Chapter 32 Nikolai
NIKOLAI
I burst through the front door of the lodge with Holly in my arms. She's so cold against my chest I can barely feel her heartbeat through all the layers between us.
My security team fill the great room, but I don't acknowledge them as I stride past. All I see are Holly’s blue lips, and her pale skin, as pale as the snow that clings to her hair.
I take the stairs two at a time and carry her straight to the guest bedroom and into the bathroom. The door slams behind us, and I set her on the counter while I crank the shower to get it warm.
Steam fills the room almost immediately.
My hands shake as I peel the wet clothes from her body. Her jeans are stiff with ice. Her sweater is soaked through. Every piece I remove reveals more pale skin, more evidence of how close I came to losing her.
She’s soft and pliant and leans up against the mirror like a rag doll. She doesn’t fight me. She can barely keep her eyes open. And if it wasn’t for her violent shivering, I think she would pass out.
When she's finally bare, I strip down to my briefs and lift her into my arms again. She's so light and fragile. Nothing like the fierce woman who enjoyed calling me an asshole.
The shower is a warm cascade when I step under the spray with her cradled against my chest. She doesn't flinch. Doesn't react. Just hangs limp in my arms while the water pounds down on us both.
"Come on, solnyshko," I murmur against her hair. "Wake up for me."
Nothing.
I adjust my grip, one arm around her waist, the other cradling her head against my shoulder. The hot water streams over us, and I can feel her slowly come back to me. Her skin goes from ice-cold to merely cold. Her breathing deepens slightly.
"Holly." My voice is rough. "I need you to wake up now."
Her eyelids flutter.
"That's it. Come back to me."
A soft sound escapes her throat and then those big brown eyes crack open.
"Nikolai..." My name is barely a whisper on her lips.
"I've got you." I pull her tighter against me, and she melts into my body, limp in my arms under the cascade of warm water. "I’ll never let you fall."
She shivers, and I turn us slightly so the water hits her back directly. Her fingers curl weakly against my chest.
I hold her up as the water works its magic, bringing color back to her cheeks.
I press my lips to her forehead and feel the chill still lingering there.
"Stay with me," I say quietly. "Don't fall asleep."
"But I’m so tired..." Her words slur together, and her eyes start to drift closed again.
"No." I shift her in my arms, and her eyes snap back open. "You need to stay awake a little longer. Can you do that for me?"
She nods weakly against my shoulder.
"Good girl." I brush wet hair from her face. "You stay awake, and I'll make you one of Katya’s hot cocoas. She thinks it’s a secret recipe, but I’ve known it for years."
A ghost of a smile touches her lips. "Will there be extra marshmallows?"
"As many as you want, malyshka, as many as you want."
"Okay." Her voice is small.
We stay under the water until her shivering subsides and I'm certain the cold has released its grip on her. Only then do I turn off the shower and wrap her in a towel.
She sways on her feet, so I lift her onto the counter again and dry her carefully. Every inch of exposed skin. Every strand of wet hair. She watches me with heavy-lidded eyes, too exhausted to protest.
When she's dry, I carry her to the bedroom and dress her in warm clothes. Thick socks. Soft leggings. One of my sweaters that swallows her whole. She doesn't resist. Just lets me move her limbs like a doll while I work.
"Can you walk?" I ask when I'm finished.
She nods, but when her feet hit the floor, her knees buckle. I catch her before she falls and sweep her back into my arms.
"Easy, solnyshko," I murmur.
I settle her on the couch closest to the fireplace. The flames are already roaring, courtesy of one of my men, and I tuck a blanket around her.
I change quickly into dry clothes and step away to find Dmitri.
He's in the kitchen with two of the security team, and they all straighten when I enter.
“What do you need, Nikolai?”
“Hot cocoa for Holly,” I tell him.
He dismisses the security men and then turns back to me. “I’ll make it.”
“No, I’ve got it.”
Dmitri doesn't question it as I move to the stove and start fixing Holly’s hot cocoa. The distraction is welcomed. Because the adrenaline is still coursing through me and I need to keep my hands busy.
When I knew Holly had gone, I hadn’t waited for Dmitri or my security men. I went looking for her myself.
Then, two miles up the road, I saw them. The wide arcs carved into the snow where a vehicle had swerved and gone over the edge and down the embankment.
I ran to the edge and looked down into the steep drop, and for the first time in years, I felt genuine fear.
Not the calculated awareness of danger that keeps a man like me alive.
Real fear.
The kind that claws at your chest and squeezes your heart until you can't breathe.
Because I knew she was down there. Somewhere in that wreckage and snow and broken trees.
And I knew she would be terrified.
The realization hit me as I was scrambling down that embankment. That this was the same kind of accident that killed her parents. A car going off a snowy road. The same helpless terror. The same cold closing in.
History repeating itself in the cruelest way possible.
No.
The word had torn through my mind with violent force.
Not her. Not like this.
I wouldn't let it end that way.
I slid and stumbled down that embankment with my heart in my throat.
And then I saw her.
Lying still in the snow, her body crumpled.
For one terrible, infinite moment, I thought I was too late.
That she was already gone.
And the fear that ripped through me was unlike anything I'd ever experienced. It was primal and devastating and it made me want to tear the world apart with my bare hands.
But then I reached her, touched her face and felt the faint warmth of her breath against my palm, and the relief nearly brought me to my knees.
She was alive.
Now that she’s back at the lodge and safe, the rage is rising in me.
Hot and fierce and absolutely lethal.
Because Andrei did this. He left her to die in the cold. Left her bleeding and unconscious and alone.
"Nikolai?" Dmitri's voice pulls me back. He's watching me with concern in his eyes.
I force myself to breathe. To push down the violence that wants to erupt.
"Are you okay?" He asks.
"When this threat has passed, we find the pizda who left her to die.”
“Holly told you who took her?”
“In the car on the way back to the lodge. She said she had called Andrei to pick her up. Asked him to take her to a hotel but he refused. Said he was taking her to a man who paid him to spy on what was happening here at the lodge.”
Dmitri’s expression remains neutral as he nods. But I know him well enough to know he is picturing the calm and calculated way he would kill Andrei.
But he won’t get the satisfaction.
Because Andrei will feel my wrath when the time comes.
I take the hot cocoa and head back to Holly, my mind already working through what comes next.
Finding Andrei is a priority. He won't have gotten far, not in this weather. Not with the men I have already mobilized to hunt him down.
And when I find him, he's going to pay for what he did.
He's going to learn exactly what happens when someone threatens what's mine.
And it won't be quick.
Or clean.
It will be a lesson that echoes through the Bratva for years to come about the consequences of touching Nikolai Morozov's wife.
But first, Holly needs me.
I round the corner and see her huddled under the blanket, still shivering, her face pale in the firelight.
And despite the rage still burning in my chest, I gentle my expression as I approach.
Because right now, what she needs isn't the monster.
She needs the man who will keep her safe.
The man who will burn the world down before he lets anyone hurt her again.