Chapter Eight
Andrei
Restless doesn’t begin to cover it.
My apartment feels wrong tonight…too quiet, too polished, like it’s mocking me.
I’ve spent the last two hours pacing from the windows to the bar and back again, replaying Mila’s face over and over.
The hurt in her eyes. The way my father’s name poisoned something good before it ever had a chance to settle.
I thought I was done with him.
Turns out ghosts don’t need invitations.
Work has always been my refuge. When my mind won’t shut up, numbers do. So I grab my coat and leave before I tear the place apart with my thoughts.
The executive floor is dim when I arrive, lights softened for the night shift. My footsteps echo as I move down the corridor toward my office, already running through reports I can bury myself in. I’m almost past the main conference room when voices drift out through the partially closed door.
I don’t slow at first. Late meetings aren’t unusual. Then I hear a familiar voice…
Mila?
My body reacts before my mind does. I stop so abruptly my shoes scrape against the marble floor. Her voice is tight, strained in a way I’ve never heard before. Not nervous…afraid. There are other voices too—male.
I move closer, every instinct in me snapping awake. I stop just outside the doorway, trying to listen without alerting them.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” Mila says shakily. “I was just leaving my letter of resignation for Andrei,” she says. Fuck.
“You shouldn’t have been anywhere near those files,” one of the men cuts in.
Another voice follows, colder. “Do you have any idea what you’ve stumbled into?”
My jaw tightens.
Obviously, she has no idea. I can hear that much immediately. She’s confused, trying to explain herself, trying to de-escalate something she doesn’t even understand. But I do.
Shipping containers. Altered manifests. Missing entries hidden behind internal approvals. A problem I’ve been quietly unraveling for weeks. And now the pieces snap together.
I recognize the voices.
Roger, the CFO, and Howard Abrams.
Men who stayed on after my father died. Men who smiled to my face while resisting every move I made toward legitimacy. Men who thought I was too soft. Too young. Too different from the man who came before me.
The feeling of betrayal lands heavy in my chest, sharp and ugly, but I shove it aside.
Mila matters more than their treachery.
I pull out my phone and text my head of security with quick, precise instructions.
Then I hear Howard again.
“I knew you were trouble the moment I saw you,” he says, his tone dropping into something dangerous, “You’ve got to go.”
That’s it. I can’t wait any longer.
I push the door open hard enough that it slams against the wall. All three of them turn toward me. Mila’s eyes widen, her expression going from shock to relief in seconds—and then fear again when she sees my expression.
Roger barely has time to react before I pounce on him. Surprise is a weapon, and I use it to my advantage. My fist connects with his jaw, the impact jarring up my arm. He stumbles back, clips the table, and goes down hard, unconscious before he hits the floor.
Howard lunges for me with a shout.
We crash into the conference table, papers scattering. He’s heavier than he looks, desperate and fueled by panic, but I’ve spent my life learning how to put men down without killing them. I twist, drive my elbow into his ribs, feel the air leave his lungs in a sharp wheeze.
He swings anyway. I duck, grab his arm, and slam him face-first into the table. He snarls, fights dirty, but desperation makes him sloppy.
I wrench his arm behind his back and force him to his knees just as the door bursts open again.
Men in security uniforms flood the room.
Howard freezes when the guards seize him, snapping restraints around his wrists. The other man is hauled up from the floor, still unconscious, dragged away like dead weight.
And suddenly, the room is quiet. Too quiet.
I turn then, finally, and look at Mila.
She’s standing exactly where I left her, looking white as a sheet. Her hands are clenched tight at her sides and when our eyes meet, she exhales like she’s been holding her breath for hours.
I close the distance between us in two strides and pull her into my arms. “You’re safe, solnishka “I say, my voice low and firm. “Let’s go home.”
She nods weakly, leaning heavily into my frame. I guide her to my car, keep one hand at her back the whole drive, grounding us both in the simple fact that she’s here. Breathing. Safe.
The drive home seems like forever. Mila doesn’t say a word, just stares blankly outside the passenger side window. Inside the house, I take her coat from her shoulders, set it aside, then guide her to the couch. My hand stays at her back until she sits.
“Talk to me,” I say gently. “Start from the beginning.”
She exhales, shaky. “I…I forgot my laptop.”
My jaw tightens. I wait.
“I realized it when I got home,” she continues, eyes fixed on her hands. “I tried to tell myself it could wait until morning, but I needed it. And—” she hesitates. “I really needed something to focus on after dinner.”
The words hit me like a punch in the guts. This is my fucking fault.
“So I went back,” she continues. “The building was quiet. Too quiet. I was almost at my desk when I heard voices coming from the conference room.” Her fingers knot together.
“I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop. I swear. I was just passing by, but then I heard something about manifests and containers.
” She swallows. “It sounded serious so I stopped. I shouldn’t have, but I did. ”
I sit forward now, elbows on my knees. “What did they say?”
Her eyes flick up to mine, searching. “They were angry. About you. About how things were changing. Howard said it wouldn’t have happened if your father were still alive.”
My chest goes cold.
“I knew then I shouldn’t be there,” she goes on quickly. “I tried to leave quietly. I really did. I took one step back and—” She winces. “There was a cart behind me. I didn’t see it. I bumped it and a stack of binders fell. It was so loud.”
I can see it. The sharp crack of plastic. The silence afterward.
“I thought…I thought they were going to hurt me.” She looks up at me then, eyes shining with unshed tears. “And all I could think was that I didn’t want that to be the end. Not without fixing things between us.”
My chest tightens.
“I kept thinking about you,” she says. “About how angry I was. About how I never told you—” she stops, presses her lips together. “I kept thinking I might never get the chance to make things right.” I reach out, take her hands, and she lets out a shaky breath.
Silence stretches between us, thick with everything unsaid.
“You were going to leave me,” I say quietly.
She flinches. “Just for a day. Maybe two. I needed time.”
“I don’t like it,” I admit. “But I’ll deal with that later.”
Her shoulders relax a fraction.
“There’s something else,” she says. “When I was standing there, scared out of my mind…I realized something. Those men—your father—they’re not you.
You don’t move like them. You don’t talk like them.
You don’t look at people like they’re disposable.
” Her thumb brushes over my knuckle. “You protect. I mean that’s all you’ve ever done,” she says with a breezy chuckle.
“You’re my daddy,” she adds with a hint of playful intimacy.
My chest spreads with emotions—big emotions that I can’t define or deny. I pull her closer, until she’s half in my lap, her forehead resting against my chest. I cradle her face, force her to look at me.
“I love you,” I say. No hesitation. No armor left. “I didn’t plan it. I didn’t want it. But it happened anyway. You happened.”
Her breath shudders and her face breaks into the biggest, most beautiful smile. “I love you too.”
I kiss her then…slowly. Deeply.