Chapter 38
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
FIONA
The guest bedroom door clicks shut behind my parents, the quiet snap of the latch too loud in the silence. I tell them I need a shower, an excuse more than anything, but the water might do me some good.
I make it back to Aleksei’s bedroom—our bedroom—and close the door behind me, heading for the en suite. The moment the shower roars to life, whatever fragile strength I’ve been holding on to begins to fracture. I undress slowly, almost mechanically, my fingers clumsy as I strip each piece away.
When I step beneath the spray, I brace both palms against the tile, letting the water beat across the back of my head in hard, steady bursts. I shut my eyes, but nothing inside me quiets. The man’s face is still there.
His eyes when I pulled the trigger. His body hitting the floor. My father bleeding. My own hands shaking so violently I could barely hold the gun.
And none of it washes off.
The tears roll down my cheeks, and I can’t suppress them anymore.
We almost died.
I killed someone.
A small sob breaks free, like my body is finally able to feel it all.
The door creaks open behind me, and I catch Aleksei walking up to me through the glass.
“Fiona? Are you crying?” He pulls open the door.
I shake my head, wiping at my cheeks even though it’s pointless. He already heard.
“No. I’m fine.”
The muscle in his jaw flexes, and without another word, he yanks off his hoodie, shoves his sweats down, and steps out of them like nothing else in the world matters except getting to me.
He doesn’t ask permission. He simply steps inside and closes the door behind him, the steam curling around us as he pulls me into his arms.
The moment I feel him, I break. My body sags into his, my sobs muffled against his chest. His hands trace down my back in calm, reassuring strokes, easing the frantic tremor beneath my skin.
“I’m here.” He drops a kiss to my temple. “It’s over now. You’re safe, moya ptichka.”
My vision blurs as I look up at him.
“I don’t want to see it anymore,” I whisper. “His body…after I killed him. I need it to stop.”
“It is hard the first time.” His hand comes up to frame my cheek. “But remember this. Your father and mother would be dead if you hadn’t done it. You would be…” He trails off, like he can’t bring himself to imagine the very idea of me gone.
I tilt my head, searching his eyes through the mist. “When did it stop for you?”
I don’t even know if he ever felt what I’m feeling now, but I need him to tell me that eventually, it won’t be like this.
His thumb brushes under my eyes, sliding away the water and tears that mix there. “The first time I killed someone, it haunted me for weeks. I would wake soaked in sweat, heart pounding like I was still there.”
Something inside me stills. “How old were you?”
He hesitates, just for a moment. “Ten.”
The word lands like a stone dropping straight through me. My mind struggles to make sense of it. Of the boy he was and the man he was forced to become.
He clasps the back of my neck and leans his forehead to mine. “I will be here for you through all of it. Whatever you need, however long it takes. And as long as I am alive, no one will ever touch you or your parents again. That is not a promise. It is the truth.”
I wrap my arms around him and rest my head against his chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart and wondering how someone born into that kind of violence could become this.
Gentle. Safe. Mine.
Turning off the water, he reaches for a towel, wrapping me in it before drying himself with another.
Then he lifts me like I weigh nothing and carries me to the bed, setting me down carefully.
He grabs one of his shirts and slips it over my head, then pulls on his own clothes and climbs in beside me.
Settling onto his back, he winds an arm around my waist and draws me over him until I’m stretched across his chest, held firmly in the warm, hard strength of his body.
“Is he dead?” I don’t know why I’m asking when I already know the answer.
“Yes.” His fingers trace soft, lazy patterns on my back.
I close my eyes. Not in horror or relief, but in resignation.
This is who my husband is. I’m a prosecutor married to a mobster. I don’t think I’ll ever get over it.
“Do you want to ask me anything else?”
I lift my head and look down at him. “Do you know who sent them?”
He goes quiet, and something twists in my gut. “Not yet.”
Did he just lie?
“I know you’re scared, but I won’t let them get near you. Not again. I will find them all and hunt them down because this is who I am, Fiona. This is who your husband is.”
There’s something brutal in his stare, something wild and untamed like the lion he proudly bears on his chest. But I see something else: his fear that this is where I pull away. That I won’t want him anymore.
Instead, I lean in and press a kiss to the scar just beneath where the lion tears apart the wolf. “Then I guess it’s a good thing I’m your wife. Because I’m not going anywhere.”
His breath stutters. Then his arm squeezes around me and he tilts my jaw closer, kissing me slow, the passion and affection seeping through his pores.
I get lost in his kiss. In the way his hands roam my body. In the way he flips me under him and slides inside, rocking slowly as he stares deep into my eyes, making me forget everything but the way it feels when we’re together.