Chapter 14 - Alexey
The routine background sweep is supposed to be a standard procedure, nothing more than tying off loose threads before they can snag on the larger operation.
I run it myself at two-thirty in the morning while the penthouse sleeps around me, the only light coming from the glow of my laptop screen and the distant city skyline beyond the windows.
Fadir’s accounts are going down, one by one; his suppliers are pulling back, and his public image beginning to crack under the weight of the carefully seeded leaks. Everything is progressing exactly as planned.
Then Anja’s name appears in a subsidiary ledger.
Viktor Kuzmin, her father, still owes a small residual amount to one of our older collection arms. Not a massive sum, but enough to keep it active in the system. The kind of loose end that can become leverage for someone like Fadir if he ever digs deep enough into her past.
A single phone call, a quiet threat, and the man who has already tried to sell his daughter once can be used as a weapon again.
I stare at the screen for a long moment, fingers hovering over the keys.
Clearing it isn’t strictly necessary for the immediate war against Fadir.
But loose ends are bad for business. They create openings.
Weaknesses. And I refuse to let anything from Anja’s past give that bastard even the smallest opening.
I also consider how those phone calls to Anja are becoming burdensome to her. If I want her entire focus to be on Fadir and his demise, I need to rid her of outside conflicts and distractions.
I authorize the write-off anonymously, routed through three layers of intermediaries so it can never be traced back to the penthouse or to her.
The amount owed vanishes from the system within minutes. No fanfare. No record. Just gone.
I tell myself it is purely necessary.
The next day, the change becomes obvious.
The harassing calls to Anja’s old number stop. The desperate voicemails from her father, filled with slurred pleas, laced with the same shame and entitlement that has driven her out of back home at eighteen, fall silent.
She notices immediately.
I am in the kitchen when she confronts me, sleeves rolled up, finishing the simple stir-fry I’d started when I heard her footsteps. The island gleams under the pendant lights, and the aromatic scent of ginger and garlic fills the space.
Anja storms in barefoot, wearing one of the oversized t-shirts that has become her unofficial uniform in the penthouse, her hair loose and slightly tousled from running her hands through it.
Her emerald eyes blaze with a storm of confusion and something softer, suspicion mixed with reluctant warmth.
“Why did the calls stop?” she demands, stopping on the other side of the island. Her voice cracks slightly on the last word. “My father’s voicemails… they’ve gone silent. The collectors aren’t calling anymore. What did you do?”
I set the wooden spoon down and meet her gaze evenly. No apology. No flourish. Just the truth.
“I cleared the residual debt he owed one of our subsidiaries,” I say calmly.
“It was a loose end. Small, but active. The kind of thread Fadir could have pulled if he ever connected the dots between your past and our operation. I handled it quietly. Anonymously. It protects the plan and removes a potential weakness.”
She stands there, hands gripping the edge of the marble, knuckles whitening.
For a long moment, she doesn’t speak. The air between us feels thick, charged with everything she isn’t saying from the shame of her father’s failures to the terror of the collectors who once frightened her, or the deep fear that her past would always be a chain waiting to drag her back.
I expect her to storm out. To throw sharp words about control or manipulation, or how I have no right to interfere in her family mess. Instead, she stays rooted in place, eyes searching my face like she is trying to find the hidden motive.
Then her shoulders sag, just a fraction.
“Thank you,” she whispers. “But this money comes off of we agreed upon.”
The words land heavier than any curse she has ever thrown at me. Quiet and vulnerable in a way that hits somewhere deep in my chest, harder than I expect.
The fiery woman who once called me a monster in the car after the warehouse rescue is standing in my kitchen whispering gratitude for something I have done without seeking credit.
For the first time, I feel a delicate crack forming in my vow to keep this as a business transaction between myself and Anja.
But, I find myself being pulled towards this woman who goes beyond strategy, beyond the value of her trust, and well beyond the public illusion we are maintaining to torment Fadir.
Something warmer. The kind of pull that could complicate everything if I let it.
I lock it down tight.
Any warmth I feel is only a byproduct of successful teamwork.
Nothing more. She is still reeling from betrayal, job loss, and the ghosts of back home.
I refuse to become another man who takes advantage of her vulnerability, no matter how naturally she has begun to fit into the rhythm of the penthouse.
No matter how her insights have accelerated the slow squeeze on Fadir.
Tonight is still not the night anything changed between us.
I turn back to the stove, plating the stir-fry with steady hands.
“Eat while it’s hot,” I say, voice level. “The next phase against Fadir starts tomorrow. We keep moving forward.”
Anja lingers a moment longer, the quiet “thank you” still hanging between us like heavy smoke. Then she picks up the plate, her fingers brushing mine for the briefest second.
The invisible wall remains firmly in place.
The slow dismantling of Fadir Klem continues.I remind myself, again and again, that the line between us has been drawn for a reason.
***
The steam still clings to the bathroom mirror when I step out of the shower, water dripping from my hair onto my shoulders. I drag a hand towel across my shoulders, then wrap it low around my hips, the fabric rough against my damp skin.
I should have gone straight to my office to review the latest reports on Fadir’s empire.
Instead, I stand in front of the fogged mirror, staring at my own reflection of brown eyes, the raised scar along my jaw, and the faint lines that came from years of calculated patience rather than reckless rage.
Thirty-four years old, and for the first time in a long time, my mind refuses to stay on strategy.
Anja’s whispered “thank you” in the kitchen still echoes in my head.
I close my eyes, and the image comes unbidden.
What it would feel like to take her in my arms for real.
Not the calculated touch at the small of her back during public appearances. Not the brief, commendable moment when her fingers brushed my scar. But actually pulling her close, and closing the distance between us until there is nothing left but the warmth of her body against mine.
I can picture it too clearly. Her tall frame fitting against me, long hair spilling over my arm as I slide one hand around her waist and the other into her hair. The way her attention would widen for half a second before softening. The soft intake of breath just before I lean down and kiss her.
Slow at first. Testing. Then, deeper when she responds, and that quiet fire I’d seen burning in her for weeks finally allowed to surface. I imagine the way her hands would come up to my chest, fingers curling into my shirt as she presses closer. The curve of her waist under my palm.
The way her body, lean and graceful, still carrying the tension of everything she’d survived, would melt against me once the walls crack completely.
The taste of her mouth, the faint scent of ginger tea, and whatever shampoo she uses in the guest suite, the small sound she might make in the back of her throat when the kiss turns hungry.
My grip tightens on the edge of the sink.
I can almost feel it. The press of her hips against mine, the way her breath would hitch when I back her gently against the wall, and the heat of her skin through the thin fabric of one of those oversized t-shirts she wears at night.
Young, fierce, and vulnerable, and far too sharp for her own good. The woman who handed me the USB drive like a weapon, who decoded Fadir’s desperate emails with ruthless precision, who laughed, genuinely laughed, at Arina’s teasing during Sunday dinner, is becoming my greatest distraction.
A low growl rumbles in my chest, full of desire and involuntary.
The sound startles me. I open my eyes and stare at my reflection again, jaw tight, water still tracing slow paths down my torso. The towel around my hips suddenly feels too constricting. Heat pools low in my stomach, unwanted and insistent.
This is dangerous.
I cleared her father’s debt because it was a loose end. I answered her questions about the Sokolovs because trust makes the long game smoother. I kept every interaction strictly professional because she is still reeling from betrayal, and I refuse to become another man who takes advantage.
Yet here I am, fresh out of the shower, imagining what it would feel like to kiss Anja Kuzmin until neither of us can remember the original deal.
I drag a hand through my damp hair, exhaling sharply.
Another shower is in order.
This one will need to be cold.
I turn the handle without hesitation, stepping back under the spray before the water has even finished warming.
The icy blast hits my shoulders like needles, shocking the heat out of my blood.
I brace one hand against the tiled wall and let the cold water pound against my skin, willing the unwanted images to dissolve.
Anja is a minion in the war against Fadir. Her trust is useful. Her insights are valuable. The pretend relationship exists only so he can watch everything he thinks he owns slip away while we appear to grow closer.
Nothing more.
The invisible wall between us remains.
I repeat the words like a mantra while the cold water sluices over me, chasing away the dangerous warmth that has no place in this arrangement.
By the time I step out again, skin prickling and mind clearer, the penthouse is still quiet. Anja is presumably in her suite across the hall, doors closed, boundaries intact.
I dress quickly in gray sweatpants and a black t-shirt, then head toward my office to bury myself in the next phase of Fadir’s dismantling.
The slow squeeze continues. Tonight, again, is still not the night anything changes between us.