fucked?” The tires screeched as he braked and pulled over to the side of the road. I clung to my seatbelt, breathing heavily and rapidly. I was so angry, I felt betrayed, once again in this fucking life. "Look at me, Enna," he said softly, and I pressed my lips together in response to that deep voice that had guided me even in the darkest moments. Even when there was no hope left. I slowly turned my face toward his, and my lips trembled when my gaze fell on his scar. "You betrayed me," I said, and despite my best efforts to remain cold and firm, my voice broke, his hands slid against my cheeks instantly as he shook his head. "Never. Never, Sienna, never," he said, his desperate gaze diving into mine, "I'd rather die than betray you. You know that." Did I know? Yes, better than anyone. Wasn't that what he had done when we barely knew each other, when he could have hated me.
