Only for a second. But I see it.
And I know she hears the truth in it.
Her mouth curls. “Then he is weaker than I feared.”
Behind her, Alena makes another sound and shifts, one hand leaving a smear of blood on the floor as she pushes up.
The movement draws Aleksei’s mother’s attention for one fatal second.
She turns her head.
I slam my free hand into the call button.
The alarm goes off, loud and sharp.
Her eyes snap back to me, furious now.
“You stupid girl?—”
39
ALEKSEI
By the timeI step out of Zatanna’s room, I’ve already made the decision.
Today I kill him.
Not later. Not strategically. Not with patience or pressure or any of the careful methods I’ve used to keep this war from becoming personal in the most final way.
It is personal now. He’s involved. I know it.
How, I don’t know yet.
How he got into my house, how he got close enough to her food, how he thought he could touch what was mine and keep breathing after it, I do not know.
Right now, I do not care.
I walk down the corridor with that single thought in my head and every other one stripped away. My men fall in behind me without being told. They know my face. They know the pace of my steps. They know what it means when I stop looking like a man and start looking like a verdict.
The elevator ride down is too slow.
The lobby is too bright.
By the time I get to the hospital doors, my hand is already reaching for my phone to tell Sergei to bring the car around.
Then my phone rings first.
Anton.
I answer without slowing. “What.”
His voice is tight. “Boss. Alena was seen walking into the hospital.”
I stop so abruptly one of my men nearly walks into my back.
“What?”
“Five minutes ago. Security cam at the west entrance. She came in alone.”
