Chapter 4
NIKOLAI
Ilie still, holding her close, and listen to her breathe.
Slow. Uneven. Post-storm quiet and the sheets a mess.
I didn't plan this. But I don't plan most good things.
She shifts closer without thinking, her knee grazing my thigh. I can feel her heartbeat. Quick but steady.
Virgin.
Hadn't seen that coming.
She breathes again, deeper. I look down. Her cheek on my shoulder, golden hair everywhere. She smells like champagne and sex and something softer underneath, something that makes me want to press my face into her neck and stay there, which is a thought I'm going to strangle before it grows legs.
"Don't overthink it," she murmurs, a smile dragging at the corner of her mouth.
"I'm not," I lie.
"Liar," she smiles wider.
“I’m trying to understand how a woman who looks like you is a virgin at twenty-six.”
“It’s very complicated.”
I don’t care. I shouldn’t care.
But I took her virginity. That makes her mine. Those are the rules.
“Your birthday…why are you alone?”
“Because I don’t have any friends.”
“Why?”
She sighs. “It’s complicated.”
She’s got secrets. So do I.
“Happy birthday.”
"Thanks. I think that... counted as a present."
"Did it?" I huff out a laugh.
"Mhm."
I look at her mouth and feel the tug to taste it again. Not because I can. Because I want to. I ignore the instinct. I'm good at ignoring instincts that could ruin me. Usually.
She rolls onto her back and stares at the ceiling like answers are written in the paint if you squint.
"My mother is... protective."
I listen. It's one of the few things I'm actually good at.
"She doesn't let me out much. No, actually," she turns to her side, "that's the understatement of the century.
No boyfriends. No friends, really. All I had were lots of rules and four walls I had to stay within.
" A shrug, like she's trying to make it smaller than it is.
"But it wasn't all bad. I read a lot. I swam. "
She trails off. Then: "I always had guards watching my back. Mother knows where I am every minute of every day. But tonight, I snuck out."
My spine stiffens. Warning bells. The kind I've learned to trust over the kind that keep me warm.
"Why? She doesn't let you out at all?"
"She says it's for my protection. That the world is dangerous." Elle shrugs, her shoulder a pale curve in the half-light.
I study her face. No tells. No twitches. No rehearsed pauses or sideways glances. Either she's the best liar I've ever met, or she's telling the truth.
I'm betting on the latter. And I don't like what that means.
"And tonight you decided what, exactly?"
"That I needed an adventure of my own or I was going to explode." She looks at me, her green eyes bright even in the half-dark.
“Who are you?”
“Elle.”
I roll to my side and look down at her. My instincts are telling me something is very wrong.
“Don’t fucking lie to me.”
She flinches. “What’s wrong?”
“Who are you?”
“Raphaella. Elle. I’m nobody.”
“Why are you confined to that building?”
“I told you—my mother.”
“Why?”
She reaches up and touches my cheek. I don’t pull away. I stare into her eyes and search for the lie.
She’s truly innocent. How in the hell does that happen?
"Does it bother you? That I was a virgin."
My suspicion wanes. I flop back down.
"It bothers me that you had to ask." The answer is out before I decide to give it. She just stares. "No," I add, quieter. "It doesn't bother me."
Something passes between us. Something I don't have a name for and don't plan to find one.
“Are you my new guard?”
“Why would you think that?”
“You were in the building. Do you know Jeffrey?”
This is tricky. I don’t know Jeffrey. I can’t tell her why I was in the building. Telling her I was doing a little recon would prompt a conversation I wasn’t interested in having with a woman I knew nothing about. The intel I had missed the fact a young woman was living in the penthouse.
The door explodes inward.
Three armed men. No knock. No announcement. They walk in like this is their turf, and the lead one has a Glock leveled at my chest before the door finishes swinging.
I'm not wearing a goddamn thing but a sheet.
I shift in front of Elle before I've even decided to. Instinct. The kind that comes from years of protecting things I can't afford to lose.
Elle, to my absolute shock, starts laughing. She actually laughs. Sits up, sheet clutched to her chest, eyes wide and weirdly friendly.
Who the hell is this girl?
"Really, Jeffrey?" she says to the largest man. "You couldn't have knocked?"
The man doesn't take his eyes off me. "Get dressed, Elle. Now."
"I'm sorry," she says, still smiling like armed intrusions are a normal thing. "I know you're mad."
Christ. She knows them. These are the men who watch her. The guards she mentioned.
"Mad doesn't begin to cover it." The older guy she’s been directing her words at has a steel voice."Gayle is going to kill all of us."
Everything inside me goes cold and organized. I'm not used to being on the wrong side of a breach. I don't like the angle, the light, the smell of other men's decisions in my air. I quickly assess the situation. One exit. Knowing Elle is in no danger removes that from the equation.
But I’m not safe.
I’m the target.
My gun is in my coat jacket, the one I threw by the door. My pants are on the floor. I make a move to grab them, but Jeffrey's weapon tracks me like a shadow.
"Get dressed," he orders. "Now."
Elle's voice breaks. "Please, Nik. Just do what he says."
I don't take orders well. Never have. But three guns against no guns is arithmetic, not bravery.
I grab my underwear from the floor and pull them on. Slow. Compliant. Cataloging.
Three men. Lead has a Glock, trained center mass. Second has what looks like a Sig, held too high. Third is closest to the door, hand on his weapon but not drawn. The coats they're wearing are tailored, not tactical.
Jeffrey's jaw is set. "Both of you, get dressed. You're coming with us."
Elle's laughter is gone now. "Jeffrey, wait. I'll come with you, but..."
"Quiet," he snaps.
I catch Elle's eye. Wide. Terrified. Whatever game this was, it just stopped being funny.
"He doesn't have anything to do with this," she says quickly. "He's just a guy I met at the club."
"A guy." Jeffrey narrows his eyes at me. "Sure."
"Both of you," the second guard says, "clothes. Now."
I bend for my pants. Nothing threatening. Just a man getting dressed, hands where everyone can see them.
"Don't try anything stupid," Jeffrey warns.
I pull on my pants. Stand slowly. "Wouldn't dream of it."
Jeffrey's weapon stays on me.
Elle clutches the sheet to her chest, eyes darting between me and the men. "Jeffrey, please. This is insane. I just wanted one night."
"Your mother has the entire NYPD looking for you," he cuts in. "And you're in a hotel room with him."
"Let's go." The third guard gestures with his weapon.
I meet Elle's eyes one more time. She's silently begging me not to do what I'm about to do.
Sorry, sweetheart.
I move for my shirt. Hands visible. Pace slow.
"That's far enough," Jeffrey barks.
I stop. Raise my hands slightly. "Just getting dressed. Like you asked."
He nods, weapon still trained. I take one step forward, reaching for the shirt on the chair.
Then I pivot.
Throat first. My fist catches Jeffrey under the jaw and his head snaps back. The second guard gets my elbow across the bridge of his nose. Bone crunches. I'm already moving toward the third when the first shot splits the air.
Elle screams.
I duck, roll, come up behind the bed. The bullet buries itself in the wall where my chest was half a second ago.
"Stop!" Elle shouts. "Jeffrey, don't! Nik, please!"
I vault over the bed, driving my shoulder into the third guard's stomach. His gun skitters across the floor. Jeffrey yells something. Blood pounding in my ears drowns it out.
I grab the fallen weapon. Chamber a round. Turn.
Something hard connects with the back of my skull.
The room tilts. My knees forget how to lock.
Elle's voice, frantic and far away: "Don't hurt him!"
Another blow.
Amateurs.
Darkness rushes in, cold and absolute.