Chapter 14
fourteen
We land nine hours later at the small SeaTac airstrip where my hangar is located. I barely sleep the entire flight as Andrei and I work on getting to know one another.
In one word, it is surreal. Tomas filled the void Kirill left within me as a child, and I never wanted another father. To have the chance at getting to know the father that would have loved and kept me if he could have shifts something inside of me.
Something I’m not quite ready to name.
Maksim and Nikolai await me as I step off the plane and back onto the blessed terra firma of the city I call home. The two men greet me with wide, bright smiles and firm hugs. None of us has ever been separated from each other for longer than a week at a time. Five weeks is nearly unacceptable.
“Your woman is causing quite the stir.” Nikolai smirks at me. “And she’s learned a few things since you’ve been gone.”
Vas has been keeping me apprised of Ava’s every move. Not that I would interfere, but I did have him caution her a few times on her actions.
It hasn’t worked.
“I’d honestly wear a bulletproof vest when you decide to tell her you’re still alive,” Maksim jokes. “On second thought, maybe something to protect your legs. She’s got a thing for shooting out kneecaps.”
Andrei laughs boisterously behind me. “I like her already.” He claps me on the shoulder. “And you said she was sweet and na?ve.”
“She was,” I mutter.
Nikolai smirks. “Then this idiot went and made a fool of her. On top of that, he faked his death.”
“Nothing worse than a woman scorned.”
“Where is she now?” I slide into the backseat of the G-Wagon.
“In Portland with Vas and her father,” Maksim reports. “Looks like O’Malley’s niece stole some evidence from lockup for her on her mother’s case.”
I wish I could have been there for her.
“How did O’Malley get Kavanaugh to agree to a sit down?” It is well known the two Irish families have a long, blood-filled history with one another.
“O’Malley threatened to withhold the evidence pertaining to Ava’s mother if he didn’t agree.”
“And no one is dead?”
Nikolai laughs.
“According to Vas, everything is groovy.” Nicolai pitches his tone at the last word. It makes him sound like a blonde-haired surfer boy named Crash who smokes pot. Or Shaggy from Scooby-Doo.
“Get me something more than groovy,” I tell him, mimicking his tone. Andrei smirks at me and for the briefest of moments I wonder how he sees me.
Will he think I’m a good leader?
Will he accept how I run my organization?
Part of me feels like a teenager again, begging for approval. I want my biological father to be proud of what I’ve built.
“Where to, boss?” Maksim asks as he pulls through the gate and onto the main thoroughfare.
“Let’s regroup at the penthouse and head out from there,” I tell him. “Let Damon know to have the helicopter fueled and ready to go in two hours.”
Maksim nods.
Sitting back into my seat, I sigh. It is good to be home.
“So,” Dima breaks the peaceful tranquility that settles over us. “Who’s gonna tell Ava about Kenzi being a badass ninja and you miraculously being raised from the dead? Cuz,” he taps his finger to his nose. “Not it.”
The whole car—save for Andrei—follows suit with a chorus of ‘not it’ ringing through the small space.
Fucking children.
My biological father laughs heartily before shrugging and sticking his finger to his nose.
“Not it.”
The whole car breaks into a fit of laughter.
Yes—it is certainly good to be home.
“Your woman has a thing for kneecaps,” Vas groans into the phone. “She’s obsessed with them.”
I chuckle. Apparently my sweet defiant wife has turned into a bit of a psycho. I would be lying if I didn’t admit it turns me on.
A lot.
“Doesn’t surprise me.” The noise of the helicopter is nothing but a dim sound in the background with the headset on. “Look who she lived with for half her life.”
“Kenzi is a bit of a psycho herself,” Dima grunts next to me. Kenzi slaps him across the head, and he grins. “Just saying.” He shrugs.
“What’s our next play?” I ask him.
“About that…” Vas trails off. “We can’t target Cartwright yet, but we’re working on it. Your wife has a business date tonight and she fired me, but otherwise we’re doing pretty good. The entire restaurant will be filled with—”
“Did you say date?” I interrupt him. “Why the fuck is she going on a date?”
“It’s not a date, date,” Vas explains. “She’s meeting with Joseph O’Neill’s son, Conrad, to discuss merging our assets.”
“Conrad O’Neill is a narcissistic abuser,” I growl, the corner of my lips turning up in a snarl. “Why the fuck are we talking about merging our assets?”
“We aren’t really going to merge our assets.” Vas’s eye roll is audible. It doesn’t take a genius to realize he’s irritated that I’m not catching on quick enough for him. “We need him to believe that so he would go to dinner with her.”
“The only person she should be going to dinner with is me.”
“Well… you’re dead,” Vas deadpans.
“If he lays one fucking hand on her…”
Vas chuckles. “She’ll go straight for his kneecaps, trust me.”
“Vasily…” I warn.
My brother sighs. “We needed a way to get to him and dangling her out there was the only way to get him to bite,” he tries to assure me. “She can handle herself and she has been for more than a month now.”
Sighing, I pinch the bridge of my nose and blow out a breath. “I know.”
“Plus, I’m a little hurt that her date was what you focused on first,” he sounds affronted. “I tell you she fired me, and you don’t have one ounce of pity for your best friend.”
“She didn’t actually fire you,” I point out.
“Well, she sure as hell thinks she did,” Vas grumbles. “All because I won’t tell her where Dima is. Something about trust. Okay, maybe there are a few other reasons, but still. I’ve never been fired before.”
“I heard McDonald’s is offering a fairly competitive wage,” Dima crows. “You’d look so cute in that uniform. Maybe even Wendy’s. We could dye your hair and give you pigtails.”
“Hm, I could also smash your face in and make you look like that man from the Goonies.”
“Hey,” Dima gasps. “Don’t knock Sloth. He was the best part of the movies.”
“Children,” Kenzi groans. “Can we please get back on point.”
“Since when does Nikita get to butt in on conversations?”
“Jesus,” I groan. “We’ll be there in about ten minutes. Make sure everything is ready.”
“Got it, boss.” Vas pauses before hanging up. “Are you going to see Ava or…”
Am I?
I haven’t thought that far ahead yet. My mind is focused on other things than how I’m going to approach Ava about the fact that I’ve been alive this whole time and hunting down Kirill.
She is going to be pissed.
I want nothing more than to take her.
Make her mine all over again.
But something is stopping me, and I don’t know what it is.
“We’ll talk about that later.”
“Sure thing.” The line clicks off and he’s gone. A wave of regret hits me, crashing me against the jagged rocks of the shore.
“Really?” Kenzi raises a brow at me from across the helicopter. “We’ll talk about that later?”
I sigh.
“Are you saying that you know exactly how you’re going to approach her and spill your guts about being an assassin?”
Kenzi shrugs. “It’s not that hard.”
“Yeah?” I ask. “Go ahead. Tell me how you plan to explain all that before she goes in for the kill.”
She snorts but then bites her lip nervously.
“Exactly.” I point my finger at her. “Don’t pull that mightier-than-thou shit without thinking it through yourself.”
“What does it matter how we tell her?” she questions me. “Either way, she’s going to see it as a huge betrayal.”
“Probably run off to daddy’s,” Dima pipes up.
“And that’s after she guts you,” Maksim snorts.
“We’re all fucking comedians today,” I groan. “Why don’t we all sit silently and think our private thoughts?”
Andrei snorts. “This is certainly going to be the best vacation I’ve had in a while.”
Great.
“This guy’s a douche,” Dima growls into the comm line as we watch Ava’s dinner with Conrad O’Neill. He isn’t wrong. The man reeks of the worst kind of narcissism and misogyny. They barely sit down before he starts into his personal exploits about sheiks and presidents.
It is nauseating.
“Can I kill him?” Andrei growls when the man tries to order my wife a salad.
“Only if you can make it look like an accident in front of all these people.”
“Poison always works.” Kenzi smirks. “I’m sure I could sneak some in. Also, these people are all of Sully’s men. Wouldn’t matter if we made it look like an accident or not.”
“Right then.” Andrei smiles dangerously. “This will be good.”
“I have to admit.” Maksim grins, taking a sip of his wine as he watches the video screen of my wife dining with that fucking bastard. “She has definitely turned into a badass.”
“Must run in the family.” Dima winks at Kenzi, who rolls her eyes dramatically at his poor attempt at flirting.
“So does the sudden urge to murder people.” She shoots him a wink of her own and runs a finger across her throat.
It isn’t too long before their dinner arrives.
Pride swells within me as I watch Ava break down the O’Neill boy bit by bit.
She isn’t the usual woman he is used to dealing with.
They are just empty, air-head bimbos looking for their next sugar daddy.
It doesn’t bypass my attention that he isn’t aware she is the CEO.
He thinks we sent him the company whore.
A mistake he is currently regretting as Ava lays into him about his company’s sudden drop in shares and habit of overspending.
“Oh, shit,” Dima crows. Conrad O’Neill goes to leave but my wife won’t be dismissed so easily. Without blinking, she digs her steak knife into his hand, cutting through the skin like it is supple leather.
“Did I say you were dismissed.” She crooks her head to the side, her eyes wide and innocent. My cock jumps to attention. He calls her a psychotic bitch, but my body and mind are calling her perfect.
My perfect little psycho.
I don’t think my cock can get any harder.
Then I watch her knife his other hand. I lied. I am harder than granite now. Fuck.
“Let’s go,” I say abruptly, standing from the table in the small room we rent to run surveillance. “Now.”
Maksim stands and murmurs to Dima over the comms to follow.
“Are you seriously going to leave?” Kenzi darts in front of me, blocking my path.
“Yes,” I growl. I am not about to explain to her why I need to go. That seeing her sister like that is driving me to the point of madness.
“No.” She stands in front of me, arms crossed against her chest, eyes adamant. “You need to wait and own up to what you did.”
I stare down at her in fucking disbelief. Is that what she thinks I am running away from? She thinks I feel guilty about leading Ava to believe I am dead? Or that I don’t want to face her wrath?
The woman couldn’t be more wrong.
It has nothing to do with either of those things.
What I don’t want to face is the one thing I have always refused to.
My feelings for her.
My love for Ava borders on possession and obsession. The more I fall for her, the harder it is to keep control of the animal inside me. I don’t call her Little Red for no reason. I am the Big Bad Wolf, and I want to devour her.
Every. Single. Inch.
But the more obsessed I become with my love for her, the more I am afraid of losing her. Not her love, but her life. Every woman I have truly cared about either died at the hands of an enemy or at my hands for betraying me.
The deeper I fall, the deeper the wound will be if either of those two things come to pass.
I know I have to face my fear of that, but it is often simpler to ignore it.
I want Ava, there is no doubt in that. And I love her but showing her that love gives her access to a vulnerability I am not ready to exploit.
“You’re scared,” Kenzi taunts me. “It’s written all over your face.”
“Easy, malen’kiy ubiytsa,” Andrei cautions. Even he can see how thin the rope is and that it is about to snap.
“Why?” she snarls. “My sister loves you. Even now, in your death, and you can’t muster up the balls to face her. Why? Huh? What are you so afraid of?”
“Don’t push me, Kenzi.” My face darkens as I stare down at her.
“I’m not afraid of you, Matthias,” she sneers. “I stopped being afraid a long time ago. You don’t want to face her? Fine. I’ll do it for both of us.”
“Shit,” Maksim curses. He reaches out to grab her the moment he sees her body shift into gear, but he is too late. She is a slippery assassin, that’s for sure.
“Damnit.” Running a hand through my lengthening hair, I tilt my head back and close my eyes. “Fuck.”
Deep breaths, I coach myself, deep breaths.
“She’s right though,” Andrei speaks up from beside me. “Not about you being afraid of her rage, but you do need to face her.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Andrei smiles sadly. “You’re afraid your love for her will ruin you both.
” His eyes brim with sadness and loss. “You’ve been hurt time and time again.
I can see that. I know that. But you can’t hide behind that wall forever, Matthias.
At some point in time, it’s going to have to crumble.
Give yourself the chance to truly love her because if you don’t—you’ll lose her for good and it won’t be to death. ”
His hand clamps on my shoulder and squeezes.
“Think about that, moy syn.” Then he leaves.
Moy syn.
My son.
He called me his son.
“Hey boss,” Dima interrupts my thoughts.
The pride that wells in my chest at being called Andrei Tkachenko’s son.
He told me he would earn the right to be called father.
It would appear I don’t have to earn the right to be called his son, and that breaks a piece of the wall I so carefully constructed when I was younger.
“You might want to catch up with Kenzi. She took your Martin.”
“Point?”
“Umm…your wife is currently hauling ass after her?”
Shit.
“Tell Vas and make sure Sully shuts down the police radios. I don’t want them being followed.”
“Got it.”
Badass indeed.