Chapter 9
NINE
ANYA
I know the exact moment Dmitri arrives, not because anyone announces him and not because there is some dramatic shift in sound, but because the entire suite recalibrates around his presence.
The men stationed outside the door straighten.
One adjusts his cuff. My father’s posture tightens by a fraction that most people would miss, but I have spent my entire life studying those fractions.
The air grows heavier in a way that is specific to my younger brother.
I have felt it since childhood. It is not fear.
It is awareness. Like standing too close to live current and knowing exactly how much damage it can do.
But Dmitri does not come alone, Mikhail enters first.
There is nothing theatrical about him. He does not need the room to bend.
It does anyway. His presence is quiet authority, measured and composed.
His suit is immaculate despite the travel.
His gaze moves once around the suite, taking in security positions, exits, lines of sight, before finally landing on me.
It softens. Only slightly. “Anastasiya,” he says.
Then Dmitri steps through the doorway behind him.
He fills it in a way Mikhail does not try to.
His hair is shorter than the last time I saw him in Moscow.
There is a shadow along his jaw that makes him look older, harder.
His eyes sweep the room once before locking onto me.
He crosses the space in three long strides and pulls me into him.
Not gently. Not carefully. His arms close around me like he is reattaching something that nearly came loose.
“You look thinner,” he mutters into my hair, voice rough.
“I was not exactly being fed on a schedule,” I reply steadily. “Volkov did not prioritize balanced meals when he chained me to a wall.”
His body goes rigid. Mikhail steps closer now. Dmitri pulls back and grips my upper arms, his eyes scanning my face, my neck, my wrists. He does not ask if I am okay. He assesses damage. “Who did it?” he asks flatly.
“Volkov orchestrated it,” I say. “Security was compromised. I was taken to a warehouse outside the city and restrained. He intended to use me as leverage. To get information on Papa.”
“And he is dead,” Dmitri says.
“Yes. The Iron Reapers ended it.”
Mikhail’s gaze sharpens. “You were with them afterward.”
“I was taken to one of their homes after the hospital so I could recover properly.”
“Whose home?” Dmitri asks.
“Roman’s.”
“The one Papa insisted on speaking with,” Mikhail says quietly.
“Yes.”
Dmitri’s mouth tightens slightly. “The one who told Papa he would not be pushed.”
“Yes.”
“Did he touch you?” Dmitri asks.
“Yes,” I fold my arms over my chest and answer honestly. All three of them go still. “He helped me walk when my legs were unstable. He treated my wrists. He stayed in the room when I woke from nightmares. He touched me when I asked him to. He did not touch me when I did not.”
“Did he take advantage of you?” Mikhail asks.
“No,” I say firmly. “He didn’t.” The silence between all of stretches.
“And you trust him,” Dmitri finally says.
“I trust that he sees me as a person,” I reply. “Not as leverage. Not as an extension of our family.”
Before either of them can respond, my father’s phone rings and he answers immediately. “Yes.” His eyes flick to me. “Where?” A pause. “Understood.” He ends the call and his eyes find mine again.
My pulse spikes. “What happened?”
“There was an attempt,” my father says evenly.
My chest aches. “On who?”
“Roman Kovacs.”
The room tilts, the air thinning like someone just opened a window in the dead of winter.
“What do you mean attempt?” I demand, my voice sharper than I intend. “Define attempt.”
“His motorcycle was followed leaving Perdition,” my father says evenly. Too evenly. “Shots were fired. He returned fire. He was hit but still alive.”
Hit.
The word lodges in my chest. It ricochets, over and over, until it drowns everything else out.
I don’t remember deciding to sit, but suddenly I’m in the chair, elbows on my knees, arms wrapped tight around myself like I can hold my organs in place. My palms are cold. My fingers won’t stop trembling.
“This is all because of me,” I whisper.
“No.” My father’s answer is immediate. Controlled. “He could have been shot for any number of reasons. You don’t know this man or what he and his biker club are involved in.” His jaw tightens. “Is this the kind of man you are willing to throw your whole future away for?”
I look up slowly. “I’m not throwing my future away for him,” I say, each word measured so I don’t shatter. “That doesn’t have anything to do with him.”
He pushes to his feet and starts pacing in front of me, the heavy tread of his shoes hitting the floor like a gavel.
“It has everything to do with him. I don’t know what he has filled your head with, but you belong in Moscow.
With me. With your brothers. With your family.
” He stops, fixing me with a hard stare.
“Have you forgotten you have been promised to another man?”
The word promised feels like a chain around my throat.
I stand so fast the chair scrapes loudly behind me.
“No.” My voice breaks, then steadies. “I haven’t forgotten.
How could I? You have been preparing me for this my entire life, Papa.
” My chest rises and falls too fast. “When other girls were dating and sneaking out and being stupid teenagers, I was home. When they left for university, I stayed here taking online business classes so I could help the family.” A bitter laugh slips out before I can stop it. “I’m not even sure why I bothered.”
My brothers shift uncomfortably behind him, but I don’t look at them.
“You don’t actually want me involved,” I continue, my voice rising despite my effort to stay calm.
“You don’t want my ideas. You don’t want my degree.
You want an obedient wife who smiles at the right dinners and gives Konstantine heirs.
” My throat burns. “What value do I really have to you apart from what is between my legs?”
The words hang there, ugly and raw and my father and brothers stare at me in disbelief. They stare at me like I have detonated something in the middle of the room. Fine. Let it explode.
I drag in a breath that feels like glass in my lungs. “It happened after I left him. After Volkov died. After I returned under our protection.” I look directly at my father. “That is not coincidence.”
Mikhail’s expression shifts first. He does not look shocked. He looks calculating. “You believe he was targeted because he helped you.”
“Yes.” My heart is hammering so hard I can feel it in my throat. “Now, I am going.”
“No,” my father says immediately.
“Yes,” I push back just as fast. “He risked himself for me. I will not sit here and wait for updates like I am some fragile thing you keep on a shelf.”
Dmitri steps forward and catches my arm lightly. Not rough. Just firm. “You are not running toward an active situation.”
“He walked into that warehouse without even knowing I existed,” I fire back, pulling my arm free.
My voice shakes but I refuse to lower it.
“He went in because Volkov was a threat, not because he was trying to rescue me, and when he found me chained to that wall, he did not hesitate. He could have stepped back. He did not. So do not tell me to stay behind glass and wait.”
The image slams into me without warning. The smell of oil and dust. The cold metal biting into my wrists. The sound of boots on concrete. His voice. Calm. Furious. Focused.
He did not hesitate.
Silence stretches between us, thick and heavy.
“You care for him,” Dmitri says quietly.
“I care that he saved me,” I answer, though my chest aches in a way that makes that sound like a lie. “If he dies and I stayed here because it was safer, I will not forgive myself.” That part is the truth. Brutal and absolute.
My father studies me for a long moment. I see the war in his eyes. Not between business and family. Between control and reality. I am not a child. I am not a bargaining chip standing obediently in the corner.
He looks at Mikhail. Mikhail nods once. “Two cars,” my father says. “Full detail.”
Relief and dread crash into each other inside me.
The drive to Perdition is fast and silent.
The city lights blur past the window in streaks of white and gold.
No one speaks. The men in the front seats communicate in quiet, coded murmurs through earpieces.
I sit in the back, hands clenched in my lap, staring straight ahead.
When we pull into the lot, my pulse spikes.
Roman is standing outside the clubhouse.
He is upright, thank God. There is a bandage wrapped tight around his upper arm, the white already stained through at the center.
His knuckles are scraped. There is dried blood at his temple. He looks furious but alive.
Men I recognize as Iron Reapers stand around him like a wall of muscle and ink and barely restrained violence. Their expressions are dark. Protective. Lethal.
Relief hits so hard my vision blurs. My lungs finally expand fully for the first time since I heard the word hit.
The SUV barely slows before I shove the door open.
“Anya,” someone hisses behind me.
I do not stop. My boots hit gravel and I move toward him, my father’s security detail fanning out automatically behind me.
Roman sees me and his entire body goes still. For one heartbeat, we just stare at each other. He looks shocked. Then angry. Then something else. Something that twists low in my stomach. “What the hell are you doing here?” he demands, voice rough.
I ignore the question. “You’re bleeding,” I say instead, reaching him. My hand lifts before I can think better of it, hovering near the bandage on his arm. “They said you were hit.”
“I am hit,” he mutters. “It’s a graze.”
“That is still being shot,” I snap.
His mouth twitches like he is fighting a smile and losing.
Behind him, one of the Reapers shifts, clearly clocking the fleet of black SUVs and the armed men stepping out around me. Roman’s eyes flick past me to my father. “I had it handled,” he says quietly to me.
“You should not have had to,” I fire back just as quietly. “It happened after I left. After Volkov. After everything.”
His expression hardens. Not at me. At the implication. “You think this was about you.”
“I know it was.”
His jaw flexes. “You don’t know that.”
For a moment, the world narrows to just the two of us standing in a parking lot full of armed men and bad blood.
“You should not be here,” he says again, but his voice is different now. Not angry, protective.
“You walked into that warehouse and saved someone you did not know,” I say softly. “Do not tell me I cannot walk into a parking lot for you.”
His eyes search mine like he is trying to find hesitation. He won’t find any. Something shifts in his expression then. Something raw. Something that looks dangerously close to feeling. “Damn it, Anya,” he mutters under his breath.
I do not care who is watching. I step closer. “Are you going to live?” I ask him, my voice barely steady.
His gaze drops to my mouth for a fraction of a second before returning to my eyes. “Yeah,” he says. “I’m not that easy to kill.”
My chest loosens just enough to breathe. “Good,” I whisper.
Because if he had died and I stayed behind glass, I would have burned the entire world down with the guilt.