Chapter 51 #2
That gets an actual laugh out of him. Low. Brief. Mean enough to make me want to throw something.
I turn my head and glare up at him. “Don’t laugh at me.”
“You are lying naked in my bed pouting because I won’t take you to work with me.”
I cross my arms under the pillow. “I’m not pouting.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
He just looks at me.
The worst part is, I know exactly how I sound. Clingy. Ridiculous. Like some pathetic little thing who can’t stand the idea of a few hours without him.
I hate that too.
Except with him, the feeling doesn’t come with shame the way it should. It comes with something worse.
Safety.
He makes me feel safe enough to be embarrassing. Which is probably its own kind of sickness.
I look away first. “Fine.”
His hand slides over my spine, slow and absentminded, like he knows I’ll calm down if he touches me long enough.
Cheater.
“You’ll survive lunch with two pregnant women,” he says.
I blink and look back at him. “They’re not that pregnant.”
“Tell that to Adriana when she decides she wants something specific and no one understands her fast enough.”
A snort slips out of me before I can stop it. “You’ve been talking to Angelo.”
“Da.”
His mouth twitches again, victorious now that he’s dragged me out of my sulk.
“I still want to go with you,” I mutter.
He leans down, presses a kiss to my shoulder, then another just below it. “No.”
I sigh into the pillow like the world is ending. He smacks my ass again, lighter this time.
“Get your ass ready,” he says. “Before you know it, Vasilisa and Adriana will be here, and then I’ll have to hear about how you made them wait.”
I rub the spot and glare at him over my shoulder. “You’re horrible.”
“Da.”
“Arrogant.”
“Da.”
“Annoying.”
This time he kisses the center of my back, mouth lingering just long enough to make my skin prickle.
“Da.”
My heart does something stupid.
I roll onto my side to look at him properly.
He’s already standing now, reaching for his jeans, all hard lines and tattoos and the kind of masculine certainty that makes a room feel smaller around him. There’s still a mark on his throat from me. My heart flutters.
I watch him dress in silence for a second, memorizing without meaning to.
The cut of his shoulders. The flex of muscle under skin. The way he tucks his gun on like it belongs there as naturally as a watch or a wallet.
Something uneasy moves through me.
Small. Cold. Sharp enough to catch.
Maybe he sees it on my face, because he looks over and his expression shifts. He comes back to the bed without a word, hooks a hand behind my neck, and kisses me once.
Then again, slower this time.
When he pulls away, his forehead brushes mine for half a second.
“I’ll be back,” he says.
I swallow.
“Okay.”
His thumb strokes once along my jaw, then he straightens and heads for the door.
At the last second I call after him, “If they make me eat something green, I’m blaming you.”
He doesn’t turn around, but I hear the smile in his voice.
“Be difficult. I like you like that.”
Then he’s gone.
And the room feels too quiet without him in it.
I sit up and run my fingers through my hair, wincing when they catch.
My phone starts ringing.
I glance toward the nightstand and almost smile. Maksim must have forgotten something again.
I grab it and answer without checking the screen. “What did you forget?”
A low chuckle slides down the line.
“Oh, Tavsan… so domestic.”
My blood goes cold.
Gabriel.
My fingers tighten around the phone. I drag the sheet higher over my chest on pure instinct, my stomach turning as I jerk a look at the screen.
Unknown number.
Fuck.
“Wrong number,” I say coldly. “Unless you’re finally ready to stop hiding and let Maksim find you.”
A beat of silence stretches between us.
Then Gabriel laughs softly. “Still pretending he can protect you from everything?”
I clutch the sheet. “You sound desperate.”
“No, Tavsan. I sound informed.”
“Don’t call me that. Men who are informed usually don’t need blocked numbers.”
His chuckle is quiet. Mean. “And yet you answered like a wife waiting for her husband.”
My jaw locks.
He keeps going before I can cut in. “Tell me—do Maksim’s men know who you are now?”
I go still.
That pleases him. I can hear it.
“Did you enjoy that little slip?” he huffs out a laugh. “Now they all know exactly who they let into their Pakhan’s bed. Exactly who he chose to keep close. Exactly who can be used against him.”
“Well, your little plan didn’t work. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t I?” he asks. “How long before they stop smiling in your face and start thinking clearly? How long before they realize their great, fearsome leader is dragging a weak point around by the hand?”
My grip tightens on the phone. “I’m not weak, and they accept me.”
“Acceptance is cheap,” Gabriel says. “Men like that will tolerate anything their Pakhan puts in front of them until it starts to cost them.”
I swallow hard. “Unlike you, Maksim can actually control his men.”
“That isn’t control.”
“Of course you wouldn’t recognize it,” I snap. “You’ve never controlled a fucking thing in your life.”
He hums, unbothered. “It means they do not follow him because they respect him. They obey because they fear him. That is not loyalty, Ayla. That is compliance.” His voice cools. “And compliance cracks the second men think their leader has let filth too close.”
My stomach turns cold.
“Go fuck yourself.”
“Do you really think men like that want someone like you in their house?” he asks softly. “In his bed?”
I say nothing.
“You think they want Turkish trash warming their Pakhan’s sheets?”
The word hits like a slap.
“You don’t get to talk to me like that.”
“But that’s what you are, isn’t it?” he says. “Or did you forget where you came from?”
Rage flashes hot enough to make my hand shake.
“He chose me.”
Gabriel laughs under his breath. “For now.”
My jaw locks so hard it aches.
“You really don’t understand men like him,” he says. “Men like Maksim don’t elevate girls like you. They use them. They keep them close until the smell starts offending everyone else in the room.”
My chest goes tight with something ugly and hot.
“You don’t know anything about him.”
“No?” he murmurs. “Then tell me, when he put a bullet in Ali, were you there?”
Everything in me stops. For one second, I forget how to breathe. He hears it.
Of course he hears it.
And suddenly his voice is smiling. “I thought so.”
Ice crawls down my spine.
“How do you know that?” I whisper, before I can stop myself.
Gabriel ignores the question completely. “Ali was the only man who ever bothered showing you kindness, and Maksim murdered him right in front of you.”
“You don’t get to say his name.”
“Did you forgive him for that too?” he asks. “Or did you just decide your cunt mattered more than your memory?”
My vision blurs at the edges with fury.
“Keep Ali out of your mouth.”
“Ali gave you water,” he says, calm as ever. “Food. Small mercies, when no one else cared whether you starved. And you crawled into the bed of the man who killed him.”
My whole body feels hot and cold at once.
“You don’t know anything,” I bite out, because it’s all I have.
“I know enough,” Gabriel says. “Enough to know what you are. Enough to know he hates our kind, and still you spread yourself open and call it, what? Love?”
“You know nothing about love.”
“Did you really think that would make you the exception?” His voice drops lower. Crueler. “Did you think fucking a Russian would wash the filth out of you?”
“Go fuck yourself, Gabriel.”
“I’m serious,” he says, and that almost makes it worse. “You are the sort of thing powerful men enjoy in private and cut loose the second it costs them too much.”
My teeth grind together.
He lets the silence breathe just long enough to make the next words land.
“Did you really think you were different?”
Something hot and humiliating flashes through me. I shove it down so hard it hurts.
“You don’t know anything about us.”
Another soft laugh. “Us.”
I hate how he says it. Like the word itself is ridiculous.
“You really have grown attached.” His voice drops, silk over a blade. “Tell me, did he finally make you believe you’re more than a whore he keeps coming back to?”
My blood boils.
“Did he tell you he loves you?”
The room goes very still. He hears it, the way my breath hitches.
“Didn’t think so.”
“Shut up.”
“Do you say it to him?” he continues, relentless now, each word chosen to humiliate. “You give and give and spread your legs and play at belonging, and for what? A bed to warm? A leash with prettier stitching?”
Rage hits so hard I almost shake with it.
“At least I know what you are,” I snap. “A coward hiding behind fake numbers and cheap little mind games because you know if Maksim gets his hands on you, you’re dead.”
He goes quiet for a second.
Not wounded. Measuring.
“Nice to see you’ve grown a backbone now that you think you have protection.”
“I’ve always had one. You were just too stupid to notice.”
“No,” he says. “You were just easier to break then.”
I close my eyes for one second. Breathe in. Out.
When I speak again, my voice is ice. “Tell us where you are.”
“What?”
“You heard me. If you’re so sure of yourself, stop calling and come out. Maksim is going to kill you anyway. You can die fast, or you can die slow.”
For the first time, something in his voice sharpens.
“You think I’m hiding?”
“I know you are.”
“No, Tavsan.” His tone lowers, turns almost thoughtful. “I’m building.”
A prickle runs down the back of my neck.
“When I come for him,” he says, “it won’t matter how tightly he keeps you. No one will protect you then.”
It sounds like a bluff.
It probably is a bluff.
But probably is not the same thing as definitely. So I make myself laugh. Cold. Disbelieving. Mean.
“You should work on that before making threats. I almost believed you for a second.”
He doesn’t answer right away.
And suddenly I know that’s the point. Not to convince me fully. Just to leave the door cracked.
I refuse to give him that satisfaction.
“Your hatred is making you weaker, brother,” I spit coldly. “Still so angry? Why? Because Baba killed your mother in retaliation?”
I smile, vicious and without humor. “Well, retaliation is coming. And when Maksim guts you, I’ll be there to watch the life drain from your eyes.”
Then I hang up before he can answer, pulse hammering, fury burning hotter than fear.