“No. It was revenge for my father. For every person like him who gets crushed by people like—” She stops.
“People like me,” I finish. “I’m exactly what you came here to destroy.”
“Yes.” The admission is barely audible. “You were.”
“Now?”
“Now I don’t know anymore. You’re cruel and controlling and you’ve caged me in ways my father never experienced. Except you’re also the man who saves kittens and checks locks obsessively and holds me like you’re terrified I’ll disappear.” Her hand tightens around mine. “You’re the machine I wanted to break, but somehow, you’re also human.”
The confession sits heavy between us. All this time, I thought her investigation was personal—about us, about what I’d done to her. It was bigger than that. Older. Rooted in trauma that predates me by years.
I’m a stand-in for the men who killed her father. A convenient target for rage that has nowhere else to go.
“I’m sorry,” I say. Meaning it. “For what happened to him. For being the kind of man who makes that possible.”
“Don’t apologize for what you are. Just… ” She stops, searching for words. “Don’t prove me right about you. Please.”
The plea is quiet, desperate. She’s asking me not to be the monster she feared. Not to become the thing that justifies the hatred she arrived with.
I don’t know if I can promise that.
“I can’t guarantee I won’t hurt you again,” I say honestly. “My world is violent. The choices I make have consequences for people who don’t deserve them. You already know that.”
“I know.”
“Icanpromise I’ll remember you’re not just mine to protect. That you came from something real—loss and grief and the kind of pain that shapes people into fighters.” I pull her closer, needing the contact. “Your father would have hated me.”
“Probably.” She rests her forehead against my chest. “He would have hated that I care about you even more.”
We stand like that for a long moment, Misha watching from the couch with feline judgment. No words needed. Just presence, understanding passing between us in the silence.
This isn’t conquest. Isn’t obsession alone.
This is trust forged under pressure, through honesty that cost us both something to give. It binds tighter than chainsever could, more permanent than marriage certificates or forced vows.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, a warning sounds.
If she betrays me now—after this, after she’s shown me her scars and I’ve shown her mine—it won’t just destroy me. It’ll destroy us both. Everything we’ve built, every moment of understanding, every careful step toward something that might actually resemble partnership.
Choose freedom, or choose this.
Choose me.
I should confront her now. Should force the issue, demand she tell me about the phone I know exists, the contact she thinks I haven’t discovered.
Instead, I hold her. Let her rest against me while Misha purrs from the couch and the city glitters beyond windows that never close.
“Whatever happens tomorrow,” I say quietly, “remember this. Remember us. Remember that you have a choice, and that choice matters more than whatever they’re offering you.”
She goes very still. “What happens tomorrow?”
“The Volkov meeting. I’ll be gone for hours. You’ll be here, alone with your thoughts and whatever decisions you need to make.” I tilt her face up. “I’m trusting you, Janice. Completely. Don’t make me regret it.”
Her eyes search mine, fear and understanding warring in their depths. She knows I know. Knows this is the test.
“I won’t,” she whispers. “I promise.”
I want to believe her.
