Page 225 of Marrying the Savage

“You held your son down and made him sick to empty my house.”

“I did what I had to do.”

“For what?”

“For my family,” Grigori snaps. “For my son. For the place he was supposed to have before she came here carrying your child. The old Damir would have seen right through my bullshit, but this one made you a fool.”

Damir’s face doesn’t change, but his eyes do.

Grigori laughs once, breathless and ugly. “Look at you. Still looking at her. Still proving me right.”

Damir lowers his gun slightly. Not enough to surrender. Enough to make Grigori look at it.

That’s all Damir needs.

His other hand moves. The knife comes from his sleeve so fast I barely see it before it hits Grigori’s gun hand.

Grigori curses, the shot going wide into the stone above the terrace doors. I jerk away as his grip loosens, and Damir crosses the distance between us like he was already in motion before the sound.

He grabs Grigori and rips him off me.

I stumble sideways, catching myself on the balustrade, my heart pounding so hard I can barely hear. Damir drives Grigori back with a punch to the face, then another to his ribs. Grigori fights back, not like a coward, not like the spoiled cousin I had half believed him to be, but like a man who has been waiting years to do this and knows he may not get another chance.

They hit the terrace table hard enough to overturn it. Glass breaks.

Grigori grabs for the fallen gun. I see it before Damir does.

“Damir!”

Damir turns, kicks the gun out of reach, and Grigori uses the opening to drive his shoulder into Damir’s stomach. Both men slam into the balustrade. Stone scrapes. Damir catches himself. Grigori swings again, wild now, blood running from his mouth and hand.

“You took everything,” Grigori says.

Damir blocks the punch and grips him by the collar. “You touched my wife.”

Grigori spits blood. “You should have trusted her then.”

Damir looks pained. “I know I should have. That’s why I’m here correcting my mistakes.” He looks right at Grigori, who snarls.

“Very well,” Grigori says, “Change of plans. You both die today.”

Grigori goes in for a second punch, before shoving Damir sideways. Damir’s back hits the terrace column. Grigori lunges past him, toward me, maybe for the gun, maybe for my throat, maybe just because he knows it will make Damir move without thinking.

Damir moves. He catches Grigori from behind and yanks him back.

Grigori twists, his injured hand slipping against Damir’s sleeve. His heel hits a piece of broken glass. His foot goes out from under him. For one suspended second, both of them are at the balustrade.

Damir reaches for his jacket. Grigori grabs at him.

Then Grigori’s body tips backward over the stone edge.

His eyes go wide.

Damir catches his wrist, and for a second, he holds him. The muscles in Damir’s arm strain. Grigori hangs over the drop, blood on his face, one hand locked around Damir’s wrist like survival has stripped everything else from him.

“Damir,” Grigori gasps.

Damir looks down at him.