A small smile plays around the edges of her full lips, and, with a sigh, she rolls over onto her side. I finish draping the threadbare sheet over her and admire the curve ofher hips. Damn, she's beautiful. I can see my hands wrapped around those hips while…
Focus Conti, focus.
Before I go full pervert on her, I grab my jacket and head out into the heat, wondering what kind of man drugs a woman, tucks her in, and then risks his neck to keep her safe, and realize I already know the answer. And I don't like it. The wordwifeis starting to mean more than a shield I can hold up to the world.
My phone vibrates. Dad. I let it buzz itself into silence and put it back into my pants pocket. It buzzes again. I'm tempted to ignore it, but duty gets the better of me. I frown when I see the name across my screen: Grigori Arsenyev. What the hell?
I’ve never met him, but I’ve heard enough to know he’s not the kind of man you want knowing your blood type. In Bratva circles, his name isn’t spoken; it’s measured. They talk about him like a ghost story parents tell their sons to scare them straight. A boogeyman with a doctorate in pain.
They say he lives like a czar out of time, in stone castles behind iron gates, with rooms lit by fire instead of bulbs. Rumor has it he collects medieval torture devices the way other men collect cigars. Not for show. For practice. He believes old pain teaches better than new science.
And yet, in the same breath, they’ll tell you he’s a genius with a keyboard. Knows how to gut a man through code as easily as throughthe ribs. He can launch a cyberwar while sharpening a blade. A psychopath on speed and silicon, half ghost, half algorithm.
He’s not just feared because he kills. He’s feared because he studieswhypeople live, and then he takes it from them.
"Arsenyev," I say, dry as a tombstone, because I like to start with facts. "What a surprise. Calling to introduce yourself to your new brother-in-law?"
Silence answers like a blade dragged across glass. When he speaks, it’s slow and clean—danger broken into syllables. "Conti. I'm not calling to be pleasant. I'm calling to warn you not to kill my sister by negligence."
My nose detects the faint smell of piss in the corridor and wrinkles in disgust. A maid passes, shoulders tight, eyes on her shoes. I watch her move out of habit, watching is how you measure distance between people and weapons. She doesn’t slow. That little human motion makes this whole conversation feel theatrical.
"I’m not running a hospice," I tell him. "She’s sleeping." I leave out the part about the sedative. No need to hand him a knife with my name on it. "I’ll make sure she rests."
"My sister is stubborn as iron," his voice holds a deep Russian accent. "She'd rather die than admit a weakness."
"I’ve noticed. Self-immolation seems to be her hobby."
He snorts. Not a laugh, but I take it as such. "You are not amusing."
"Never tried." I let the silence sit and wait him out. I can appreciate a brother being worried about his sister, even if said brother happens to be the Pakhan of the Bratva.
His voice grows colder by a few degrees. "Take care of her, Conti. If she dies because of you, I will dance at your funeral pyre."
I picture that: Grigori in ceremonial black, hands neat, dancing. The image is absurd and precise. I answer in kind. "I don’t do funerals without a reason. I don’t collect grudges that aren’t mine."
A sharp inhale on the line, the kind of breath that measures rooms. I don't give him time to respond. "Is that why you called?" I add, leaning my shoulder on the wall. The plaster is warm. "To threaten me? To tell me you burn slow and bright? Or to thank me for keeping her breathing?"
There’s a fraction of a shift, an inflection that’s not quite a smile, something like curiosity edged with threat. "She is proud," Grigori says. "She will tell anyone she is fine. She will break herself for the satisfaction of not asking for help."
There it is, care buried under a Pakhan’s words. He won’t say it, but the weight of his words is obvious: a man trying not to be a man who needs someone else. I can feel his pride like heat through the line. "You sound like aworried father," I tease, allowing some softness into my voice.
"No." His reply is short and sharp. "I'm her brother."
"Fine," I say. "I'll keep her alive then."
With his next words, he sounds exactly like the sociopath he's rumored to be. "Tell her she may sleep as long as she needs. But if she wakes and there is blood that shouldn’t be there—if a hand moved while she slept—my gift to you will be… unique."
Unique. Somehow, he managed to inflict more images than a drawn-out picture of torture could with that one word. Iron Maidens and racks enter my mind, and I don’t like either image. We circle each other in words. Two roosters on a wire: our postures are neat, our wings folded. Neither strikes—yet—both test the other’s reach.
"Make sure she rests."
"For my sake?" I ask.
"For your sake." He lets it hang like a coin left on a table. "And Conti—do not make my sister a lesson."
"Lessons are tedious," I tell him. "And I’m easily distracted."
He doesn’t laugh, but something almost like approval passes, if men like him approve at all. "Good night, Conti."
