Chapter 10 Konstantin
KONSTANTIN
She looks at me like I’ve grown another head.
I don’t blame her.
Even as the words leave my mouth, I realize how absurd they sound—asking the woman I bought, the woman I backed into a gilded prison with a contract and a last name she didn’t ask for, to help me do something no one else has the balls or loyalty to attempt.
She freezes in place, her wrist still in my hand. Her pulse thrums beneath my thumb—fast.
She doesn’t ask me what kind of help. Not yet. She just looks at me, waiting, suspicious, guarded as hell—and so goddamn beautiful I have to remind myself not to stare too long at her mouth.
That mouth. I remember how it tasted last night.
How she sounded when she came against my tongue, her back arched, her fingers tangled in my hair like she didn’t want to let go.
I hadn’t meant to touch her like that. I hadn’t meant to need it.
But something about her—something in the way she defies me even when she’s trembling—makes me reckless.
“I need your help,” I say again, voice low just so I can break the tension pulsing between us. What is it about her that makes me lose control? Why do I feel this way?
She stares at me like I’ve just confessed to murder.
“What?” she breathes. “Help with what?”
I let go of her wrist slowly, deliberately. My hand falls to my side, but I don’t move back. She’s standing, I’m standing—we’re eye to eye, the space between us crackling.
“To bring my father down,” I say.
She blinks. Once. Twice. “You want me to help you…with that?”
“Yes.”
Her mouth opens, but nothing comes out. She’s too smart to play dumb, but I can see her searching for the angle, the why, the part where this turns into a trap.
I give her none of it.
“My father wants me gone,” I say. “He has for a long time.”
Her expression shifts, slowly, lips parting as something cold and sharp sets into her voice. “You think he put the hit on you?”
I hold her gaze. “I don’t think,” I say. “I know.”
We stand like that, in silence, the truth heavy between us.
For a second, I think she’s going to laugh, or turn away, or ask me if I’ve lost my mind.
But she doesn’t. She just keeps looking at me, the pieces starting to move behind her eyes—faster than most people ever put them together.
And I know she understands something now.
“You’re serious,” she says finally.
I nod once. “Deadly.”
She exhales through her nose, glancing off to the side, jaw set. “And you thought asking your bride—who you don’t know, who you bought—was a good place to start?”
“I thought asking the one person here who doesn’t owe my father a damn thing was smarter than trusting anyone who does.”
She’s quiet.
I can feel her heartbeat in the air between us, fast and uneven. She crosses her arms, but it’s not defensive—it’s grounding. She’s thinking, not retreating.
“I don’t even know what you’re planning,” she says.
“You don’t need to. Not yet.”
Her eyes snap back to mine. “That’s not how trust works.”
I step closer. “Trust doesn’t work at all. It just happens. Or it doesn’t.”
She studies me—really studies me. I let her. Let her search for weakness, deception, cracks in the armor. There’s nothing left to hide. Not about this.
“If he wants me dead, he’ll try again,” I say. “And I won’t be so lucky every time.”
I see a shudder go through her. She may pretend she doesn’t care, but she does.
“And you want me to stop him?” she asks, brow arched.
“No,” I say. “I want you to help me beat him.”
She flinches. Not visibly. Just a small shift in her stance. But I see it.
I press in anyway. “You’re here. You’re already in the middle of it. And I think you’ve got more to gain than you’re letting on.”
A pause.
Then she says, quietly, “You have no idea what I have to lose.”
The sun’s higher now, spilling hot light across the back of the property. I’m behind the house, the old training range tucked beneath a row of cypress trees, quiet and isolated. The kind of place where I can hear myself think, and more importantly—shut the fuck up and focus.
I reload slowly, sliding the magazine in with practiced ease. The dummy downrange is tattered from years of use—patched, repainted, but still standing. Like most things in my life.
“You told her what?” Lev’s voice comes from behind me.
I don’t answer.
I line up the sights.
Exhale.
“Konstantin.”
I squeeze the trigger. The shot rips through the dummy’s shoulder.
“She’s smart, but that doesn’t mean she’s ready,” Lev continues. “You sure it was a good idea to get her involved?”
I lower the gun, click the safety, let the silence stretch.
“She’s already in it,” I say quietly, watching the dummy sway. “Whether she likes it or not.”
Lev exhales. I don’t need to turn to know he’s shaking his head, arms probably crossed like he wants to lecture me. But he doesn’t push. Not this time.
I raise the gun again.
Nadya’s face flashes in my mind—not the way she looked when she was under me last night, or even at the table this morning. I see her the second before the first shot was fired. The way her eyes cut to the window. The way her body moved—fast, grounded, instinctive.
I close my eyes.
Exhale.
Pull the trigger again.
A perfect hit—right where the throat would be.
She doesn’t behave like a Bratva princess. She doesn’t act like someone raised to be seen, not heard. She isn’t soft. Or docile. Or clueless.
There’s something she’s not telling me. A piece of her past that doesn’t fit the polished image Pyotr Makarov pretended to auction.
And I’m going to find out what it is.
Because if I’m trusting her to stand beside me when the knives come out—
I need to know exactly where hers are hidden.