Chapter 39
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
FIONA
“Come on. What are you afraid of?”
Aleksei’s words drift across the warm breeze, laced with that familiar teasing edge as he taps the seat of the sleek black-and-red sports bike between his thighs. The same one he leaned against the day he chased me through the woods.
That feels like a lifetime ago. Everything has changed, yet somehow nothing has.
Like the impossible question lingering in the back of my mind: how do I stay with him and still keep my job?
“Well, for starters, the fact that you could kill me.” I’m only half teasing, but the idea of riding with him sends a spark through me.
He’s been asking for days and I keep saying no, yet some part of me craves the thrill of it. The freedom, the wind in my hair, the long stretch beneath us as he flies down the road.
He holds out a helmet, resting it on his knee, one hand wrapped around the handlebar. I cross my arms and arch a playful brow, but I don’t step toward him.
It’s been a week since the night I pulled the trigger, and even though time has blurred the edges of the memory, I still can’t forget it. The man’s face. The fear. The blood.
Aleksei has been there in every way he knows how, even trying to convince me to take time off work. But I couldn’t. My job matters to me. I can’t just disappear, not with so many cases depending on me.
His smile softens. “I would never kill you, lyubov moya. I’d die before I let that happen.”
Those words seep through my chest, and I make my way toward him, throwing my arms around his neck.
“You’re such a romantic.”
“I take after my brother.”
I actually laugh, an honest sensation I haven’t felt in days. “Wait until I tell Konstantin you said that.”
He groans. “No, please, anything but that.” His hand goes to his chest like he’s been wounded. “I have a reputation to uphold.”
I shake my head, letting the ease of the moment cloak around me and make me forget the ugliness for a while.
Fuck it.
I slide onto the seat behind him.
“Good girl.” He kisses the tip of my nose and secures the helmet around my head.
When I lean forward, my arms find their place around his waist, and it’s stupid how right it feels. Like I’ve done it a thousand times before. Like this is where I was always meant to be.
“Are you ready?” He glances back at me over his shoulder, mouth threaded with that smirk he always wears.
My heart gives a little thump. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
Please don’t kill me…
“I promise to take it easy on you.” He revs up the engine. “I’ll go slow.”
“You? Go slow? That’ll be the day.”
He chuckles right before we move, gliding down the long driveway of the estate, past the stone walls and security gates and the parked cars.
The wind rushes around us, and I squeeze my eyes shut for a second, letting the sensation crash over me.
There’s something about being on the back of this bike, arms locked around a man like Aleksei, that makes the world fall away.
It’s reckless. Exciting. Dangerous in a way I’ve never craved before.
“Go faster,” I tell him, and he answers with a laugh before the bike surges forward, wind tearing past us.
For the first time in days, everything falls away. The death. The cryptic notes buried under a stack of files in my office. The fear that someone is coming after me. That my parents could be next.
They’re still in the guest suite down the hall. Aleksei insisted they stay until the threat is gone. He even assigned men to guard the vineyard while they’re at work, and for that, I’m grateful.
He takes a smooth, effortless turn, and we coast along a back road lined with trees, the sun melting low on the horizon. Reaching back briefly, he places his hand on my thigh, squeezing gently. Like a reminder.
I’m here. I’ve got you.
I squeeze him tighter, burying my face in his back, letting the warmth of his body and the hum of the engine quiet the noise in my head.
Later, we’ll go back, and it’ll all drown me again. But right now, I can pretend for just a little while longer that this ride is the only thing that matters.
That maybe, in the eye of the storm, we’ve found something that feels like peace…and even something deeper than that.
“I seriously cannot believe you guys kept this from me.” Emilia’s eyes narrow as she glares between Konstantin and me, her disbelief so exaggerated, I half expect her to throw her hands in the air.
“Do you all think I’m some fragile little thing who needs handholding?
That I can’t handle hearing my best friend almost got her face blown off? Because I can.”
She’s not wrong. She could probably out-shoot half the men Konstantin employs, and she’s had her fair share of close calls. But still, Konstantin insisted it was better not to tell her. Said it would stress her out. And now that she overheard Kirill talking about it earlier, here we are.
“Katyonak.” Konstantin reaches across the table and takes her hand, bringing it to his lips. “I love you. I love our baby. I didn’t want to stress you out or put your health at risk.”
She huffs, but her lips twitch like she’s trying not to smile. “You just have to be all sweet and protective, huh?”
“Of course.” He shrugs with a calm grin. “Why else would you keep me around?”
“For the orgasms. Obviously.” She says it so casually, I nearly snort tea through my nose.
“Well, I’m glad you don’t want to kill him anymore.”
“Give me an hour. I’m sure I’ll be pissed again.” Flashing him a deathly look, she turns back to me, her face softening. “As for you, are you okay? Who do I need to kill?”
“I think Aleksei has that part covered.” When I smile, there’s a heaviness I can’t seem to shake, no matter how hard I try. “But seriously, I wish I knew who’s doing this. And why.”
“We will take care of it,” Konstantin says, and the tone of his voice leaves no room for argument. “We will not rest until every last one of them is dealt with.”
“But who are they?” I ask, needing something, anything, that can help me piece together what’s going on.
A name. A reason. A connection.
He holds my gaze, his expression unreadable. “Enemies. That’s all you need to know.”
Not the answer I wanted.
Konstantin eventually leaves us, something about a meeting, but not before he kisses her again like the world is ending. And for them, it almost did once. I think that’s why they’re so fearless now. Because they’ve already walked through fire and survived.
Emilia and I move to the patio with fresh mugs of tea and settle into the cushioned chairs under their gazebo. The late afternoon sun is warm against my skin, the garden alive with the chirp of crickets and the rustle of distant trees.
It should feel peaceful, but it doesn’t.
She watches me in silence for a few moments, long enough that I finally look up and catch her expression filled with concern.
“You’re not okay,” she says. “You don’t have to pretend with me.”
My throat dries. “I’m trying. I really am. But I can’t stop seeing him. That man. The one I shot.”
Her expression doesn’t change. She just nods.
“Yeah. That doesn’t go away overnight.”
“I keep thinking about all the ways it could’ve gone wrong. What if I’d frozen? What if I hadn’t even been able to get the gun? We would’ve been…” I trail off, swallowing down the sudden burn behind my eyes.
“But you’re all fine. Because you did everything right.”
“I killed someone.”
“He was gonna kill you. You saved your family.”
Silence stretches again before I say, “I know I had to do it. I don’t regret it. But I just can’t believe I did that, you know?”
Emilia leans back in her chair and exhales. “I killed people when I was with the Bureau. A few, actually. And the first time…God. I threw up. I couldn’t sleep for days. I kept thinking, what if I could’ve found another way? What if I made the wrong call?”
“And now?”
“Now I know that sometimes the only way to survive is to end the threat. It doesn’t make you a monster. It makes you human.”
I nod slowly, letting her words sink in. “I guess I just wish I could go back to not knowing what it feels like. To just being a prosecutor who believed in justice and rules.”
“You still are.” She shrugs.
I exhale slowly and nod. “Thanks, Em.”
“I’m always here for you, anytime.”
We sit in silence after that, sipping our drinks and letting the sun melt into the horizon. And I let her words settle into me, reminding myself that it was either him or us.