Chapter 25
SERGEI
Leo was gone.
I hadn’t fully come awake yet, but I already felt his absence next to me.
Last night we’d fallen asleep wrapped up in each other, but as I reached across the bed to confirm whether he was still there, I came up empty.
My hand stilled there for a moment, fingers brushing against nothing but cool sheets, before I forced myself to keep moving.
I found my phone after a second pass under my pillow, dragged it out, and squinted at the screen.
“Fuck.”
It was unlike me to sleep this late. Every morning at six, I ran.
Five miles, same route carved into muscle memory.
It didn’t matter if it was raining or snowing, if I’d slept two hours or six.
I ran because it kept everything else in line.
It was the start I needed to structure my day.
Anything else could go wrong or fall off schedule, but I needed that one thing to remain the same.
Except today.
I pushed myself up onto my elbows, my gaze sweeping the room in a quick, practiced assessment that had nothing to do with security and everything to do with denial. Because I still wanted to be wrong and for him to be somewhere else in the bedroom.
He was not.
The sheets on his side of the bed were cold, which meant he had been gone for some time.
Not just a quick trip to the bathroom, then.
Of course he’d left while I was sleeping.
A humorless breath left me, more exhale than laugh, really.
I dropped my head for a second, staring down at the mattress as if it might offer some explanation where one wasn’t really needed.
This wasn’t new. Leo had done this before.
The last time we had sex, the second I turned my back, he’d run out on me.
I still had no idea where he’d fled to, and he was already pulling this stunt again.
How much longer did I have to put up with this game of him pulling my strings?
He controlled everything about our sex life, whether we had one or not, when it started, and when it ended.
And I let him.
I let him because I didn’t want to push too much and because I was being sensitive about his husband’s death, when in truth, I didn’t care one fuck about Bradley. It was good the bastard was dead, or I wouldn’t have met Leo, and that would have been fucking awful.
Leo had gotten under my skin like no one else had.
But would he ever like me a little? I wasn’t stupid enough to think that the incredible sex was enough to carry a relationship.
If he didn’t start caring about me half as much as I did him, everything I’d been doing to win him over would be in vain.
I’d thought last night would be different. The sex hadn’t just been skin against skin. Our sex had been deeper, more meaningful, and I’d felt it in my soul.
But I’m wrong. Leo obviously doesn’t give a shit about me.
I dragged a hand over my face, shunning the thought before it could settle too deeply. Last night was different. He might deny it, but I’d seen the way he looked at me, felt the way his hands lingered on my body, the way he kissed me over and over again like he couldn’t get enough.
Unless I’d imagined that too. Maybe all of it was wishful thinking, and somewhere, Leo was having a good laugh at the way I always fell so easily for him.
“Idiot,” I muttered, my voice low in the empty room. I wasn’t sure if I meant him or me. More than likely me.
I sat there a moment longer than necessary, listening. The silence pressed in from all sides, thick and absolute. There was no movement downstairs that I could hear. No running water. No quiet sounds of someone moving through the house.
I got up because there was always the possibility—little, though it might be—that I was wrong.
I went through the motions in the bathroom on instinct alone.
Took a piss, brushed my teeth, rinsed my mouth out harder than necessary like I could scrub the frustration from the back of my throat.
Water hit my face next, so cold it forced me to suck in a breath, and I braced my hands on the edge of the sink, staring at my reflection.
The same face and expression stared back at me, but inside, I wasn’t the same man. Leo’s actions hurt, and the worst part was that he didn’t even seem to care. The only one who mattered to him was his precious Brad.
Fuck.
I hated feeling jealous over a dead man because I couldn’t do anything about it. After a second, I straightened up and forced my teeth to unclench.
I’m not giving up. Not by a long shot.
Those feelings that had emanated from Leo last night had to be real.
No one could fake such passion. He was just scared, and I needed to be patient with him.
He’d spent over a decade loving that asshole, after all.
Leo was a decent man. I wouldn’t feel the way I did about him if he was any other way, and a part of me grudgingly respected that he wasn’t so fickle as to move on at the drop of a hat.
I only needed that level of devotion to be directed at me. Once I had it, I knew he’d be locked in for life. The thought of having Leo as mine made my eyes prick with tears, but I didn’t cry because it wasn’t wired in my DNA.
The stairs creaked faintly under my weight as I headed down. I didn’t rush, even though I felt the urge to. I kept my pace steady, my breathing even, like this was just another morning. I stepped into the kitchen and stopped.
Empty.
My gut felt even more hollow, and it wasn’t due to a need for food, although my stomach was grumbling. There was no sign of him. No evidence that he’d lingered even a second longer than necessary.
Before Leo, I’d never realized how alone I was. I worked for Maxim and had several men who reported to me, but I’d never really connected with anyone on a personal level. His absence reminded me of how empty my life had been before him.
I leaned back against the counter, the cool surface pressing into my spine as my gaze moved slowly over the room. The place looked exactly as it did the day I’d bought it—clean but so damn empty. Not even a chair to sit on. There was nothing that suggested someone actually lived here.
I filled my lungs with air, then expelled it with as much force as I could muster.
What the hell had I expected from him? I’d brought him here.
To a place that didn’t offer anything but a fuck on a mattress on a floor.
No warmth. No comfort. No reason for someone like Leo to stay longer than he absolutely had to.
I should have made the place more presentable for him.
“Yeah,” I muttered under my breath, scrubbing a hand over the back of my neck. “Real inviting.”
My phone rang, the sound cutting through the quiet, and the device vibrated in my hand. For a split second, hope surged in my chest, but it wasn’t Leo. Maxim’s name flashed across the screen, and I deflated.
I answered anyway. “Yes?”
“You didn’t think to tell me what happened last night?”
He went straight to the point without preamble, and there was no room to pretend I didn’t know exactly what he was talking about.
I dragged my hand down my face slowly. “It was late. I was being considerate.”
“And you couldn’t have called first thing this morning?”
“I’m just getting out of bed,” I mumbled.
“What’s that?”
“I said I’m just getting out of bed,” I repeated louder.
“You’re always up by six. Did something happen? Are you hurt?”
His question should have been comforting that someone actually cared about me, but I already knew that about Maxim.
When I’d been reckless in the past, he would always say that he saved my life, and if I wanted to thank him, I’d better stay alive.
That was all he asked. And so for a while—years—I breathed only because Maxim expected me to.
For the first time, I longed to breathe for someone else.
“It was a long night,” I said with a sigh. “We should talk in person.”
There was a brief pause on the other end, and I could practically feel his irritation through the silence. “What’s going on with you, Sergei? I feel like you’ve been distracted lately.”
Because I am.
But that wasn’t something you admitted to your boss.
“I’ll send you the location of where to meet,” I said. It was a decoy address that actually meant the emergency facility we had. Only a few people in our organization knew about it, and only those directly involved in Maxim’s personal security.
“Fine. I don’t know what the hell is going on with you, Sergei, but you need to get your head in the game. This isn’t the time to be distracted.”
The call ended, and I lowered the phone, my grip lingering on it a second longer than necessary as the quiet settled back in around me. If Maxim noticed I was distracted, then this thing with Leo must be affecting me more than I’d thought.
The sound of the front door opening crept into the kitchen, and I held my breath. Unhurried footsteps shuffled in the emptiness. No one else but Jess knew about this place yet, which meant…
Leo.
He walked into the kitchen like nothing had happened, like he hadn’t left me alone in a bed that still smelled like him. He was wearing a pair of my joggers and one of my T-shirts. Paper bags hung from his hands, and he was already talking as he crossed the threshold.
“You don’t have anything worth eating in the fridge, and your pantry’s literally empty,” he said, emphasizing the word “literally” as he set the bags down on the counter with a soft rustle.
“I checked. And please tell me you’re not the one drinking all that beer in the fridge? Because it’s not good—”
I closed the distance between us before he could finish. My arms went around him, pulling him in tight, the movement instinctive and a little too forceful, but I couldn’t let go. He hadn’t run out on me again.
Leo froze, but not in a stiff, resistant kind of way. He seemed more surprised at the unexpected hug.
“Sergei, what’s going on?” he asked. “You’re squeezing the stuffing out of me.”