Chapter 15 Aleksei
ALEKSEI
Fuck.
The elevator doors part and she’s gone in a blur—bolting down the hall, hair wild, the flush still high on her cheeks. I call after her, but she doesn’t stop, doesn’t even look back.
My heart’s hammering so hard I can feel it in my teeth. I run a hand through my hair, still tasting her on my lips, still feeling the imprint of her legs around my waist, and the desperate heat of her mouth.
A uniformed technician rushes up, tools jangling, eyes wide with apology. “I’m so sorry, sir. There was a—uh—power glitch in the system. Won’t happen again, I swear—”
Any other time I’d have fired him on the spot, torn into him for the screwup, but I barely hear him. My thoughts are a mess, adrenaline burning through me, and all I can think about is the way Zatanna looked at me right before she ran.
I brush past the technician, ignoring his stammered apologies. I need air, space, distance—anything to get control again.
But as I walk away, all I want is to pull her back into my arms and never let her go.
Fuck.
I step into the lobby, trying to slow my breathing. The building feels louder down here. People moving through the marble hall, phones ringing, footsteps echoing. Normal life. Meanwhile I feel like I’ve just walked out of a fire.
The right thing to do would be simple.
Fire her.
Bring someone else in to handle the bride search. Someone neutral. Someone who doesn’t make my brain stop working every time she walks into a room. Someone who doesn’t kiss me like the world is ending.
I drag a hand down my face.
Why the hell am I this affected by her?
I barely know her. A week ago, she was just another résumé in a stack of applicants. Now one kiss has me acting like a reckless teenager.
My phone buzzes in my hand.
I answer without looking, still distracted, still watching the revolving doors spin people in and out of the building. “Yes?”
A soft voice slides through the line. “Well. You sound tense.”
I stop walking.
Alena.
My jaw tightens immediately. I hadn’t even looked at the screen. If I had, I might not have answered at all. “What do you want?”
She laughs lightly. “Straight to the point. I missed that about you.”
“I didn’t.”
She ignores that. “I hear congratulations are in order.”
“For what?”
“For your sudden interest in marriage,” she says smoothly. “You? Looking for a wife. The whole city is whispering about it.”
Cold spreads through my chest. “How did you hear that?”
“Alena always hears things,” she says, amused. “Especially when certain people would love to see you fail.”
My mind goes straight to one person.
My father.
I wouldn’t put it past him for a second.
“You’re calling because?” I ask.
“Because,” she says, her voice turning thoughtful, “I wondered if you’d finally realized you made a mistake letting me go.”
I almost laugh. “Not even a little.”
There’s a pause on the line.
Then she sighs. “Such confidence. I suppose we’ll see how well that works out for you, Aleksei.”
The line clicks dead.
I stare at the phone for a moment, my jaw tight.
I should go home. I should clear my head. I should put distance between myself and the actual woman who’s already too deep beneath my skin. Instead, my feet carry me down the block in the same direction she ran.
I tell myself it’s coincidence at first—habit, convenience, whatever lie helps me ignore the truth. But the truth is simple and absolute:
I’m following her.
I see her before she sees me. She’s at the bus stop, arms wrapped around herself against the wind, eyes fixed on the road like she’s holding herself together by sheer force of will. She looks small, fragile. Human in a way I haven’t let myself be in years.
Something tightens in my chest. Something territorial. Something dangerous.
I stay half a block back, leaning against a streetlamp, hands in my pockets. I watch her breath fog in the air. I watch her adjust the strap of her bag. I watch her tuck her hair behind her ear the way she always does when she’s anxious.
I shouldn’t know her tells already.
I shouldn’t even want to know them.
But I do.
The bus arrives with a loud hiss of brakes and a cloud of exhaust. Zatanna steps on, shoulders drawn in, head down as if she’s trying to make herself invisible. She has no idea how brightly she burns.
The doors close, and the bus pulls away.
I wait a few seconds, then turn in the opposite direction, heading for the parking garage. No one looks twice at me—just another man leaving work late. But inside, everything in me hums with restless purpose.
I shouldn’t do this.
But I’m already unlocking my car.
I shouldn’t follow her home.
The engine turns over, smooth and quiet.
I shouldn’t want to know where she sleeps, who she lives with, whether she’s safe.
I pull out of the garage and merge into traffic.
But I do.
I stay several cars back from the bus, far enough not to draw attention, close enough to keep her in sight. Every time it stops, my pulse kicks, and every time she doesn’t get off, something in me loosens.
She has no idea I’m behind her.
She has no idea she’s become an obsession.
Then—something prickles at the back of my neck.
A presence. A shadow.
I glance at my side mirror.
A black sedan has merged into the same lane, two cars behind me. No headlights. No attempt to pass. No deviation in speed.
My jaw tightens. I switch lanes casually.
So does the sedan.
I take the next exit ramp.
It does too.
A cold thread winds through my spine—not fear, but recognition.
Someone is tailing me.
I test the theory.
I change lanes. Slow slightly. Speed up. Take the next turn.
It follows.
My jaw flexes.
I've been followed before. Surveillance. Rivals. Enemies. People who want the Vasiliev name gone. But tonight, with her on that bus, something in the equation feels different.
I don’t know where Zatanna will step into the night.
But I know one thing with absolute certainty:
Whoever is in that sedan won’t get anywhere near her.
The dark sedan is still there. Two cars back. Patient. Matching every move I make.
Not coincidence.
I shift gears and press the accelerator. My car slips out of the line of traffic, sliding past the bus in the next lane. As I overtake it, I glance sideways through the windows.
There.
Zatanna sits halfway down the aisle, head turned toward the glass, staring out into the city. Her shoulders are slumped. She looks small, lost in thought, the earlier fire gone from her face.
Sad. She’s sad.
Something twists in my chest.
I can’t let this reach her.
I push the car harder, racing ahead of the bus, leaving it safely behind in traffic. Once I’m a full block ahead, I make a sharp turn onto a side street.
The sedan follows. I breathe out a sigh of relief.
Now it’s just me and them.
The street opens into a darker industrial stretch, warehouses and shuttered storefronts lining the road. Fewer cars. Less light.
Perfect. My pulse steadies. I slow slightly, giving them confidence.
The sedan closes the distance.
And then I see it.
A glint in the passenger window. The flash comes a split second later.
BANG.
The shot cracks through the night, the sound exploding against the buildings. My instincts take over. I jerk the wheel, swerving hard as something smashes into the rear quarter panel.
Another shot rings out.
Glass splinters somewhere behind me.
“Idiots,” I mutter, adrenaline flooding my veins.
They picked the wrong man to chase.
I slam the accelerator to the floor. The engine roars as the car launches forward, tires screaming against the asphalt. In the mirror, the sedan barrels after me, headlights cutting through the dark.
Another muzzle flash. Another shot.
I veer sharply around a corner, forcing them to overshoot, then cut the wheel again, threading through the empty street with practiced precision. Years of running dangerous routes through darker cities kick in without thought.
They’re trying to box me in.
Not happening.
I blow through an intersection just as the light flips red, horns screaming behind me as I shoot across the cross traffic. The sedan barely makes it through, skidding sideways to stay on my tail.
Good, keep chasing.
Keep your attention on me.
Another flash from their window.
BANG.
The bullet punches through my rear window, glass exploding inward. I duck instinctively, wrenching the wheel left and sliding around the corner onto a narrower street.
My tires scream across the pavement.
They follow.
“Stubborn bastards,” I mutter, shifting gears and gunning the engine again.
I know these streets better than they do. Years of running shipments through the city and avoiding cops and rival crews, taught me every shortcut and choke point in Manhattan.
I accelerate down a long stretch, letting them think they’re gaining. Then I slam the brakes and whip the car sideways into a tight alley barely wider than the vehicle.
Their sedan overshoots the entrance by ten feet before correcting.
Too slow.
I shoot through the alley, clipping garbage cans and sending them scattering like bowling pins. The alley spits me out onto the next avenue. I cut hard right, merge into traffic, and disappear into a cluster of taxis.
For three seconds I think I’ve lost them.
Then the sedan bursts through the intersection behind me, nearly clipping a delivery truck.
Fuck, they’re persistent.
I pull onto the elevated roadway that runs along the river. Fewer cars here. Long stretches of open asphalt.
It’s a bad place for them to try shooting again.
Or a good place for me to end it.
The sedan closes the distance again.
I can see the driver now—a shaved head, eyes fixed forward. The passenger leans halfway out the window, gun raised.
Another shot.
The bullet ricochets off the guardrail beside me.
Enough.
I drop a gear and slam the accelerator to the floor. My car surges forward, then I jerk the wheel sharply and brake.
They’re too close to react.
Their sedan swerves violently to avoid rear-ending me. Tires lose traction.
The car fishtails.
For a moment it looks like they’ll recover.
Then they slam sideways into the guardrail with a violent crunch of metal.
The sound echoes across the empty roadway.
I don’t stop.
I keep driving another block before pulling into a dark service road and killing the headlights. My pulse is steady now, the adrenaline fading into cold calculation.
They’ll crawl out of that wreck if they’re lucky. And if they’re smart, they’ll disappear before I circle back.
Because whoever sent them just made a serious mistake.
I pull my phone from the console and dial a number from memory. It rings once.
“Ilya,” I say calmly when he answers.
“What happened?” he asks immediately.
“Someone just tried to kill me.”
A pause. Then his voice drops into the same dangerous register mine has. “Who?”
I stare back toward the roadway where the wrecked sedan sits smoking in the distance. “That,” I say, “is exactly what we’re about to find out.”
But even as the anger burns through me, another thought cuts through the haze.
Zatanna.
The engine ticks as it cools, the night settling heavy around the car. The wrecked sedan sits crooked against the guardrail a block back, one headlight flickering like it’s dying slowly.
I should leave.
Every instinct I have says the same thing. Move. Don’t stay in one place. Don’t wait for whoever sent them to realize their mistake and send more.
But instead, I’m sitting here with my phone in my hand.
Zatanna’s name on the screen.
I stare at it for a second, annoyed with myself. What the hell am I doing?
She should be home by now. Safe in her tiny apartment somewhere in this city, far away from whatever mess just tried to take my head off.
The last thing she needs is a call from me right now.
If anything, I should be driving in the opposite direction, disappearing until I figure out who sent those idiots.
Calling her makes no sense.
Yet before I can talk myself out of it, my thumb presses the call button.
The phone rings.
Once. Twice. Three times.
I almost hang up. Then—
“Hello?” Her voice is cautious, a little breathless like I caught her off guard.
Fuck. I stay quiet for a second, suddenly realizing she has no idea who this is.
“…Hello?” she says again.
“It’s me,” I say finally.
There’s a beat of silence.
Then recognition settles in her tone. “…Mr. Vasiliev?”
I lean back in the seat, eyes on the empty road ahead of me. “You’re home,” I say. It comes out more like a statement than a question.
“Yes,” she says slowly. “Why?”
Relief slips into my chest before I can stop it. Good. She’s home.
“You called me,” she adds carefully.
“I need you to do something.”
There’s a quiet laugh on the other end of the line. “Of course you do.”
“I want my first date scheduled within the next twenty-four hours.”
Silence.
Then she says, very calmly, “You’re joking.”
“I’m not.”
“Mr. Vasiliev,” she says, “its past my shift time.”
“I don’t care.”
“That’s not how scheduling works.”
“It is tonight.”
I hear movement on her end, like she’s pacing around her apartment now.
“You kissed me in an elevator two hours ago,” she says carefully, “and now you’re calling me to arrange a date with another woman.”
For a moment I’m genuinely caught off guard. I hadn’t expected her to bring that up so directly. Most people would pretend it never happened.
Zatanna, apparently, is not most people.
My grip tightens slightly on the phone. “Correct.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
“Can you do it?”
She exhales slowly. “You realize the normal response after a moment like that is not… administrative scheduling.”
“I don’t believe in normal responses.”
“That much is clear.”
Despite everything, the corner of my mouth lifts. “So,” I say, “can you do it?”
Another pause.
Then she sighs. “Yes.”
“Good.”
“But if this woman turns out to be awful,” she says, “that’s on you.”
“I’ll take that risk.”
She’s quiet for a moment. Then, softer now, she asks, “Why the rush?”
Because someone just tried to kill me.
Because the longer I let myself think about you, the harder this entire plan becomes.
But I don’t say any of that.
“I don’t have time,” I tell her.
Another long pause stretches between us.
“…Fine,” she says at last. “I’ll set it up.”
“Twenty-four hours.”
“You’re very bossy for someone calling me in the middle of the night.”
“Goodnight, Zatanna.”
She lets out a quiet breath.
“…Goodnight, Mr. Vasiliev.”
The line goes dead.
I lower the phone slowly, staring at the dark road ahead.
Then I start the engine.
Because the longer I sit here thinking about her voice, the more dangerous tonight becomes—for both of us.