Chapter 13
Acold hand covers my mouth, waking me from a dead sleep. My eyes fly open, and I swing my arm across my body, hoping to catch whoever it is in the face with my fist.
I completely miss and end up being shoved into my pillow.
“It’s okay; it’s all right.” Lev’s face, barely visible in my darkened room, appears above me. “It’s me.”
“What are you doing?” I demand, my words getting lost in his palm.
“I need you to stay quiet, can you do that?” Is he insane? He’s in my room in the middle of the night suffocating me.
I nod, because that’s what you do when someone asks you such as stupid question. It’s not like I can tell him that I’m planning on kicking his ass as soon as he lets me go, he’d never let me go.
“I’m serious, Max. You have to stay quiet.” There’s a seriousness to his command that’s different than his usual Neanderthal bossiness.
Deciding it might be okay to go along with him, just this once, I nod again, this time sincere in my answer.
He peels his hand off my mouth and sits on the bed beside me.
“What’s going on?” I whisper as I sit up.
“You’re not safe here.”
“Why? What’s happened?”
The bed bounces a little when he gets up, reminding me of how large this man really is.
Did I actually think I’d be able to get up and kick his ass?
He’s made from concrete and marble. Or maybe just one of the two.
I’m not exactly sure, but it’s the middle of the night so I can’t be blamed for my rambling thoughts.
With one finger, he pushes open the thin slats of my blinds, peering out. I’d had them opened when I went to sleep earlier. After he’d left, I opened the blinds and the window to let in fresh air. I like a crisp air when I sleep.
“Did you close those?” I push the blankets off me and swing off the bed.
“I did. Stay there.” He points to me while still looking through the small opening he’s created in the blinds.
Marion stretches out from her spot on the pillow beside me. She jumps down onto the floor and stalks over to Lev, sitting next to his foot.
Unbelievable. This cat has lost all loyalty.
“Lev, tell me what’s going on. It’s one in the morning. Why are you in my apartment? How did you even get into my apartment?” I move to my feet.
He lets the blinds snap back into place, then turns to me. Now that my eyes have adjusted to the dark, I can see the concern pulling at his brow.
“What’s happened? Is it the boys?”
“Your brothers are fine.” He sounds like he wishes it were otherwise, though.
He goes to my closet, pushing open the folding doors. Finding the carry-on suitcase I have stashed there, he pulls it out and tosses it on my bed.
“Do you have any other bags?” He opens the suitcase on the bed.
“Why?”
“You need to pack your things. You can’t stay here.”
“Like hell I can’t stay here.” I push the suitcase closed.
“Maxine.”
“You can’t barge in here in the middle of the night, wake me up like some stalker, and not tell me what’s going on.”
A softened light appears in his hand, it’s his phone. After a few swipes, he turns the screen toward me.
I lean closer to him, blinking a few times to be sure my vision is clear. A man stands in a window, looking across the street. Nothing odd about that.
“It’s just a guy in a window,” I say.
“No. That is a man standing in a window directly across the street from this window, looking into your window.” He shoves it closer to my face. “Do you see how he’s dressed? All in black, leather gloves?” He swipes the screen to a new photo. “With binoculars and a rifle strapped to his chest.”
He zooms in for me, to show the man more clearly.
I swallow. My throat coats with dust, and a lump the size of a pool ball seizes halfway down. “How’d you get those photos?”
“Stephan took them. He’s downstairs.” A notification pops up on the screen while I’m still staring at the photograph.
A text telling him the building is clear and the one across the street is, too.
“What does that mean?”
He reaches over to the nightstand and flicks on the small lamp. The light hits his face, and the fierceness strikes me. There’s no casualness to his features; he’s a man on a mission.
“It means someone who can get a clear view into that window was watching you.” He reopens the bag. “Now, pack your things.”
“Wait.” I slide past him to the window and shove open the slats. “So, someone from over there?”
The lump swells to the size of a grapefruit.
“So, someone over there could see into my room. Where you…oh god, where you…oh no.” I let go of the blinds and push myself against the wall. “Did they see what you did?”
A small tug of his lips tells me he knows exactly what I’m talking about. And I was really hoping we wouldn’t have to re-visit the activities that took place in this room at least for half a lifetime.
It was the last thing I thought of as I drifted off to sleep. His hands on me, his mouth. His tongue. What if someone had seen, had been watching?
“I assume if they were there at the time, then yes, they saw.” He grabs a handful of hangers from the closet and brings the clothes to the open suitcase, completely unfazed by the fact someone could have watched what we’d done.
“You assume they saw, but you don’t care?”
“When we catch them, I’ll find out. Right before I rip their eyes out for watching you to begin with,” he points out as he grabs the last three hangers from my closet and tosses the shirts into the bag in a mess.
“Stop.” I grab his wrist. “You’re making a mess of my clothes.”
“Then stop arguing with me and pack. I’ll get you another bag.” He storms from the bedroom, merely pointing at Marion when she follows him and telling her to stay put.
And the damn cat does.
“You know, you make me look bad when you follow his orders so fast,” I tell her.
Of course she doesn’t seem to care, she’s too busy climbing back onto the bed and curling up in a furry ball.
Five minutes later, Lev walks back into my room carrying two duffel bags and tosses them on the bed.
“I’ll pack that drawer!” I stop him when he reaches for the top drawer of the small dresser.
He may have had his tongue on me, giving me the world’s most intense orgasm, but he’s not packing my panties and bras. Or any of the other items I have in that drawer.
“What else do you need to bring?”
“Since I don’t know where I’m going or how long I’ll be there, I can’t answer that.” I put my hands on my hips and blow out a breath. “I guess I could see if Vee wouldn’t mind letting me use her apartment.”
“No.” He shakes his head.
“You’re right, it’s the same building, just next door. Maybe I can stay with her. Ivan might not like it, but—”
“No.”
“You can’t keep saying no.”
“You’re staying with me.”
“No.” I shake my head immediately. “Absolutely not.”
“It wasn’t a suggestion.” He lowers his chin.
“There has to be another choice.”
“There isn’t.”
“You don’t know that. I could have other friends to stay with.”
“And put them in danger?”
That gives me pause. First, I don’t have any other friends who I’m close enough with that I could beg for a spot on their couch for a few days. Second, even if I did, I don’t want to bring whatever danger this is to their doorstep.
“How long?”
“Until I know it’s safe for you to return home.”
I sink my hands into my hair and sit on the edge of my bed. “Are the boys safe? Have you found out where my brothers are?”
“They’ve left town. I’m still working on finding out where they went and why, but they’re not here.” The bed dips, and he sits next to me, putting his hand on my knee. “Staying with me is the safest place for you.”
I close my eyes. It’s not like it’s the first time I’ve been told to pack up and leave. More than five times since my mother died, I was moved through the foster care system. Sometimes I was given a day’s notice, but usually it was only a matter of hours.
I’m twenty-four-years old. I live on my own, I have a job. I pay my rent on time, and the rest of my bills. This shouldn’t still be happening.
“Max?” His voice softens. It only makes it worse, his pity.
“I’m fine.” I shove his hand off my knee and bound up to my feet. “I’ll finish packing and change. What about Marion? I won’t leave her behind.”
He stares at me for a moment, studying me as though if he looks hard enough he’ll be able to read some magical instruction manual on how to deal with me.
“She’s coming with. Do you have a carrier for her?”
“Yeah. In the front closet. She hates it, though.”
“I’ll get her in.” He stands up, scooping her off the bed as he does. She mewls at the annoyance of being manhandled. “Shush.”
I’m left alone to finish putting my life into duffle bags while the mafia man tucks my man-hating cat into her carrier.
“Ready?” Lev stands in the doorway five minutes later.
“Yeah.” I zip up the bag. All of my drawers have been emptied. “I only needed one of the duffels.”
He nods, grabbing the small suitcase and the duffel from the bed. One of his men from Nicolette’s party is there waiting and he hands off the bags to him. A strong scent of curry washes into the room.
Lev says something to him in Russian, and he hurries off.
“We need to go,” he says to me, gesturing toward the open door.
When I step into the living room there are two more men. “You didn’t need to bring an army with you.”
“I brought who I needed. Now let’s go.” He gestures to the carrier and one of his men picks up Marion, who howls the moment she’s jostled.
“I can carry her.”
“Dominik has it. You follow behind me.” Lev grabs hold of my hand and pulls me into the hall.
It’s quiet as we move down the hall to the stairs. These hulking men move like ninjas; it’s unsettling.
When we get to the entrance way, the curry-scented man takes the lead. Pushing through the small area, he opens the exterior door. We follow him, then Dominick behind me and another man behind him.
“I don’t see why we need so many of us—” My complaint about our little army cuts off when a bullet buzzes past, striking the car closest to us.
“Fuck. Get down.” Lev covers me with his body, curling around me like a lumpy blanket.
I’m crouched down.
“Where?” He calls over to his men.
“From across the street. I have it.” The third man returns fire. The loud pop of his weapon echoes in my ears.
“Stay low. The car’s right there.” Lev points to the SUV idling two cars down. “Ready?”
“Yeah.” I look behind me. “Marion.”
“She’s fine. Just stay low.” Lev unravels himself from me only enough so I can move freely, but he keeps his body blocking me from the second round of shots fired at us.
It’s loud this time. Like a firecracker going off, and then another and another. Dominik curses from behind us. Marion’s carrier sits beside him while he gets down on one knee, taking aim at a target across the street.
“What’s happening?” I scream as a chunk of the curb flies up at me. Concrete strikes my neck, throwing me back into Lev.
“Get in the car!” He yells, yanking open the back door of the SUV.
He lifts me up into the seat. Another shot hits the sidewalk. Marion yowls from her carrier. Dominik is still focused on the where the shots are coming from.
“Marion!” I try to climb out of the car to get her, but Lev pushes me back into my seat.
“No. Stay here.”
“I can’t leave her!” Again I shove against him, but he’s immovable. His jaw tenses.
He points a long finger at me. “Stay here.”
Ducking down, he scrambles back toward Dominik, grabbing Marion’s carrier just as another bullet strikes. My heart stops.
If he hadn’t grabbed her, the bullet would have hit her. He must notice it too, because he freezes for a breath. His body goes rigid, and he barks orders in Russian to his men.
Dominik runs across the street while Lev returns to the car. His expression is hard.
I grab the carrier the moment it’s within reach. Marion continues to howl as Lev slams my door and climbs into the driver’s seat.
“Get down, Max. Stay down.” He orders as he quickly maneuvers out of the parking space and peels into the street.
I’m on the floor, between the seats, sticking my fingers through the grate of Marion’s crate.
He saved her. That bullet could have easily hit him, too.
Eyes as large as saucers peer at me through the thin metal bars. She nudges closer to me, licking my fingertips.
“It’s okay, sweetie. We’re safe. Lev will keep us safe,” I whisper to her.
The car swerves, and I slide, hitting the seat.
“It’s okay now. You can get up,” Lev says. “Put your belt on.”
I manage to climb up into the seat and strap in. Resting my head against the window, I try to look behind us in the rearview mirror. No one’s behind us.
“Dominick? And the other two guys?”
“They’ll meet us.”
“Are they all right?”
“They’re fine.”
At a red light, he leans to the side, grabbing his phone from his back pocket. A tense, short conversation in Russian takes place. His accent gets so thick when he’s taking in his native language, I can’t tell if he’s angry or simply being himself.
“That was Dominik. They’re all fine, like I said.”
“Why where those guys shooting at you?”
His eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror. “They weren’t shooting at me, Max. They were shooting at you.”