There’s a clatter of sound, and I resist the urge to look over, but can see enough out of the corner of my eye to tell me that Liev has finally made a move. A move to defy me. Nika has the older man pinned against the table, wrist trapped, jaw working in anger. Alyona flinches, prying her gaze away from me to look desperately at the father she thinks abandoned her.
“You think you can just lock me up and parade me around like a shield?” She snaps, realizing that he won’t or can’t come to her rescue. “You’re not my father. You’re not my anything.”
The words shouldn’t matter. They do anyway.
I reach for her then.
Not roughly, but with enough authority that there is no mistaking who initiated the contact. My hand closes around her wrist as I pull her away from the table and toward the hallway. She stumbles half a step, shock flashing across her face, then she plants her feet and resists.
“Kazimir!”
There are more sounds of a struggle, but Nika will come out on top. Liev has gotten soft in his administrative capacity; despite the muscles he keeps around with nightly workouts and morning runs.
“Let go of me,” Alyona hisses, struggling against me, body soft and panicked.
I don’t.
The hallway swallows us in shadow and quiet; the door closing behind us with a muted finality that sends a ripple of tension through my blood. I turn her to face me, backing her up until her shoulders brush the wall. For a moment we are so close that the air between us is charged and dangerous.
It’s the alley all over again, only in reverse.
This time, I’ll be able to watch the ecstasy on her face. I’d make her suck her desire off my fingers after making her moan around them and thank me.
My hand slides from her wrist to her chin, and with firm fingers I tilt her face up to mine. Her skin is warm beneath my touch, her pulse racing where my thumb rests, and the awareness of her hits me hard and fast, like a blow I wasn’t braced for.
“You will obey me,” I tell her quietly.
She bares her teeth at me, breath coming fast, eyes blazing with something that looks too much like fire. “I’ll never be yours.”
The words slice deeper than she could know.
Something dark and hungry coils tighter in my chest, and I lean in just enough that my mouth brushes her ear. “That,” I murmur, my voice low and rough, “sounds like a challenge.”
Her breath catches, traitorous and sharp, and I feel the tremor that runs through her despite her defiance. For a heartbeat, the world narrows down to the heat of her bodyand the tension humming between us. I know I could take this somewhere neither of us could come back from.
I release her abruptly.
“Take her,” I say, stepping back and gesturing to a man hidden in the dark corner without looking at him.
She lunges forward like she might say something else. Perhaps something meant to wound me. But he’s already there, and his grip is firm and professional as he guides her away. She twists in his hold, fury pouring off her, voice carrying down the hall.
“You think this ends with you winning?” she throws back at me. “You don’t own me.”
I meet her gaze steadily. “Not yet.”
The door closes behind her a moment later, the sound solid and final, and the echo of it settles somewhere deep in my bones.
I turn back to the command center and find Liev staring at me with an expression I don’t recognize. It’s something between anger and fear. He was breathing hard, but seems more in control now. Nika has a bruise blooming on his jawline. He watches Liev closely, every lean muscle tense.
“You locked her in a room,” Liev says flatly.
“I secured her,” I reply. “There is a difference. Do you want her getting out just to be hunted down like a fawn?”
“She’s my daughter.”
“And she’s being targeted,” I counter. “Which makes her my responsibility, whether you like it or not. This ismyterritory, Liev, my problem. If they get her, I have to give up my ports. If she’s under my protection…”
Nika stands off to the side, silent, his posture deferential, but his eyes flick to mine briefly. He knows more than he’s saying. He’s smart enough to keep it that way.
