Chapter 38
Liev
He moves faster than I expect.
Not because he’s stronger, but because he’s desperate, and desperation cuts through hesitation in ways discipline doesn’t always anticipate.
One of my men shifts a fraction too late, and Hinto takes the opening, pivoting hard and grabbing Ryder as she’s pulled into the room from the adjacent corridor.
His arm locks around her, dragging her tight against him, a gun wrenched free from one of his downed men in the same motion and pressed to her side.
The room tightens instantly. Viktor curses in Russian, and Vivienne sneers. Ross’s men are uneasy, shifting from foot to foot, eyeing one another, questioning what to do now. This wasn’t part of it.
They’ve agreed to the trap, but will they defend us if it comes down to it?
“Stop,” Hinto says, his voice sharp now, stripped of the smooth control he walked in with. “You let me walk out, or she dies here.”
Ryder doesn’t struggle. That’s the first thing I register.
She goes still in his grip. Her eyes find mine across the space, steady in a way that cuts through everything else.
Good.
Viktor steps forward slightly, his expression unreadable. “This is pointless,” he says flatly. “You don’t have an exit.”
Hinto laughs. It’s edged with desperation, but a heady confidence, too. Shit. He actually thinks he can win this.
“Don’t I?” he asks.
His grip tightens fractionally on Ryder, not enough to hurt her, but enough to reinforce the threat.
“I know what this is,” he continues, his gaze locking onto mine. “I’ve seen it before. Men like you, thinking they’re in control until something like this reminds them otherwise.”
His smile sharpens.
“Love,” he says. “That’s what this is.”
The word sits wrong in his mouth. Not because it’s inaccurate, but because he thinks it’s leverage.
“You love her,” he spits, like he’s stating something I should be ashamed of.
I don’t answer him immediately. Instead, I look at Ryder. Really look at her.
At the way she’s standing, the way she’s thinking even now, even with a gun pressed into her side. There’s no panic in her expression, no plea for me to fix this, no expectation that I’ll undo it for her.
There never has been. And that makes me want to give her everything.
“I do.” The words come out firm, sure, no hint of embarrassment in them. Because I’m not embarrassed, not ashamed.
Why should I be?
Our eyes lock.
And I give her the truth.
“I love her more than I’ve ever loved anything. I love her more than this empire—than anything the Bratva has ever built. And I’d walk away from it all. For her.”
Ryder smiles, her eyes still on mine, the gun still pressed to her side. I try to will her to understand, to believe me, because it’s all true.
I would give it up. But I don’t have to.
“That’s your mistake,” Hinto says sarcastically, a sadistic grin on his face.
When I don’t panic, his expression falters.
“Not quite,” I say. “You keep making the same mistake. You’ve been looking at her for her entire life and seeing something to control.”
His grip tightens instinctively, like the words alone threaten his hold on the situation. I try not to look at his finger on the trigger. I don’t want to see if he’s trembling, if he’s willing to pull it and end this.
He can’t be stupid enough to think I won’t destroy it all if I lose her.
“Your problem,” I add, my tone lowering just slightly, “is that you still think she needs saving.”
The room feels like it narrows to a point. I don’t move, don’t tense up, because this was never about me pulling her out of his grasp.
It was about him failing to understand that she could step out of it herself.
Ryder adjusts her weight, just enough to change her center of gravity, her shoulder angling a fraction under his arm. Hinto reacts to the movement instead of anticipating it.
That’s the mistake.
Her elbow drives back hard and fast, connecting with his face with a sharp crack that snaps his head to the side. The gun wavers for a split second, his grip loosening just enough.
It’s all she needs.
She twists out of his hold cleanly, dropping low and taking his balance with her. He goes down hard; the impact knocking the air from his lungs as she turns the motion into control, forcing him flat.
Lev, a silent shadow, steps in smoothly and puts a knee down on Hinto’s back.
The rest of my men move in immediately, securing him before he can recover, weapons trained, pressure applied where it counts.
It’s over.
Ryder rises slowly, not rushing, not looking back at me right away. Her breathing is steady, but there’s something tight in the line of her shoulders that wasn’t there before.
Hinto laughs. It’s rougher now, edged with something close to disbelief as he looks up at her from the ground, blood smudged across his mouth and nose.
“That’s my girl,” he says, like he’s proud.
Ryder’s face twists into anger as she sneers down at him.
“You don’t have to do this,” he continues, his voice shifting again, searching for a different angle now that force has failed him. “You’ve proven your point.”
No one interrupts him.
“I built all of this for you,” he says, his gaze fixed on her. “Everything. The connections, the power, the reach. You think he can give you that?” His eyes flick briefly toward me, dismissive. “This is temporary. You know that.”
Ryder’s features finally drop, the anger draining from her. She looks tired, and everything in me wants to just take her home. To tug her carefully into the shower, let hot water wash all of this away: the blood, the dirt, the pain.
“Walk away from this,” Hinto murmurs. “Let me handle him. You take what’s yours. The empire, the autonomy, legitimacy if you want it. You won’t have to fight for scraps or prove yourself to anyone.”
He’s not offering her survival. He’s offering inheritance. Everything he’s spent his life building, placed in her hands with one condition.
Let me die.
My gaze stays on her, but I give her nothing else.
No interference or attempt to sway her mind.
This isn’t my decision, and she knows it.
Hinto doesn’t, though—that much is clear.
The smooth calm of his brow tells me that he thinks he has this won.
Even now, arms bound behind him and blood drooling down his chin.
Her gaze flicks to mine. I let her see exactly what I mean: It’s yours. Whatever you decide.
She exhales, and when she looks back at him, it’s different. Clearer.
“You’re wrong,” she says. “I don’t need either of you. That’s the point you keep missing.”
He goes still.
“I choose him,” she adds. “You gave up an empire, and you were willing to bury my body to get it back.”
Realization flickers across his face too late. Ryder steps back slightly, creating space as she looks toward Viktor, then to the men holding Hinto in place. Her expression doesn’t waver, doesn’t soften, doesn’t hesitate.
“Call the contact,” she says.