Chapter 25
Nika
Shit.
Max meets my gaze from across the smoggy living room. “The snow on the roof must have blocked off the chimney.” I spin toward my closet and start grabbing clean clothes, pulling on socks, long johns, leggings, a tank top, a cashmere sweater, and then a wool coat.
Once finished, I pivot to find Max and face off with the expanding wall of black that’s begun creeping from the living room into other areas of the house.
The taste of mildew and musk coats my mouth and throat, growing thicker with each passing second.
Ducking down, I try to squint through the haze. I spot a pair of ambulatory snow pants near the front door, where the smoke swirls and thins.
Crawling seems the safest way through, though I can’t remember if CO2 is heavier or lighter than air. Am I just trading an obvious threat for an invisible one? The alarms should go off at any moment. I’m not excited about that loud, blaring confusion.
Covering my mouth, I hold my breath until I reach the door and discover Max pulling a boot over his wonky ankle.
“What are you doing?” The cleaner air helps to clear the fog that started building in my head. Either that or the slap of cold.
Max finishes snapping the hood flap over his mouth, which hides everything but his eyes. Compared to their icy blue, outside is practically balmy. “I’m going up on the roof. There—”
“You don’t know anything about chimneys.” At least, I can’t imagine Roman includes Basic Chimney Sweeping 101 in his murderer training. I try to push Max away from the door so I can get to the snow gear I store in the coat closet.
“And you don’t know anything about me.” He glares, forcing the door out of my hands.
The declaration gives me pause. Despite everything we’ve been through the last few nights and the dossier I have on him, he’s right. I’ve no idea how skilled he is at home maintenance. I guess he did manage to fix the electricity.
We’re strangers hellbent on destroying each other without understanding who the other really is.
“I don’t suppose you have a flamethrower?”
My train of thought skitters, slides off the rails, and crashes into the woods where it ignites. “What?”
Did he say flamethrower?
He skirts past me into the gale. “I guess I’ll do it the hard way then.”
The wind tries to slam the door shut, but I catch it automatically. The room still needs the smoke cleared and the air refreshed, no matter the temperature or how long it takes to warm the house afterward.
While I’m struggling with that, Max trudges over to the side of the house, a dark shape against white chaos. Despite the way the wind whips at him, he plods forward, breaking a line in waist-high snow.
With every step, he gets taller, then shorter. Then he disappears altogether.
For a few moments, I listen to the shrieking wind. Then I glance up. Is that the groan of pine trees or the moan of an overloaded roof?
Could heavy snow piles actually cause the house to cry out?
Long minutes pass.
With a fwump, a pile of snow shifts off the roof and plummets to the driveway. Another clump follows.
Sure signs of Max making his way across the house.
Or maybe that was actually a snow-covered Max hitting the ground.
Squinting against the driving flurries, I try to make out any movements in the white. Slithering noise overhead warns me to step back inside as another dislodged load falls from the roof and lands at the door.
He’s still up there, alive and fighting.
The fwumps continue their way toward the chimney.
Considering the height of the snow piles, I’m not sure he can even see it.
It’s not until the smoke in the house starts truly thinning that I realize he’s accomplished his task. Within seconds, I can see the fireplace again. The embers glow cheerily in the hearth, oblivious to everything else.
Still, Max doesn’t come down as clangs and thumps vibrate through the house.
No longer fearing death by asphyxiation, I close the door and wait, worrying my bottom lip between my teeth.
Frozen like the little girl on the island fifteen years ago.
With every strange thud, my heart stops. I twitch at each scrape against the roof. After the fifteenth or so time, my brain finally starts functioning again.
Mad Max Belov is braving a blizzard to clear the snow off my roof and ensure my house stays safe and warm. He could have just killed me, stolen my truck, and left.
The blizzard gives him the perfect reason to return to Chicago. I can just imagine the excuse he’d offer Roman.
They stopped answering. Must have fallen victim to the storm. We should regroup at the mansion and wait for them to contact us.
I’m sure the news is reporting how many cars have disappeared, their occupants likely missing until the spring thaw.
It’d be so simple to explain away.
Instead, he’s staying. Helping.
Hell, he could just use the snow to block all the doors and windows and then let the bad air finish me off.
He’s had a million chances to torture and kill me. Yet all he’s actually done is wreck my safe house and drive me crazy with his touch. Upon reflection, I’ve had no real torment, and I’m perfectly alive and well-fed.
What does he want from me?
What do I want from him?
Why do I care?
The thoughts constrict my chest.
Needing to distract myself, I go back to the fireplace. Once the chimney’s cleared, I can build up the fire again. I coax the embers into flame with three fresh logs.
Then I seize the opportunity to get a quick shower.
Running for the bathroom, I wash quickly and brush my tangled hair. Once that’s done and I pull the damp strands up into a tight ponytail, I finally feel like myself.
When I enter the living room again, I freeze.
Max hovers behind the couch, blood trickling from an oddly pale cut on his forehead. The red mixes with snow and drips down his cheeks in thin pink lines.
His features are stone until his eyes meet mine. Then he nods, steps around the couch, and collapses to the side as his ankle gives out.
I move toward him without thinking.
He catches himself on the arm of the couch and turns his fall into a slide onto the cushions. Sinking down into the seat, he relaxes. A dark, wet lock of hair sits plastered against his forehead, coated with snow and blood.
My hand reaches out of its own volition and gently brushes that hair aside. The gash isn’t deep, it continues to bleed as he thaws out. How did he end up with this?
“Max?”
His head lifts, and his eyelids flutter open. Those pale eyes find mine, cold and distant at first, but then a hint of relief flickers in them. “Nika. It’s warm. That’s…nice.”
A half-hysterical, half-genuine laugh bubbles up at the situation’s absurdity. We’ve been fighting each other—hell, trying to kill each other—for days, and he says that’s nice? Is he delirious?
I kneel in front of him, inspecting every line on his face.
The intensity of all the things he’s done hits me at once. Restraining me, interrogating me, touching me, breaking me down piece by piece…
As well as the things he didn’t do.
He didn’t claim my virginity when he found out. I did that.
And the revelation shook him. I’m not sure why, but he practically froze as soon as he realized. Let me take what I wanted but refused to do more.
He fed me, cared for me, let me stretch and work out.
Not only did he not tie me up and leave me while smoke filled the room, but he went onto the roof in a blizzard to clear off the snow.
Which version of this man is the real Max Belov?
He appears before me as if for the first time. Everything until now—the violence, fury, and desire—was just a prologue to this moment. “Who are you?”
He shifts on the couch, his face twisted in discomfort. Then he sighs. “I’m the guy who killed his baby brother and sister.”
“Oh, Max…” The words escape before I can stop them. Worse, they come out…soft. So unlike me and everything I’ve trained to become.
Sympathy is a crutch for the weak. Dimitri taught me that. I cannot be weak.
But I do feel sorry for the man before me, and I don’t believe the truth is as blatant as he’s stated. It’s like how he said he killed his mother.
Max is not a killer. Not like that.
I don’t doubt he feels guilt and crushing responsibility, but I no longer believe he murdered his mom.
Not intentionally. Not the way he makes it sound.
He’s too loyal. The man has devoted his entire life to the concept of family, albeit a broken, criminal one like Roman’s.
Loyalty like that isn’t a learned behavior. It’s a core, fundamental belief that sprouts from valuing family above all else.
A little twinge of solidarity blooms in my chest, buzzing under my skin.
His pain runs as deep and pure as mine. We’re mirrors. Broken reflections of each other, both carrying the weight of dead loved ones.
In the growing silence between us, I’m not sure what to say. I want to ask, but I don’t because I need to still view this man as my enemy.
Unless I can turn him into an ally against Roman. Would that even be possible?
“Joy to the world, the Lord has come…”
Music carries over the mountains, clearer than the words of the song. Then they’re both lost in the wind before a few final notes ring out.
What is that sound? Is this what dying feels like?
Every now and then, when the wind is just right, noise from the town below will drift up to us. They must be having some kind of Christmas festival.
This stronghold remains disconnected from the world, but for a few fleeting moments, the emotions from outside filter in here.
Through the dark, cold, snowy night comes the puerile hopes and joys of seasonal miracles.
A ghost from a childhood I never really got to enjoy. For the last fifteen years, Christmas has been just another day in the endless cycle of survival. Another reminder of everything normal people have that I never will again.
Because Roman stole that from me, along with everything else, leaving only my rage and my lifelong mission to make him understand what that loss feels like.
Considering what he’s said, I’m sure the song’s lyrics hit Max the same way.
They’re a painful reminder of the family he lost, the youth that ended in the kind of trauma that transforms eight-year-olds into weapons.
The carol comes and goes again, vanishing quicker than the wind and leaving us in stagnant silence.
Max scrunches his eyes closed. Then, he relaxes. His breathing slows and deepens as sleep pulls him under.
I guess not even Mad Max can stay a monster for so many days on end. He pushed himself past every limit and finally stopped fighting.
His legs droop, and his arms fall into his lap. He’s completely out.
I stand slowly, my knees protesting. Hell, everything is protesting except for Max. I don’t even get a twitch in response when I nudge him with my foot and poke his hand.
I’m upright, fully dressed, and unbound with an unconscious captor.
For the first time in days, I’m completely free.
The locket is right within reach. I could take it. Should take it.
The urge to grab the necklace and disappear into the night hits me like a physical blow, propelling me forward.
If I walked out and left the door open, he’d die of exposure in hours. I’ll have what’s mine. What I’ve been working for all these years.
I could finally cut all ties with my former life.
All ties…
Including Max.
I…don’t want that.
Especially if I could stay, and through some miracle, have both. He was listening to me, hearing me out.
For the first time, I have a chance to form a real connection. I can’t waste this opportunity.
All I can see is the blood on his forehead. The dark circles under his eyes that speak of days without restful sleep.
All I can taste is the heady edge of violence and pain that resides in his kisses.
All I can hear is the harsh pull of his ragged and uneven breathing.
I have a choice to make.