39. Katya
Katya
Katya
Dmitri’s hand brushes the scar Pavel left on my shoulder. For the first time, his touch feels safe.
“Does it still hurt?” he asks, fingers gentle against the raised skin.
“Only when it rains.”
He laughs against my neck. “We’re in Moscow. It always rains.”
“Then I guess you’ll have to keep me distracted.”
We’re in his bed at the penthouse—the same bed where I once woke thinking I was his wife recovering from a car crash.
The irony isn’t lost on me, but this time isn’t about lies. I’m here because I chose to be.
“I keep thinking about how different everything is now,” I murmur, running my fingers through his dark hair. A week ago, we were fighting for our lives. Now we’re planning what color to paint the guest bathroom.”
“You want to paint the guest bathroom?”
“I want to have opinions about guest bathrooms. I want to argue with you about whether we need throw pillows and what kind of coffee to buy. I want normal, boring relationship problems that other couples deal with.”
He rolls over to face me, and those green eyes inspect my face like he’s memorizing every detail. “And you want all that with me?”
“Only with you.”
The words come out before I’ve realized what I planned to say, but they’re true.
After months of uncertainty and deception, I know what I want. Not just safety or protection or convenience, but him.
All of him.
“Katya,” he whispers, and my pulse jumps.
“What?”
“I love you. Not the version of you I created in my head, not the confused woman who needed my protection. I love you exactly as you are right now.”
“A former FSB agent with trust issues and a bullet scar?”
“A brilliant, dangerous woman who forgave me when I didn’t deserve it.”
He kisses me then, softly and slowly, and I can taste the promise in it. This isn’t about possession or control. It’s about choice, and I’m choosing him.
“Show me,” I whisper against his lips.
“Show you what?”
“Show me what it feels like when you love someone instead of trying to own them.”
Something changes in his eyes, goes deeper and warmer. He kisses me again, this time with the kind of reverence that makes my breath catch.
“I can do that,” he promises.
His mouth trails kisses along my pulse while his hands slide over my hip and cup my ass.
There’s no rush, no desperate need to claim or conquer. Just the slow, sweet burn of desire building between us.
“You’re so beautiful,” he breathes against my skin.
I arch into his touch as his lips trace the hollow of my throat. “You’ve said that before.”
“I mean it differently now.”
“How?”
“Before, I said it because I thought you wanted to hear it. Now, I say it because I can’t help myself.”
His honesty makes something warm unfold in my chest. This man who built his life on deception is offering me nothing but truth.
“Dmitri?”
“Mmm?”
“I love you, too. The real you, not the fantasy version who kidnapped me.”
He lifts his head to look at me, and I see the vulnerability in his eyes. “Even knowing what I’m capable of?”
“Your violence doesn’t scare me. What matters is that you chose to be better.”
He kisses me deeper, and I lose myself in the taste.
His hands roam my body with growing confidence, relearning every inch of me like he’s discovering me for the first time.
His fingers pinch my nipple, and I gasp into his mouth, the heat from the connection arrowing low and sharp.
“I could spend all night doing this to you,” he tells me, his voice rough with need.
“Then do it.”
He takes his time as his mouth follows the path his hands blazed. His tongue teases my nipple in slow circles, dragging noises out of me I didn’t know I could make.
“Please,” I whisper.
“Please what?”
“More.”
He scrapes his teeth over my nipple, and I cry out, the sting sweet as sin.
My hands fist in his hair, holding him against me.
“ Yeah, you like it rough,” he mutters, smug against my skin.
“Yes.”
He toys with me until I’m shaking, then his hand slides between my thighs. I’m already wet and ready for him.
“God, Katya,” he groans when his fingers find my slick heat. “You’re dripping for me.”
“Don’t stop,” I breathe, clawing at his shoulders.
He strokes me slowly and deliberately, building me up until I want to scream. When he pushes a finger inside, I arch my back off the bed with a gasp.
“More,” I demand.
He adds a second finger, and I rock desperately against his hand. The pressure is exquisite, but I need more.
“I want you inside me,” I tell him.
“Not yet. I want to taste you first.”
Before I can protest, his mouth is on me, his tongue lashing my sensitive flesh. The sensation is overwhelming, the pleasure so intense that it borders on pain.
“Oh—fuck, Dmitri!”
He pins my hips as I wither, tongue working me like he owns me. When he sucks gently on my clit, I shatter, and my orgasm crashes over me in waves.
“Fucking gorgeous,” he mumbles against my thigh as I come down from the high.
I drag him up for a kiss and taste myself on his lips. “Now,” I order.
He lines up at my entrance, and we both groan when he pushes deep inside. The feeling of being filled by him, and connected to him, chases every thought from my mind except him and how he makes me feel.
“Perfect, kotyonok,” he breathes when he’s fully seated inside me. “You were made for me.”
He moves inside me, slowly then harder, until there’s nothing but him—nothing but us.
“I love you,” I gasp as he moves into me.
“I love you, too. So much it scares the hell out of me.”
“Don’t be scared. We’re safe now.”
“Are we?” he grits, his eyes blazing.
“We’re safe with each other.”
He captures my mouth in another kiss as he continues to move within me. The pleasure builds slowly, a sweet tension that coils tighter with each thrust.
I hook my legs around his waist, and he slams deeper, nailing the spot that makes stars burst behind my eyes.
“There—God, right there,” I gasp.
He maintains the angle, driving into me until I’m balanced on the edge of release.
“Come for me, kotyonok,” he growls. “I need to feel you break on me.”
His command shatters me. I clamp around him, crying out as my orgasm rips through me. The pulsing of my inner muscles triggers his release, and he spills inside me with a grunt of satisfaction.
“That was…” I breathe, still dazed.
“Different,” he says, voice rough.
“Better.”
“So much better.”
I trace lazy patterns over his chest as I come down. “So… what happens now?”
“Now we figure out how to be normal people… if people like us can be.”
“You think we can do normal?”
“Probably not. But I’ll try if you will.”
The doorbell rings, interrupting our moment. Dmitri groans and checks the clock.
“Who the hell visits at six in the evening?”
I giggle and reply, “People with jobs and normal schedules?”
“I hate normal schedules.”
We get dressed reluctantly, and Dmitri goes to answer the door while I make myself presentable. I hear voices in the hallway, and then Anya appears in the living room carrying a bottle of wine and a knowing smile.
“You two look… relaxed,” she observes.
“We’re settling in,” I reply, trying not to blush.
“I can see that. The domestic life suits you.”
Dmitri returns from the kitchen with three glasses. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”
“I wanted to check on you both. Make sure you’re adjusting to life without people trying to kill you.”
“It’s surprisingly boring,” I admit.
“Boring is good. Boring means Viktor’s really dead, and his network is actually finished.”
Anya accepts a glass of wine and settles into one of the leather chairs. “I also wanted to tell you I’ve decided what I’m doing next.”
“Let me guess,” Dmitri says. “Private security consultant?”
“Close. I’m starting a firm. Discrete protection services for people who need more than conventional security.”
“People like us,” I interpret.
“Exactly. Criminals with consciences, ex-intelligence operatives who’ve gone legitimate, anyone caught between worlds and needing protection.”
“That’s brilliant,” I tell her.
“I learned from the best. Both of you, in different ways.”
We spend an hour catching up. Anya’s business idea is solid, and she’s already got clients lined up. The conversation is easy and comfortable, like three friends planning the future.
When Dr. Orlov arrives an hour later, our gathering is complete. He looks around the penthouse and notes, “You both seem well.”
“We’re good,” Dmitri confirms.
“Better than good,” I add.
“I’m glad. When I became involved in this situation, I wasn’t certain anyone would survive it intact.”
“Define intact,” Dmitri says dryly.
“Psychologically healthy, emotionally stable, and capable of forming genuine relationships. All things that seemed unlikely given the circumstances.”
I think about everything we’ve been through, from my amnesia to Viktor’s final assault. “Sometimes, the worst circumstances create the strongest foundations.”
“Perhaps. Or perhaps you two were determined to find each other despite the obstacles.”
“Both,” I decide.
Dr. Orlov raises his wine glass. “To finding love in impossible places.”
“To choosing love over everything else,” Dmitri counters.
“To survival,” Anya adds.
“To new beginnings,” I finish.
We toast to all of it, four unlikely friends who found each other through violence and deception but chose to build something better together.
Later, after Anya and Dr. Orlov have left, Dmitri and I stand at the windows overlooking Moscow. The city spreads out below us, full of possibilities and challenges.
“What are you thinking about?” he asks.
“Family. I never really had one growing up, and my FSB handlers weren’t exactly nurturing. But this… what we have with Anya and even Dr. Orlov… it feels like family.”
“The kind you choose instead of the kind you’re born into.”
“The kind that accepts you, knows your worst secrets, and loves you anyway.”
He puts his arms around me from behind, and I lean into his warmth. “Speaking of secrets, there’s something I should probably tell you.”
I groan and ask, “What now?”
“I might have already started looking at wedding venues.”
I turn in his arms to face him, cocking my head. “Wedding venues?”
“I figure since we’ve already done the fake marriage thing, we might as well try the real version.”
The corners of my mouth quirk up. “Are you proposing to me?”
“I’m suggesting we make it official. Legal this time, with vows and witnesses who aren’t part of a psychological operation.”
“That’s the least romantic proposal in history,” I tease, scrunching my nose.
“Want me down on one knee? I’ll do it.”
“Don’t you dare.”
He laughs and kisses me softly. “Is that a yes?”
“That’s a, ‘we’ll see how the domestic experiment goes first.’”
“Fair enough. But I’m keeping the venue research.”
“Of course, you are.”
Whatever comes next, we’ll face it together. Not as captor and prisoner, not as spy and target, but as partners who chose each other against all odds.
The war is over, Viktor is dead, and somehow, we found love in the wreckage.
That’s not a bad foundation to build a life on.