I mash the phone tighter to my ear, whisper-hissing, “Can I call you back—?”
He barrels right over me. “Ugh, you sound half-dead. Did you go out last night? Are you still in bed? Or… wait—” There’s a pause. “Are you… eating? At a diner? Sunrise Diner, maybe?”
My fork slips out of my hand and clatters onto the plate. My eyes widen to dinner-plate size. I whip my head around the diner.
No Jasper.
Lev, Boris, Dima, and Anton do the same, in perfect unison, like I’m the conductor of the world’s grumpiest boy band. Anton’seyebrow ticks up and he holds my gaze, like he’s about to ask me something I absolutely don’t want to answer.
And then—knock, knock, knock.
On the window.
Holy mother of all badly timed plot twists
I gasp.
Jasper is right there, pressed against the glass like a Broadway villain, waggling his eyebrows at me.
Then his gaze drops. To the table. To the literal mafia men boxed in around me.
I freeze. Jasper blinks. Slow. His expression morphs into pure soap opera shock.
He cups his hands around his mouth and shouts through the glass:
“Are you in the middle of a gangbang breakfast?”
15
Mary
God help me.
Jasper’s face is plastered against the glass like a deranged Disney prince who took a wrong turn at Broadway auditions. Blond hair bleached so bright it could guide planes in for landing, blue eyes sparkling like the Mediterranean. His jawline could slice deli meat, and the jacket he’s wearing is the kind of statement piece only Dua Lipa can pull off without looking insane. If he weren’t gay, I would’ve already signed away my soul to be Mrs. Saint James.
I laugh. It bursts out of me, wrong and robotic.
“Ha. Ha. Ha.” I wave at him like this is normal. Like I’m not one blink away from a full-blown meltdown.
Anton, Dima, Lev, and Boris don’t laugh. Not even close. They’re still staring at him—four unblinking predators locked on a very sparkly target.
But Jasper, of course, doesn’t get it.
And why would he? He has no idea. No idea that I’m basically ahostagein a Bratva drama I didn’t sign up for. No idea someone out there actually wants me dead. No idea that I’m currently sleeping with the green-eyed embodiment of “do not mess with me” who just so happens toalsobe an important member of the Bratva.
Fuck me. Fuck shit. Fuck.
Jasper gives me a cheerful little wave and points at the diner door.
No. No, no, no, no.
Too late.Jasper sweeps inside, bell jangling overhead like a spotlight announcing trouble. Every head in the diner tilts toward him because of course it does. He doesn’t walk—hearrives.
“DARLING!” he booms the second he’s at our table, catching my hand across the Formica like we’re in a ballroom instead of surrounded by coffee mugs and ketchup bottles. Before I can yank it back, he presses a loud kiss to my knuckles.
“You didn’t tell me breakfast came withbodyguards.”
Lev actually snorts coffee through his nose. Boris blinks at Jasper like someone just invented a new species. Dima doesn’t even twitch, though I swear the air around him gets heavier.
