25. Kirill
Kirill
When I return to the kitchen, Sandrine is waiting. Not just waiting, she’s standing at the window gazing into the courtyard. With no one else around, I study the curves of her hips, the swell of her breasts, and the gentle short waves of her blonde hair. Which suits her. Suits who she is today.
She belongs to me, but she doesn’t know how I fought for us or what being my wife means. It hits me all at once, like time folding in on itself, past and present collapsing into a single, disorienting moment.
For a second, it’s years back. She’s younger. I’m younger. She’s mine. And I’m hers. God, I thought that was enough. I was so wrong.
“Ready?” I ask, my voice deep.
Sandrine turns and smiles. A chill moves through me, subtle but unmistakable, raising the hairs along the back of my neck.
“Yeah.” She nods and tucks a purse under her arm.
Consumed with the details of tonight’s security needs, I just now notice what she’s wearing.
The cream-colored sweater dress molds to her body in ways I remember.
How each week the fabric stretched tighter and tighter as she grew with my child.
Those visceral memories were practically burned in my brain.
From the closet near the door, I grab the mink coat she never got to wear.
“This is yours.” I drop it on her shoulders. “I bought it for you shortly after Violet was born.”
She smooths the arms, then looks up at me. “It’s so soft. And warm.”
“I made a pledge that you would have the best of everything as my wife. To prove to your father and everyone else, I was proud that you were mine.”
“Did I ask for things like this?” She touches it again. “And the jewelry?”
“No,” I say sharply. “That’s what made you special. You asked for nothing. You loved me for me.”
Throat dry and tight, I step back and put up a thick blockade across my heart before I lose myself in the illusion that we are just picking up where we left off.
We step outside, and I let the bitter cold clear my head. My security detail, a line of black SUVs, idles in a formation. Sandrine pauses beside me, her gaze sweeping over them, her hand instinctively grabbing mine again.
Muscle memory.
Surprise flickers across her face. “All your guards are coming on the date?”
I glance at her, the corner of my mouth lifting. “Yes. Always. This is the life you knew waited for us.” There’s no apology in my tone. “It’s to keep us safe.”
She nods softly, and for a moment, I catch a glimpse of the woman who once belonged in this world.
And loved it. Loved me. I guide her toward my SUV, sitting in the middle of the formation.
My hand hovers at her back, resting softly, even though my muscle memory wants to press into her.
Show her what she’s doing to me all over again.
Inside the SUV, Sandrine’s thigh brushes mine. She’s sitting close enough that I can feel the warmth of her against my leg. It’s a small thing, but it lands like a whack to my system. It’s these small things I stopped hoping for.
“Where are we going?” she asks softly as the SUV accelerates down the driveway.
“A private dinner and then a surprise.”
“What kind of surprise?” She faces me.
“I can’t tell you.”
“Kidnapping me from another state, telling me I’m your wife, and that I had a child I don’t remember wasn’t enough of a surprise?”
Her humor makes me smile, although I guess it’s not funny. “Poor choice of words. Trust me.”
“Trust you?” she says, opening her mouth to perhaps deliver the same response with a different spin.
I do the only thing I can to stop it. I pull her into me and kiss her before I can overthink it. Sliding my hand around the back of her neck, I draw our mouths together, giving her the slightest chance to pull away.
She doesn’t. Her breath catches instead. My kiss isn’t rough, but it’s hungry. God, I was so hungry for her, and I didn’t even know it.
My tongue slips past the seam of her lips, and she lets me in. God, that little groan in her throat has my cock hard as iron. I can still hear the way she moaned for me in our bed. The taste of her is old, but her reaction is new.
I never kissed this woman.
Devouring her like this, the last five years fall away. But that’s a dangerous leap to make. When I break the kiss, we’re both breathing too hard for something so innocent.
I stare into her eyes, not sure what I’ll see there. “Are you mad I did that?” My thumb brushes her jaw while I hold her in place.
Eyes glassy, she whispers, “No, I liked it.”
“And there’s been no one else for you?” I ask.
She gives a soft laugh, the curve of her mouth pink from my kiss. “No. I was busy dealing with a skull fracture.”
“And I was dealing with a life fracture. We both lost you, Sandrine. And my priority was Violet.”
“She’s my priority now, too,” she says with strength. “You brought me here to be a mother. I expect to be one. Starting tomorrow. I want to be the one who wakes her up, gets her breakfast, takes her to school, and picks her up.”
“Slow down,” I say gently. “I hired a nanny for that. We’re still assessing the kind of therapy you need.”
She thinks about that. “This is the best I’ve felt in years. The strongest.”
“We are here, Pakhan,” the driver says.
I look up to see the side entrance to a restaurant where Drago and I conduct meetings. The owners give us privileges and don’t bother my guards who keep us safe.
“We can finish this conversation over dinner.” I squeeze Sandrine’s hand and help her out of the SUV.
“Good evening, Mr. Volkov.” The hostess greets us at the door. “Miss.”
Her smooth voice lifts Sandrine’s eyes. I watch for the flinch, a hint of jealousy or doubt. Jealousy, I don’t mind. Doubt has no place here.
Sandrine lifts her chin, proud to stand at my side. “Hello.”
“This is my wife,” I clarify. “You will greet her as Madam Volkov.”
“Madam,” the hostess corrects herself. “Your table is ready, Pakhan.”
Shoulders square, a calm acceptance settles over Sandrine. The same as when I told her she was to be my wife five years ago.
That’s right. Own it. Own me.
We’re led through a hallway to a private table tucked into the back. There, I hold out a chair for Sandrine, and she sits. Taking the seat across from her, I tell the hostess which bottle of wine to bring, but Sandrine shifts uncomfortably. I remember her medication.
“Scratch that,” I correct. “Just sparkling water.”
“Can I have a Coke?” Sandrine says, fiddling with the napkin.
She wasn’t even twenty-one when we… I can’t finish that thought. When we were in love.
“You were saying?” I sit back in the low glow of candlelight that gives the room quiet warmth and intimacy.
A mood I wasn’t expecting we’d reach so soon. But it feels right.
“This upheaval triggered something positive,” she says. “I feel better than I ever have.”
I tilt my head. “At this point in your recovery, you need a combination of therapy and independent living.”
She studies me. “You really looked all this up?”
I don’t admit that at first it felt like a burden. But the more I read, the more cases I reviewed, the more I learned about what Sandrine has been going through. The small details she wouldn’t think to confess.
“It may look like the brotherhood is my primary concern, but it was always you. And Violet.”
She thinks about that, and maybe it’s too soon to make her unpack what all this means. Instead, she says, “I lost a lot of progress being in Lakeshore for four years. Lourdes was in New York. In a bad marriage. I’m glad she found Ares.”
I dug up that situation and learned a local Chicago thug named David Sinclair who married Lourdes figured out I’d been looking for her sister. He tried to make a deal with me. But that got him killed, and his wife ended up married to Ares Zervas of all fucking people.
The God of War didn’t need anything from me. He staunchly refused to hand over Sandrine to me. He saw her as a fragile woman with no memory.
That’s not what I see now. That’s not who I’m with.
“I think we should approach your recovery very cautiously,” I say.
“Violet… I feel like she’s already changed my brain chemistry. Can I see more pictures of her growing up eventually?”
“Of course.” I lean back, warmed by her interest. My earlier worry she’d reject her own daughter now feels ridiculous.
She bites her lip and then, looking at me from under her lashes, asks, “Were you there in the hospital? When she was born?”
My gaze sharpens as possession coils low in my gut. “I was there. I watched her come out of you.”
Her eyes widen at that. “Do you have a video of that, too?”
“No,” I say with a wry smile. “But I can pull hospital footage.”
“That’s not necessary.” She shakes her head gently. “You have no reason to lie to me. Of all the people you could have dragged across several state lines to Chicago to be Violet’s mother.”
“Dragged?” I repeat, the word tasting bitter in my mouth.
“I’m making a point,” she says quickly. “Kirill, I’m disabled. I can’t even drive a car.”
“I taught you to drive,” I counter immediately, the memory of what we did in that closed parking lot vivid in my mind.
Her brows lift in surprise. “You did?”
“Yes, I did.” I hold her gaze. “You have a driver’s license.”
She exhales, the frustration of what she’s missed out on evident in a way I hadn’t noticed before. “I can’t drive with my condition. I have panic attacks and get dizzy occasionally from the stress. Plus, the medication—”
“You’ll have a driver,” I say, cutting her off.
Her jaw drops open, but she slaps her lips closed. I see the shift in her thinking, and I brace for a question I know I won’t like.
“Are you sorry it’s me?” she asks, softer now. “Given what I am now?”
My breath escapes me. “I’m going to get you the best care,” I say.
Her gaze lingers on me, searching for more. “You didn’t answer my question.”
I put up a finger for a moment to think. It’s not coming to me immediately because it’s not just about me and what I want. I have a daughter to consider. But I’ve seen nothing, other than how she turned inside herself yesterday, to make me think she’s unstable.