“You’re injured,” he stated, his voice dropping lower.
“No shit.” I tried bucking him off again, but he was immovable. “What did you expect, tackling me to the ground?”
He released my wrist and brushed my tousled hair from my temple, careful not to touch the wound. “Stop moving before you make it worse.”
I hated how my body responded to his proximity, to the controlled strength in every movement. Hated even more how his concern felt genuine rather than calculated for once.
I brought my hand up and touched where it hurt. My fingers came back bloody.
He grabbed my wrist again. “Stop it.”
I thrashed against his hold, ignoring how the movement sent fresh waves of pain through my whole body. “How about you let go of me?” Suddenly, I felt nauseated. Would serve him right if I vomited all over him.
The skin around his eyes tensed. “Stop moving before you make it worse.” His voice remained infuriatingly calm as he adjusted his position, somehow managing to restrain me while shifting his weight off me. “You’re white as a wall.”
“Well, I feel like a wall just rammed into me. So it kinda fits.” The words came out in a breathless snarl. My feet stung, my temple burned, my head hurt, and his solid warmth against my body was doing things to my body and head I refused to acknowledge.
“You’ve got a bleeding head wound.” He sighed, the sound rich with exasperation. “Why can’t you Salvinis ever do things the easy way?”
“Maybe because we don’t want to play games with assholes like you?” I twisted my wrists in his grasp, testing for weakness. There was none. His hands were like steel bands, precise and unyielding.
The helicopter’s blades whirred down behind us, the wind dying to a gentle breeze that stirred my hair. Ivan’s breathbrushed my ear as he leaned closer, sending an unwanted shiver down my spine.
“If I let you stand up, are you going to behave?” The question held a note of amusement that made me want to head-butt him.
“What do you think?” I snapped, still squirming despite the futility of it.
“I think you’re going to make this difficult.” His thumb traced a small circle on my captured wrist, the gesture almost absent-minded. “I think you’re going to try something stupid and get yourself hurt worse.”
I hated that he was probably right. Hated the whole roller-coaster ride we were on. Hated even more how his touch left trails of heat on my skin. “No part of it fatigues me but getting off this horse, I assure you. I am very strong. Nothing ever fatigues me, but doing what I do not like,” I muttered, my voice dripping with sarcasm while I quoted Jane Austen’sMansfield Park. I let my head drop back to the ground and my body relax in temporary defeat.
His lips opened into a soft smile. “It is a pleasure to see a lady with such a good heart for riding! I never see one sit a horse better. She did not seem to have a thought of fear.”
I inhaled sharply and stared at him. Did Ivan fucking Zotov, hardcore Russian Bratva bad-boy, just quote Jane Austen back to me?
No fucking way.
5
IVAN
With practiced precision, I scanned the perimeter through the windshield of the helicopter.
This wasn’t how today was supposed to go. Why was nothing ever easy if it involved someone from the Salvini family?
This entire operation had become unnecessarily messy.
The Paraskia Syndicate’s instructions had been clear—secure the Salvini family’s cooperation by any means necessary.
But taking the Salvini women as leverage—that was entirely Mr. Grey’s brilliant idea. And demanding Isabella Salvini? His specific interest in Isabella felt…off. As if Vince Salvini would ever agree to that. But then it begged the question, why did Grey come up with that ridiculous demand?
We’d been observing all of the members of the family for months now, tracking their movements, studying their patterns. The Salvini twin sisters were a sight to be seen—smart, pretty faces, smoking-hot bodies. Nothing out of the ordinary, really. Apart from Isabella’s behavior that day.
I’d pulled back since that day I left La Dimora, since Vince, not his sisters, was my assignment, but even I believed Grey’s obsession with Isabella Salvini went far beyond tactical value.
Let’s hope it wasn’t her who’d escaped because I really didn’t need the additional complications.
Where are you, little prey?
