Chapter 45
Ayla
Iwake up to his mouth between my thighs and the gray morning still half-dark around us.
After that, the rest of it comes in pieces. Heat. Steam. His hands in my hair under the shower. The quiet drag of bleach through the ends of it while I sit in one of his shirts in the bathroom, still warm and loose-limbed and trying not to smile when I catch sight of the blue he chose.
Blue.
Not purple this time.
Blue for me. Blue for him.
Permanent.
By the time he’s done, the ends of my hair match his again, and something about that should probably feel insane.
It doesn’t.
It feels right.
Like this morning is less about changing me and more about letting the outside of me catch up to something the inside already knows.
I come back into the bedroom, he’s dressed and fastening his belt, and my clothes are laid out across the bed.
I stop.
“A skirt?”
He glances over at me once. “Yeah.”
I look from him to the bed and back again. “I had jeans.”
“A skirt is better.”
I stare at him. “With combat boots?”
His mouth twitches like he already knows where this is going. “Yes. With combat boots.”
“That doesn’t even make sense.”
“It does to me.”
I look down at the outfit again. The skirt. The barely there top. My jacket tossed beside it. The boots waiting on the floor.
“You’re dressing me like this? This is your ideal?”
His mouth curves. “Maybe.”
I snort, “This gives me less ability to fight properly.” But I’m already reaching for the skirt.
By the time I’m dressed, I barely recognize myself at first.
Because I don’t look like the version of me bruised and hunted and still trying to decide whether I should run
I look sharper now. Meaner around the edges. More certain.
Not broken Ayla.
Something else.
Something closer to the woman who could stand beside the Pakhan and not flinch.
My phone buzzes from where I left it on the dresser. I cross the room and pick it up, my chest loosening a little when I see the messages waiting there. Kay. Jace. Ricky. All three of them okay. All three checking in. No panic. No sign Gabriel got to them.
Relief moves through me, my shoulders almost drop with it.
I start typing back when heat presses up behind me.
Maksim’s mouth brushes the side of my neck.
“Who?”
“Kay. Jace. Ricky.” I glance back at him. “They’re okay.”
“Good.”
His hands settle at my hips, heavy and familiar.
I type out one more message, then pause. “Maybe we should send someone.”
His chin drags lightly over my shoulder. “Someone?”
I look up at him in the mirror over the dresser. “One of our men.”
That gets his attention. He hums, something dark and pleased.
“Our men,” he repeats softly.
Heat creeps up my throat.
I try for casual and fail. “You know what I meant.”
His mouth touches the spot below my ear. “Da.”
I tilt my head just enough to look at him. “So?”
He watches me for one beat longer, then nods once.
“I’ll send someone.”
Something in me settles deeper at that. Not because he handled it.
Because he said yes like it was obvious my people matter too.
He steps back and reaches for his jacket.
“Come on,” he says. “Let’s eat.”
I look at him over my shoulder. “And then?”
His gaze drags over me once, slow and unreadable.
“And then,” he says, “tonight, you’re mine.”
***
By the time the bike slows in front of Exile, my heart has already started to pound in my chest.
Tonight is the night.
All day, Maksim drilled the vows into me until they lived under my tongue.
He showed me the cracked crown on his shoulder while I stood between his knees, his fingers warm on my hip, his voice rough as he told me mine would be smaller.
Cleaner. Placed on my shoulder blade where it could belong to him without belonging to the world.
I knew there would be witnesses. I knew there would be a mark. I knew what I was walking into.
And still, when Exile comes into view, I realize I should have understood how big this would be.
The club is lit in red neon, the sign bleeding into the dark, but there’s no line outside. No women in tiny dresses teetering on heels. No men lingering at the curb with cigarettes burning between their fingers. Just black cars and Bratva men posted like sentries.
My stomach drops.
Maksim kills the engine. The silence after the bike feels thick, like the city itself is holding its breath.
He plants both boots, steadying the weight of the machine, then reaches back for me.
I swing off behind him, my boots hitting the pavement, and his hand closes around my waist to keep me steady while the bike leans.
Only when I’m clear does he kick the stand down.
He takes my helmet off and hooks it over the bar. His gaze drags over me, slow, heat crawling up my neck.
“It’s like a party,” I murmur, more to myself than to him.
His mouth curves. “You’re catching up.”
The doors open before we reach them. Vaska stands there waiting, expression carved from stone, but there’s something in his eyes that says he’s been expecting this moment long before I ever saw it coming.
Inside, Exile barely looks like itself.
The music is low, more pulse than song. Amber light glows over the bar, over the gleam of bottles, over the hard faces turned our way the second Maksim walks me in. Conversations cut off. Glasses still. Men step aside without being asked.
Every eye in the room lands on me.
My skin goes tight.
Maksim keeps his hand on my back and guides me through the center of it, through the silence, through the weight of their attention, until we reach the bar. This isn’t a celebration first. It’s witness first. Ritual first. The celebration comes after.
He turns me. His body settles behind mine, close enough that the heat of him presses straight through me. Solid. Immovable. A wall at my back.
I glance across the room. Nobody looks away.
His fingers skim my shoulder, then catch the collar of my jacket and peel it from me in one smooth pull. He drapes it across the bar. Cool air brushes my skin. Thin straps of this ridiculous top are all that remain.
My breath catches.
Of course.
He dressed me for this.
Easy access to my shoulder. Nothing more. The rest of me stays covered. Kept. Hidden from every man here except in the one place he’s chosen to bare.
Possessive bastard.
His fingers slide beneath one strap, then the other, dragging them down my arms just enough to expose the curve of my shoulder blade.
His mouth brushes my ear. “Now you understand.”
“Yes,” I whisper.
His hand settles at my waist.
Vaska steps forward.
“She comes here by choice,” he says, his gaze moving over me before returning to the men. “She stands under the Pakhan’s roof. Under his protection. Under his name. She has bled. She has survived. She has been tested and did not break.”
The words move through the room like smoke. Like something old enough to matter.
Vaska looks at me. “If you take this mark, you take this family with it. Our silence. Our loyalty. Our enemies. You do not betray what shelters you. You do not turn your face from war when it comes for ours.”
I hold his gaze.
“What stands above all?”
My voice comes out steady. “Loyalty.”
“And if blood is called?”
“I do not run.”
Something shifts in the room then. Subtle. Heavy. Acceptance.
Vaska steps back.
Maksim’s hand leaves my waist. Metal clicks softly against wood.
The tattoo gun.
I brace both palms on the bar. My straps hang low on my arms. My shoulder blade is bared in one precise place and nowhere else. The air feels colder there.
Maksim’s hand spreads over my back, large and steady. “Last chance,” he murmurs at my ear, his voice gone low and rough. No mockery in it. No push. Just the weight of a choice already made.
I turn my head enough to look at him. “Do it.”
Something dark flashes across his face. Satisfaction. Hunger. Pride. I don’t know. Maybe all of it.
The machine buzzes to life.
The first bite of the needle is sharp enough to pull the breath out of me. I tighten my grip on the bar. Maksim’s free hand slides to the side of my neck, holding me there while the sound fills the room.
I almost wish I was unconscious again. Almost.
No one speaks. No one moves. The entire club stands in silence while their Pakhan marks me with his own hand.
The crown is small, exactly like he said. Cracked through the center. Precise. Deliberate.
Every drag of the needle burns. A hot, biting scrape that sparks down my spine and settles low in my stomach. Enough to hurt. Enough to matter.
He wipes the skin once. The cold drag makes me shiver.
Then the machine starts again.
A few more lines. A few more passes. A few more seconds of that hot, stinging pull.
Then silence.
My body stays braced even after the buzzing stops, my pulse still caught in it.
Maksim wipes the tattoo again, slower this time. His thumb brushes just beneath it, and I feel that touch everywhere. Then I hear the soft tear of packaging.
I glance back as much as I can. Second skin. Of course he has it ready.
His fingers smooth it carefully over the fresh ink, sealing it down with a tenderness that doesn’t fit the room and somehow makes it hit harder.
He presses the edges flat, his hand warm through the clear film, then slides my straps back up my shoulders himself.
After that, he reaches for my jacket and settles it over me, one side and then the other, like he’s covering something sacred.
When I turn, he’s already looking at me. Not smug. Not smiling.
Dark. Intent. Full of something that sits too deep to name without making it smaller.
Vaska raises his glass first. “To the Pakhan’s queen.”
The room breaks.
Glasses slam against wood. Men shout. Laughter rolls through the bar. Vodka pours. The silence shatters into noise so fast it almost feels violent.
But all I can feel is Maksim.
He catches my jaw, thumb pressing beneath my chin, and his gaze drops to my mouth before climbing back to my eyes.
“Mine,” he says quietly.
Heat floods through me so quickly my knees almost soften. “Yours.”
He laces our fingers together and leads me away from the bar, through the noise, through the cheering men knocking back shots as we pass.
“Don’t kill her before morning,” one shouts.
Maksim doesn’t even slow. “She’ll survive.”
The cold hits the second we step outside.
It catches at the strip of skin above my collar and sinks through the thin fabric over the fresh tattoo until the sting flares bright again.
Maksim turns me toward him before we reach the bike.
One hand cups the side of my neck, careful of my shoulder, his gaze moving over my face like he’s searching for something.
Regret. Fear. Second thoughts.
He won’t find any.
I lift a brow. “That your version of romance?”
His mouth twitches. “No.”
“Good.” I step closer, letting my fingers hook into the front of his jacket. “Was starting to worry you’d gone soft.”
A dark laugh leaves him. His hand slides down to my hip and closes there, dragging me into him until my thighs brush his. His body is all heat and leather and control.
“You’re getting mouthy,” he murmurs.
“Maybe.”
His eyes drop to my lips.
For one breath, I think he’s going to kiss me right there with the club still glowing behind us and half the Bratva only a door away.
Instead, he leans in close, his mouth brushing my ear.
“Get on the bike.”
The words slide through me hot enough to make me shiver. He pulls back, his hand still locked on my hip.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
His smile turns slow and cruel.
“The woods.”