6. Viktor
VIKTOR
Iwake with her in my arms, and for the first time in twenty years, I feel something that might be peace.
Morning light filters through the curtains, painting golden stripes across the bed. Celeste is still asleep, her face soft against my chest, her breathing slow and steady. One of her hands rests over my heart like she's keeping time with the beat.
I could watch her forever.
The realization should terrify me. I've built my entire life around not needing anyone, not wanting anything that could be used against me. Attachment is weakness. Caring is vulnerability. These are the lessons beaten into me since I was old enough to hold a gun.
But looking at her now, I can't remember why any of that mattered.
I slip out of bed carefully, trying not to wake her. There's work to do. Plans to make. A future to build that includes her in ways I haven't let myself imagine until this moment.
In my study, I pour myself a coffee and stare at my phone. The first call is the hardest. Not because I'm afraid of the conversation, but because once I make it, there's no going back.
I dial Alexei's number, each digit a commitment I can't take back.
He answers on the second ring, his voice rough with sleep. "Viktor. It's early."
"The Duval situation needs to change." My tone leaves no room for negotiation.
A pause stretches between us. I can hear him shifting, fabric rustling, probably sitting up in bed and reaching for whatever he keeps on his nightstand. "You want to release her?"
"No." I take a breath, steadying myself for what comes next. "I want to keep her. Permanently. The debt is forgiven—wiped clean. I'll absorb the loss."
The silence stretches long enough that I check the screen to make sure the call is still connected, that we haven't been disconnected.
"Viktor," Alexei says finally, his voice careful, measured. "She's leverage. A bargaining chip. Not a wife."
"She's mine now. The conversation is over."
Another pause, heavier this time. When he speaks again, there's something in his voice I can't quite identify—surprise, maybe. Or respect. Possibly both. "This is unexpected. Very unexpected."
"For me as well," I admit.
"She must be remarkable, this girl."
I think of her standing in that warehouse with her chin raised and her spine straight, refusing to break.
I think of her humming at 3 AM, her voice threading through the darkness like a lifeline.
I think of the way she looked at me last night, like I was worth something.
Like I was more than the monster everyone else sees.
"She is."
Alexei sighs, the sound crackling through the speaker. "Very well. The debt is forgiven. Consider it done. But Viktor, you understand what this means? She's a target now. Anyone who wants to hurt you, anyone seeking leverage or revenge—they'll go through her."
"Then they'll die trying." The words come out flat, absolute. A promise I fully intend to keep.
He chuckles, a dry, knowing sound that rumbles through the phone. "I believe you. I've seen what you do to men who cross you. Take care of your woman, my friend. I'll handle the paperwork, make sure everything is properly documented."
The call ends with a soft click, and I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding, my shoulders dropping slightly. One down. One to go.
Marcel Duval's number is in my phone, programmed in when this whole arrangement started, when we first negotiated the terms of his daughter's collateral. I stare at it for a long moment, my thumb hovering over the screen, before pressing call.
He answers immediately, before the first ring even finishes, his voice eager and desperate, tinged with anxiety. "Mr. Sorokin. Is there a problem? Is something wrong? Is Celeste behaving? I can talk to her if she's causing you any trouble?—"
"Your debt is forgiven." I cut him off mid-sentence, not interested in hearing him grovel or make excuses. "Your daughter stays with me."
The silence on the other end is different from Alexei's. This one is filled with relief so palpable I can almost taste it. Not relief that his daughter is safe. Relief that he doesn't have to pay.
"That's very generous," Marcel says finally. "Very generous indeed. I'm sure Celeste will be happy to?—"
"Don't." My voice comes out harder than I intended. "Don't pretend you care about her happiness. You handed her over like property. You haven't called once to check on her."
"I thought it was best not to interfere?—"
"You were glad to be rid of her."
He doesn't deny it.
"Your daughter stays with me," I repeat. "And you forget she exists. If I ever see you near her, if I ever hear you've tried to contact her, I'll make what happened to Sergei look like a mercy. Do you understand?"
"Yes." His voice is small now, scared. Good. "I understand."
I hang up without saying goodbye.
For a long moment, I sit in the quiet of my study, processing what I've just done. I've claimed her. Officially. In the eyes of the Bratva, in the eyes of her worthless father, in every way that matters. She's mine.
Now I just have to tell her.
She's awake when I return to her room, sitting up in bed with the sheets pooled around her waist. She's wearing my shirt from last night, and the sight of it does something primal to my chest. My clothes on her body. My scent on her skin. Mine.
"Good morning," she says, and her voice is soft, almost shy, with an uncertainty that wasn't there in the dark hours of the night. Like she's not sure where we stand now that dawn has broken through the windows.
I cross to the bed and sit beside her, close enough that our thighs touch, and take her hand in mine. Her fingers are small and delicate against my scarred knuckles. "I called your father."
Her whole body goes still, every muscle tensing. The color drains from her face. "What?"
"The debt is forgiven. Wiped clean. You're free." I watch her carefully, memorizing every flicker of emotion across her features.
She stares at me, her dark eyes wide and searching my face like she's trying to find the lie, the catch. "Free."
The word hangs between us, heavy with possibility and terror, and I force myself to say the rest. To give her the choice she deserves, even if it destroys me.
"If you want to leave, I'll have Dmitri drive you anywhere you want to go.
Anywhere in the world. Any city, any country.
I'll give you money—enough to start over properly—a new identity if you need one, new papers, a new life.
You can walk out that door right now and never look back. You'll never see me again."
The offer almost kills me. Every word feels like swallowing broken glass, like carving out pieces of myself. But she needs to know she's not trapped here. She needs to choose this. Choose me.
"And if I don't want to leave?" Her voice is barely audible.
I slide off the bed and onto my knees in front of her, my hands resting on her thighs over the sheets. The Bratva's most feared enforcer, kneeling at the feet of a woman who should hate me, who has every reason to run.
"Then you stay. Not as a prisoner or a debt payment. Not as leverage or a kept woman. As mine."
"Yours." She repeats the word like she's testing how it feels in her mouth.
"My partner. My equal in everything that matters. Everything I have becomes yours—the money, the protection, all of it."
She reaches out slowly and touches my face, her palm warm and impossibly gentle against my jaw. I lean into her hand like a starving man leaning toward the sun, like I've been waiting my whole life for this touch.
"Why me?" she whispers, and there's genuine confusion in her voice. "Of all the women in the world, why me?"
The truth spills out of me before I can stop it. "Because you looked at me like I was a man, not a monster. Because you hummed to yourself at 3 AM and broke my heart without knowing it. Because I've been alive for thirty-six years and I didn't know I was dead until you woke me up."
She's crying. Tears track down her cheeks, and I don't know what to do with them. I've never been good with tears. I've caused plenty, but I've never tried to stop them before.
"I don't know how to do this," she admits, her voice breaking. "I've never had someone want to keep me before."
"Then I'll teach you. We'll figure it out together."
She slides off the bed and into my lap, wrapping her arms around my neck. I hold her while she cries, my hands stroking up and down her back, trying to give her the comfort I've never known how to receive.
She cries like someone who's never been allowed to. And I hold her like someone learning how.
The next few days are a revelation.
Word spreads through the Bratva like wildfire: Viktor Sorokin has a woman. Not a plaything, not a mistress. A partner. The reaction is a mix of surprise and suspicion, exactly as I expected. Men like me don't fall in love. Men like me don't have weaknesses.
At a meeting with the brigadiers, someone makes a comment. Yuri, a captain from the Brighton Beach crew, who's always been too bold for his own good.
"So the Duval girl has our enforcer on a leash," he says, smirking around the table. "Who knew Viktor Sorokin could be trained like a pet?"
The room goes silent. Every man at the table knows what's coming.
I don't respond with violence. That would be expected, predictable. Instead, I lean back in my chair and let the ice settle into my voice.
"Her name is Celeste. She is under my protection. Anyone who disrespects her disrespects me." I meet Yuri's eyes and hold them until he looks away. "We all know what happens then."
No one speaks in the heavy silence that follows. No one needs to. My reputation—built on years of blood and ruthless enforcement—does the talking for me. The message is clear: touch what's mine, and you answer to me.
After the meeting disperses, Alexei pulls me aside in the hallway, his expression unreadable. "You're making yourself vulnerable, Viktor. Giving them a target."
"I'm making myself human." I'm surprised by how easily the words come, how little I care about the strategic implications. "Maybe that's long overdue."
He studies me for a long moment, this man who's been more father to me than my own biological one ever was, who taught me everything about surviving in this brutal world. "She must be remarkable," he says again, his tone softer now.
"She is."
That night, I tell Celeste about the meeting, about Yuri's comment and the warning I delivered.
We're curled up on the oversized leather couch in the living room, her head resting on my shoulder, her slender fingers tracing idle patterns on my forearm.
She listens without interrupting, absorbing every word.
"They see me as a weakness," she says when I'm done, her voice thoughtful rather than afraid.
"They see you as leverage. They're wrong." I press a lingering kiss to her hair, breathing in her scent. "You're my strength."
She's quiet for a moment, considering. Then: "Show me."
"Show you what?"
"This world. Your world." She sits up to look at me, her eyes serious. "If I'm going to be part of it, I want to understand it. I don't want to be the helpless woman who needs protecting. I want to stand beside you."
I stare at her, this extraordinary woman who never ceases to surprise me, who has consistently defied every expectation I've ever held. Who faced down a monster without flinching and decided to stay despite witnessing the darkness that clings to me.
"It's dangerous," I warn her, my voice low and serious. "The things you'll see, the things you'll learn about what I do, about the empire I've built on blood and fear—you won't be able to unsee them. They'll change you."
"I know."
"You could be hurt. Targeted. Killed." The words taste like ash on my tongue.
"I know that too." She cups my face in her hands with surprising firmness, forcing me to meet those clear, determined eyes that see straight through every defense I've ever constructed.
"I spent my whole life being kept in the dark by people who claimed they were protecting me, who thought ignorance was safety.
My father protected me right into poverty and helplessness. Don't make the same mistake he did."
She's right. She's absolutely right, and I hate it and love her for it in equal measure—hate that she's choosing to walk into danger, love that she refuses to be treated like porcelain.
"Tomorrow," I tell her, the promise weighted with significance. "I'll show you everything. The businesses, the operations, the people I work with. All of it."
She smiles, that rare, brilliant smile that transforms her entire face and makes me forget how to breathe, forget everything except the light in her eyes. "Everything."
I kiss her then, slow and deep and thorough, pouring everything I can't quite say into the gesture, and think about all the tomorrows stretching out ahead of us like an unfamiliar road. For the first time in my entire life, I actually want them. Every single one.
With her.