“Unlikely. We have files on Ludo Cassarian and Yevgeny Melnyk, but Karpov’s operational staff below that level is mostly unknown to us. If this man is a contracted surveillance operative, he probably doesn’t appear in any database we can access.” He sets down the tablet. “A composite sketch gives us something to circulate through our contacts in the port district. Someone may recognize him.”
“Set it up for tomorrow. Aurora needs to decompress today.”
She sleepsfor two hours and comes out of the bedroom looking steadier. I’ve spent the time with Viktor planning countermeasures, and by the time she sits on the couch with a glass of water and pulls the blanket over her legs, I’ve decided what to tell her.
“I need you to know something.” I sit beside her and face her directly. “The restructuring I mentioned, separating the legitimate businesses from the criminal operations, is already underway. My attorneys are dissolving shell companies. Viktor is building exit strategies for the branches that can’t be cleaned.I’ve set a twelve-month timeline to transfer the shipping network and close the offshore accounts.”
She pulls the blanket tighter. “You’re serious about leaving?”
“I’m serious about building something that doesn’t require armed guards and encrypted phones. The hotels, the clubs, and the real estate generate enough revenue to sustain everything independently. I want our children to grow up outside this world, and I want you to finish school without worrying about if the man sitting next to you in class is an operative or a student.”
She winces. “New fear unlocked. Thanks.”
I shake my head. “I’m serious.”
“I know, and it’s a beautiful picture.” She takes a sip of water. “Can you actually do it?”
“The numbers work, and the legal framework is clean. Viktor is preparing the inventory of which operations can be closed, sold, or handed off.”
“I’m not asking about the numbers.” She sets the glass down. “I’m asking whether Karpov, Eric, and the people who depend on your criminal infrastructure will let you walk away.”
“Karpov gets handled first. I can’t dismantle anything while he’s still active.”
She frowns at my half-answer. “What happens after Karpov?”
I keep my gaze steady on hers so she can see I’m being completely transparent. “After Karpov, the restructuring accelerates. The people who depend on the criminal side will be transitioned to other operators or compensated. Viktor hascontacts who can absorb the shipping routes without disrupting the supply chain.”
She’s quiet for a moment. “I believe you want this and you’ll try. I’m not convinced the world you built will let you leave it, but I want to be wrong about that.”
I exhale harshly. “I want you to be wrong about it too.”
She reaches for my hand. I take it, and the contact is warms me. She’s not forgiving me for the surveillance lapse or for filtering information, but she’s choosing to stay in this with her eyes open, which is harder and matters more.
“I’m tired of being afraid.” She says it without ceremony. “I’m tired of looking over my shoulder and wondering if the man at the crosswalk works for Karpov or Eric or nobody. I’m tired of living in someone else’s properties and sleeping next to a loaded weapon on the nightstand. I want the life you’re describing, and I want it with you. Wanting it makes me vulnerable, but that doesn’t scare me as much as it used to.”
I pull her toward me and kiss her. The kiss starts slowly and carefully, matching how we’ve been with each other since the argument, testing the ground before committing weight. She kisses me back with her hand on my chest and curls her fingers into my shirt.
“Not on the couch,” she says against my mouth. “Take me to bed.”
I stand and pull her up with me. We walk down the hall together, and I close the bedroom door behind us. The loaded Glock on the nightstand catches the dock light through the window, and I move it to the drawer before turning back to her. The gesture isn’t lost on either of us. I’m putting the weapon away so Ican touch her with hands that aren’t reaching for it, and this distinction needing to exist in our bedroom is its own kind of damage that she absorbs but continues.
I undress her slowly. She lifts her arms, and I pull her shirt over her head. Her body has changed with the pregnancy, showing subtle shifts that make me want her more, not differently. Her breasts are fuller, her waist is slightly thicker, and when I press my palm flat against her stomach, it’s firmer than it was. Thinking of the babies growing inside her hits me hard enough to make my eyes sting. She puts her hand over mine and holds it there.
“They’re in there,” she says in a reassuring tone. “I’m here too.”
I kiss her stomach, then her ribs, then the space between her breasts, and she threads her fingers through my hair and guides my mouth back to hers. We fall onto the bed together. She undoes my belt and pushes my pants down while I unclasp her bra and toss it. I press my mouth to her nipple, and she arches into me, tightening her fingers in my hair. I move to the other breast, sucking and biting gently until she makes a sound low in her throat that sends heat straight to my cock.
I slide my hand between her thighs and find her soaked. I stroke along her slit, spreading the wetness before pressing two fingers inside her pussy while my thumb circles her clit. She spreads her legs wider and grips the pillow above her head. Her breathing breaks into short, sharp inhales, and I watch her face in the dim light while I work her toward the edge, curling my fingers forward until she lifts her hips off the mattress.
“Adrian…” She says my name like a confession. “I need you.”
I hesitate because the man who was watching her today is still out there, and I’m about to lose myself in her. The vulnerability of this moment, with both of us stripped and exposed in a house surrounded by guards because the world outside wants to take her from me, makes me grip her hip harder than I intend to.
She reads the hesitation and pulls me down by the back of my neck. “Stay here. Stay with me, in this moment.”
I withdraw my hand and position myself between her legs, which she splays to welcome me. I guide my cock to her channel to push inside her with one steady thrust, and her pussy takes me in. She’s slick and familiar in a way that makes me ache with more than just desire, pulling a groan from me that I don’t suppress. She wraps her legs around my waist and pulls me deeper until I’m buried completely, and we hold still for a moment, connected and breathing against each other’s mouths.
I start to move with slow, deep strokes that let me feel every inch of her, and she matches my rhythm by lifting her hips to meet each thrust. I brace myself on one arm and use the other to tilt up her chin so I can see her face. Her lips are parted, her eyelids are half-closed, and she’s looking at me with an openness I’ve earned through every mistake I’ve made and every correction she’s demanded.
