Chapter 14 Tony
Tony
I’m still tasting her on my lips when Adrian starts talking, and the guilt hits me like a freight train.
“You took your time answering,” he taunts. “Busy?”
I close the bedroom door behind me and lean against it. My pants are barely zipped, my shirt is untucked, and the woman I just distracted with sex to avoid answering is sitting on the couch, wondering what the hell just happened.
I keep telling myself that I didn’t have a choice. She was asking questions I couldn’t answer and getting too close to the truth. Physical distraction was the only way out that didn’t involve lying to her face again.
Except that’s bullshit, and I know it.
I took the coward’s way out. I used her body to deflect from her mind, turning something that should have been pure into manipulation. And now, I’m standing here with Adrian’s voice in my ear while she’s out there feeling used and confused.
The worst part is that I wanted her. I still do.
What happened on the couch wasn’t entirely an act. I felt every touch, kiss, and sound she made.
I wanted all of it.
But I can no longer separate genuine desire from tactical deflection, and that makes me the exact kind of man I swore I’d never become.
“I was in the middle of something,” I manage.
“Something more important than my call?”
“You didn’t give me any warning.”
Adrian laughs, and the sound is cold and humorless. “I don’t need to warn you. I’m paying you. When I call, you answer. That’s how this works.”
My free hand curls into a fist. I imagine driving it through the wall. Or better yet, through Adrian’s smug face. I bite back the response I want to give and force my voice to stay even. “What do you want?”
“Progress reports. You’ve been embedded with the Kozlovs for weeks now. Living in their safehouse. Traveling with Dmitri’s sister. Yet, I’ve received nothing of value from you. I’m starting to wonder if you’ve forgotten who you work for.”
“I haven’t forgotten.”
“Then prove it. Tell me something useful about Sasha.”
My stomach turns at the way he says her name like he owns it.
Like she’s a possession he’s been denied.
Something primal and dangerous stirs in my chest. She’s mine.
The thought comes unbidden and possessive in a way I’ve never felt about anyone.
And this pathetic excuse for a man thinks he has any claim to her.
“She’s cautious. Doesn’t trust easily. Her brothers trained her well.”
“I know all of that. I knew her in London, remember?” Adrian pauses, and I can almost hear him leaning forward, hungry for details. “How deeply does she trust you?”
The question makes bile rise in my throat. Five minutes ago, I was inside her. She was gasping my name, digging her nails into my back, and trembling in my arms. Her body was warm and willing beneath mine, and she gave herself to me without reservation.
And now, I’m supposed to report on that to the man who wants to destroy her.
“She’s starting to trust me,” I reply with a sigh, “but she’s suspicious by nature. It takes time.”
“Time is something we’re running short on. I need actionable intelligence, Tony. Not vague assessments.”
“What kind of intelligence?”
“The personal kind. What’s she afraid of? What would break her? What does she care about more than anything?” Adrian’s voice drops to something that sounds almost intimate, and it makes my skin crawl. “I want to know every weakness. Every soft spot. Every place I can press to make her crumble.”
I think about Sasha’s face when she talked about leaving her brothers for London, and the guilt that she still carries with her every day. The fear that she abandoned them when they needed her most.
I think about her nightmares and the way she described Dmitri sitting with her as a child, never making her feel weak for being scared. How she still struggles to feel capable in her brothers’ eyes.
I think about her passion for art, and how it’s the one thing that’s entirely hers. The one piece of identity she built outside her family’s shadow. How her whole face transforms when she talks about authentication and seeing truths that others miss.
Adrian wants me to hand him all of that. Package up the things that make Sasha human and deliver them like weapons for him to wield against her.
“She cares about her work,” I offer instead. “It’s important to her sense of independence.”
“I already know that. Tell me something I can use.”
“She’s protective of her family. Would do anything for her brothers.”
“Obvious. Try again.”
I’m running out of deflections, and Adrian knows I’m holding back. I can hear it in the impatience creeping into his voice.
“These things take time,” I repeat. “You can’t rush trust.”
“You slept with her.” It’s not a question. “Don’t bother denying it. I have eyes everywhere, Tony. I know you just fucked her on that couch.”
My gaze snaps to the smoke detector in the corner, then the vent, then the cheap lamp on the end table—suddenly every object is a suspect.
The confirmation that he’s been watching makes my blood run cold. Then hot. Rage floods through me, violent and consuming. He watched us. Had someone watching while I was inside her, while she was vulnerable and exposed. But how?
Are there cameras in the safehouse? Is someone on his payroll reporting my movements? Either way, there’s no privacy and no space that Adrian can’t reach. Every moment I’ve shared with Sasha has been observed, catalogued, and reported back to her enemy.
When this is over, I will find whoever’s been watching. And I’m going to make them regret ever taking Adrian’s money.
“Physical intimacy doesn’t equal emotional vulnerability,” I hate how clinical the words sound. “She keeps walls up, even during sex.”
“Then tear them down, brick by fucking brick. Make her need you. Make her confide in you.” His voice goes hard as steel. “I didn’t hire you to play house with her. I hired you to gather intelligence that will help me destroy her.”
“What do you plan to do with this information?”
“That’s not your concern.”
“It is if you want me to keep working for you. I need to understand the endgame, Adrian. You keep talking about making her suffer, but you haven’t explained how.”
Silence stretches for a long moment. When Adrian speaks again, his voice is colder and more honest than I’ve ever heard him.
“She ruined my life. Took everything I’d built and burned it to the ground because she thought she was better than me.
More moral. More righteous.” He spits the words like poison.
“I want her to feel what I felt. I want her to trust someone completely and then discover that everything was a lie. I want to watch her world collapse the same way mine did.”
“And then?”
“And then I want her family to watch her break. I want Dmitri and Alexei to know that their precious little sister was destroyed by someone they invited into their organization.” Adrian’s breathing has gone heavy, almost excited.
“I want them to feel helpless the same way I did when she destroyed me.”
The obsession in his voice is worse than I imagined. This is downright pathological. Adrian doesn’t just want to hurt Sasha.
He wants to annihilate her.
Over my dead body.
“I’ll get you what you need,” I say, “but you have to give me more time. If I push too hard, she’ll shut down, and we’ll lose our opening.”
“Two weeks. That’s all the time you have left on our contract.
” Adrian’s tone returns to business, like he hasn’t just revealed the depths of his obsession.
“After that, I expect a full report on everything you’ve learned.
Every vulnerability. Every weakness. Everything I need to take her apart, piece by piece. ”
The line goes dead as I stand in the middle of the bedroom, phone in hand, trying to remember how to breathe.
My reflection stares back at me from the window.
I barely recognize the man looking back.
Years in special operations. Countless missions.
Dozens of kills. All of it leading to this moment, where I have to decide what kind of man I am.
Two weeks. Fourteen days to figure out how to save Sasha from a man who’s been planning her destruction for months.
Fourteen days to extricate myself from a contract I never should have signed.
Fourteen days before Adrian expects me to hand him the weapons he needs to destroy the woman I’m falling in love with.
I shove the phone back into my pocket and open the bedroom door.
The couch is empty. Her scent lingers on the cushions, a ghost of what happened there minutes ago.
Sasha’s bedroom door is closed. I cross the living room and knock gently.
“Sasha?”
No response.
“Can we talk?”
“Not right now.” Her voice is muffled through the wood, thick with something that might be tears. “Please, just… not right now.”
I press my palm against the door like I can reach her through it. “I’m sorry. I know that call—”
“I said not now, Tony.”
The finality in her tone stops me cold. She’s not angry; she’s hurt. And she has every right to be.
I slid out of her body and answered a phone call from the man who wants to destroy her. Left her lying there while I took orders from her enemy. Prioritized Adrian’s demands over the woman who had just given herself to me.
What kind of man does that?
The answer is simple: The kind of man I’ve been for the past three years.
The kind who takes contracts without asking questions, uses people for information, and disappears before the consequences catch up.
The kind who tells himself that emotional detachment is strength, when really, it’s just cowardice dressed up in professionalism.
I slide down the wall next to her door and sit on the floor, pressing my back against the wallpaper. Then, I stretch my legs out across the hardwood and wait.
I don’t know what I’m waiting for. She told me to leave her alone. But I can’t bring myself to walk away. Can’t go back to that couch where her scent lingers and pretend like everything is fine.
Nothing is fine.
Minutes pass. Maybe twenty. Maybe forty. I lose track of time sitting here in the hallway like some kind of penitent outside a confessional.
I hear her moving around behind the door. The bedsprings creak, followed by a soft pad of footsteps. At one point, I think I hear something that might be crying, and the sound carves a hole in my chest. But I can’t be sure, and the uncertainty is worse than knowing.
I did this to her. Me and my cowardice, and my inability to just tell her the truth.
She deserves better. Deserves someone who doesn’t have contracts and secrets and a psychopathic client who demands weekly reports on her vulnerabilities. Someone who can love her openly instead of sneaking around behind her brothers’ backs while simultaneously betraying her to her worst enemy.
The word “love” catches in my thoughts and refuses to let go.
Is that what this is?
The train to St. Petersburg comes back to me first. The way she laughed when she finally figured out my card tells. How she glowed when she talked about her mother’s pelmeni recipe. The comfortable silence between us that felt like coming home.
Then London. Her guilt over leaving her brothers. The way she lit up walking through that gallery, surrounded by art she could just enjoy instead of authenticate. How she shared pieces of herself she doesn’t show anyone else.
And that cold night by the Hermitage. Her hand reaching for mine first. How that simple touch meant more than any kiss or caress that came before it. How I wanted to freeze that moment and live in it forever.
Solnyshko. Little sun. The nickname surfaces from somewhere in my memory. Russian endearment. Something my uncle mentioned once, a term he picked up during his military days.
It fits Sasha perfectly. The way she lights up a room, even when she doesn’t realize it. The warmth she radiates despite growing up surrounded by cold violence. How she makes me want to be better just by existing.
I’ve been falling for her since the gallery attack. Maybe since the wedding. Definitely since she called me on my bullshit during that first car ride and didn’t back down when I tried to intimidate her.
And now, I have to choose.
Adrian or Sasha. The contract or my conscience. The money I need or the woman who’s become more important than any paycheck.
The terrifying truth is that I’ve already chosen.
I chose her when I started sabotaging my investigation, feeding Adrian false intelligence instead of real information. When I let myself imagine a future that included her instead of planning my exit strategy the moment the job was done.
I chose her. I didn’t even realize it until right now, sitting on the floor outside her bedroom like a goddamn teenager waiting for forgiveness he doesn’t deserve.
The question isn’t whether I’ll choose Sasha over Adrian.
The question is what I’m willing to do about it.
Adrian has leverage. The contract. The money I’ve already spent. Whatever surveillance network is tracking my movements. He’ll know if I back out now, and he’ll find another way to hurt her, or someone else to do his dirty work.
But if I stay in, I have access. Information about his plans. The ability to sabotage from the inside. The chance to turn his operation against him.
Maybe the way to protect Sasha isn’t to walk away from Adrian’s contract.
Maybe it’s to use it against him.
The thought settles into my mind like a key sliding into a lock. I can’t save her by running, but I might be able to save her by staying where I am and turning Adrian’s weapons back on him.
It’s dangerous. Probably stupid. Definitely the kind of plan that gets people killed.
But it’s also the only option I have. And I’ve never backed down from a fight. Especially not when someone I care about is the target.
I lean my head back against the wall and stare at the ceiling. Tomorrow, I’ll figure out the details. Tonight, I just need to be here. Close to her. Even if she won’t let me in.
“I’m sorry, Solnyshko,” I whisper to the closed door. “I will fix this. I promise.”
She doesn’t respond.
But I stay anyway.