Chapter 25 Nadya
NADYA
I wake to movement at the foot of my bed.
At first, I think I’m dreaming. The light is soft, barely morning, and my body’s still heavy from sleep.
Konstantin.
Sitting at the foot of my bed, hands resting on his knees, eyes already on me like he’s been waiting.
I smile without thinking.
He’s the only part of my day that doesn’t feel like a countdown. The only thing that cuts through the fog of hospital corridors and test results and blood charts.
I stretch, slow and lazy, the sheet slipping down to my waist. I don’t bother covering myself. Instead, I shift just enough to let my legs fall open, my smile turning wicked.
“Is this an inspection or an invitation?”
His eyes darken—but not with heat.
“I’m not here for that,” he says, voice low. “Not yet.”
Before I can react, he grabs my ankles, yanks me forward in one smooth motion, and pulls me to the edge of the bed. My breath catches—not in fear, but because the look in his eyes isn’t playful. It’s focused. Intent.
“Tell me,” he says. “What kind of training did you do with your uncle?”
That pulls me up short. I blink. “What?”
He doesn’t let go of my leg. His grip isn’t rough, but it’s firm. Unyielding.
“Don’t play dumb, Nadya,” he says. “I’ve seen the way you move. I know you stayed abroad with your uncle. It doesn’t take much to put two and two together.”
I shake my head. “How much exactly did you find out about me?”
“Enough,” he says. “But there are gaps that I need you to fill up.”
I take a breath. “My mother’s older brother. Former military. Not the polished kind. The kind who never really came home, even after discharge. He raised me for a few years in Odessa when things with my father got…messy.”
Konstantin watches me, silent. His thumb rubs a slow circle against my ankle.
“By thirteen he had me learning throws, joint locks, break-falls. Krav Maga forms, mostly.” I pause, trying to read whether this is enough. It isn’t.
“He drilled situational awareness into my skull—blind-corner checks, mirror angles, entries and exits. By sixteen I was picking locks and breaking them, field-stripping pistols blindfolded in under a minute. Hand-to-hand every morning, blade work every night.”
Konstantin’s eyes narrow, absorbing each word. “Weapons?”
“Knives, collapsible baton, sidearm fundamentals. He made sure I could handle a shotgun if needed—but I’ve never shot at a person.
” I swallow, meeting his gaze without flinching.
“He taught me everything except how to pull the trigger on someone’s skull.
Said that choice had to be mine when the day came. ”
Silence stretches. There’s something dark and measured stirring behind Konstantin’s eyes—planning, gauging, maybe deciding exactly where I fit in whatever move he’s about to make.
I get up from the bed and start changing. I yank my leggings into place, still not fully awake, while Konstantin prowls the room with that restless, storm-brewing energy. He’s opening drawers that don’t need opening, scanning corners as if an enemy might be hiding behind the lamp.
Something is turning in his head—something big.
“Why are we having this conversation again?” I ask, tugging a sweatshirt over my head.
He doesn’t answer right away.
I glance at him over my shoulder. He’s standing by the window now, arms crossed, jaw tight. Whatever this is, it isn’t about me.
It’s about him.
“What is it?” I ask. “What’s going on in that head of yours?”
He exhales, slow and controlled. “He’s pushing again.”
“You mean your father.”
He nods.
A beat of silence stretches between us.
And then, carefully, I ask, “Would it be sane to go directly against him?”
“Sane?” he echoes. “Probably not.”
He rubs a thumb against his brow like it’s the only way to keep the fury from leaking out.
His gaze finally meets mine—coal-dark and burning. “He’s crossing every line,” he says. “Roman too. If I let it slide, they’ll read it as weakness.”
“So you need to make a statement,” I say, heartbeat climbing.
“Yes.”
“What kind of statement?” I press.
“That”—he exhales, fists unclenching—“I haven’t figured out yet.”
His voice is quiet, but there’s no softness in it.
I look at him—really look at him. The way his eyes stay trained on something I can’t see.
The way he carries weight like it belongs to him.
And no matter how much he fights it, no matter how far he tries to carve himself from his bloodline, I can’t help but think how much he resembles his father.
Not in words. In instinct. In the way he needs to control the fire before it swallows him.
He senses it—whatever’s passing through my mind—and his gaze flicks to mine. Without saying anything else, he walks out of the room.
I follow him out into the hallway, tugging the sleeves of my sweatshirt down past my wrists.
“So what?” I call after him. “Am I supposed to train with you now?”
He doesn’t even slow. “Yes.”
I huff, half laughing, half annoyed. “Seriously?”
“I need you to be able to protect yourself.”
I jog a few steps to keep up, falling in beside him. “Hello? What did I just say to you five minutes ago? I was trained. Thoroughly. Uncle Arman didn’t raise a helpless niece.”
He stops at the bottom of the stairs, finally turns to face me. “Yeah,” he says. “But you haven’t really trained in the last couple of years.”
I blink. “So?”
“So,” he says, stepping closer, “that means when it comes down to it—when the moment demands it—you have to be able to pull the trigger. Not think about it. Not hesitate. Not wait for someone else to do it.”
My chest tightens. I bite the inside of my cheek, hard enough to feel the sting.
His voice softens just slightly. “If that’s something you don’t want…if you’re not ready for that—I can back off.”
I don’t say anything.
He looks at me a moment longer. “But I’ll rest easier knowing you’ll be fine on your own. That if someone corners you, you won’t freeze.”
I cross my arms. “You think I’d freeze?”
“No,” he says quietly. “I think you’d flinch. And in this world, flinching gets you killed.”
It’s not condescending. It’s not a challenge.
It’s fear.
“So let’s go,” he says.
I blink. “We’re starting right now?”
He doesn’t look back as he opens the front door, just says, “Yes,” like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.
Of course it is.
We cross the gravel path behind the main house, the sky still silvered with early light. The range is quiet, tucked just beyond the trees. A row of targets stand like silent judges. Everything’s clean, precise. Konstantin’s kind of place.
He unlocks the weapons cabinet without a word and pulls out a compact Glock, checking the magazine like he’s doing it in his sleep.
The click of the slide snapping forward echoes in the early morning stillness.
He holds it out, grip first. “Go on. Show me.”
I take it from him without a word.
The gun isn’t unfamiliar, but it’s been a while. I walk forward to the mark etched into the concrete with faint black paint. My stance comes back to me easily, my body falling into position like it never forgot. Legs braced. Arms steady. Breath in. Sight aligned.
I fire.
The first shot breaks the quiet. I barely hear it.
Then I fire again. And again.
The pattern settles into something automatic—pull, breathe, squeeze—until the magazine clicks empty and I lower the weapon.
I turn my head. He’s standing with his hands in his coat pockets, watching me. His face doesn’t give anything away, but I know him well enough to read the stillness in his posture.
“Well?” I ask.
“You haven’t lost much,” he says after a beat. “But you’re overcompensating in your shoulders. Your hips are too locked.”
He walks toward me slowly, like he’s still deciding something.
I scoff under my breath. “That’s what you’re going to lead with? I just hit five targets.”
“I know. You did well,” he says, stopping behind me. “But I’m not interested in what you can do standing still, on a calm morning, with nothing on the line.”
His voice drops slightly. “I need to know what you’ll do when it’s your life. Or Mila’s. Or Nikolai’s. That’s a different kind of shot.”
I feel him step in closer—close enough to sense the heat of his body at my back, though he hasn’t touched me yet. Then his hands settle on my hips, deliberate and firm, and he shifts my stance just slightly.
“You’re too rigid here,” he murmurs, guiding my weight differently. “You need to be able to pivot fast. Lean without tipping.”
One hand trails up my arm, adjusting my elbow, anchoring it with a steadiness that’s all control. My skin reacts before my mind does, a quiet ache blooming beneath the surface.
His voice is low and level, but it carries weight. “Tension is fine. You just need to control where it lives. Don’t waste it where it doesn’t serve you.”
I nod, barely, unsure if I’m agreeing with the advice or reacting to the pressure of his hand sliding down my spine before he steps away.
“Again,” he says.
This time, the movement is cleaner—not because I changed much, but because now he’s in my head. Because every correction still lingers on my skin.
I fire.
He watches.
I finish the second magazine and turn to him, chest rising faster than the shot count should justify. “Better?”
He gives a single nod, then takes the gun from me, fingers grazing mine longer than necessary.
“Well,” I say, dusting my palms against my thighs, the sting from recoil still tingling through my fingers. “It obviously helps me take my mind off things.”
Konstantin watches me with that look again, like he’s parsing every corner of my mind while keeping most of his own locked away. It should bother me. It used to. Now it just feels like us—he reads too much; I deflect too often. We meet somewhere in the middle.
“You’re good,” he says simply. His voice is low, certain. “But you will be better. If we keep this up.”
I nod, because I want to. Because I need something to fixate on that isn’t a hospital corridor or a donor list or the number of seconds it takes for Nikolai’s smile to falter when he’s too tired to hold it.
“I’ll hold you to that,” I murmur, not quite smiling.
He steps in, hand lifting slowly—not like he’s reaching for a weapon, not like he’s preparing to lecture.
Just one simple motion as his fingers slide against the side of my face, tucking a wayward strand of hair behind my ear with a gentleness that almost undoes me.
His eyes don’t leave mine, and I don’t flinch away.
His thumb lingers a moment too long at my jaw. “I know this isn’t easy,” he says. “But you’re not alone in this.”
I nod again, throat too tight to speak.
And just like that, it feels like the world narrows to a pause. Like we’re suspended in something warmer, something that’s not survival or heartbreak or blood—
“Konstantin.”
The voice cuts through the stillness. Lev, striding across the lawn.
Konstantin’s jaw tightens. His hand drops. I can see the irritation in the way he turns. “Can’t this wait?”
“I’m afraid not,” Lev says, tone clipped, unreadable.
Konstantin straightens. “What is it?”
Lev glances at me for half a second before answering. “Roman Buryakov is dead.”