Chapter 16
Alina
The throbbing of my headache intensifies as little glimpses of the shooting come flooding back to me in my dreams. The gunfire, like a storm ripping the sky open.
Concrete biting my knees. Dominik’s body hitting mine, rolling me under him, the world strobing white-hot around us.
His weight, his heat, the force of his breath against my cheek.
The wet warmth of blood that wasn’t mine soaking through fabric and skin.
A kiss that set my soul on fire and remains burning long after it was over.
Everything aches from where Dominik threw himself over me as I sit upright in the chair where I spent the night. I open my eyes and turn my head to find him still asleep in his bed, right where he’s been since he started running a fever.
Yelena came over and checked his wound. She scolded me like it was my fault it got infected, gave him a shot, and then left me with more antibiotics Dominik needs to continue taking by mouth.
Despite his shivering last night, she left his chest bare, the bandage clean and tight on his side.
His face is slack as he finally sleeps soundly with a line of stubble darkening his jaw.
At least he’s no longer mumbling nonsense or trembling the way he was a few hours ago.
His skin looks pale, but he’s on the mend, or so the doctor claims—though barely.
I hang on to her confidence because I don’t have any of my own left.
The sight of him vulnerable—after a night of fever and shivering—does something complicated to my chest. There’s still fear, yes.
And gratitude so sharp it hurts. There’s also anger, hot enough to scorch through both.
And under it all, the terrible awareness that when he covered me with his body, when he grunted with pain and didn’t move off me until the firing stopped, something in me made a choice I didn’t want to make.
Not about right or wrong but about whom I can trust to keep me safe.
A trust that had me kissing him back like the world was ending and we had to live like there’s no tomorrow. One of two kisses I replayed over and over again in my head, and in my dreams, thinking about what would have happened if we hadn’t…
“Stop,” I whisper to myself because I don’t trust myself not to reach for him again now. “Just… stop.”
Dominik needs to heal, so I shouldn’t want to see him all worked up again, pinning me to the wall, making me feel the swipe of his tongue between my legs where his fingers were the other night.
No man has ever made me feel so much in such a short amount of time or made me feel like we were the only two people in the world.
I get to my feet and stretch my arms over my head, still feeling dazed. My muscles all protest, stiff and shaky from hours of sitting in the cramped chair. It’s better than no sleep at all in a soft bed without him nearby.
Cinnamon coffee with lots of vanilla creamer would be a welcome treat right now.
Not because I’m tired—I am—but because something about the ritual would just make the day feel more normal.
I glance back to watch the rise and fall of Dominik’s chest, ensuring it’s steady before I exhale and slip from the room.
I pad toward the kitchen quietly on bare feet, afraid I might wake him with even my soft footsteps.
The first thing I see when I reach my destination is the necklace on the island glistening with the reminder of Dominik’s offer.
Turning away, I face the fancy coffee machine that’s a reminder of my stupidity.
It’s hard to believe that it was just a few days ago when I pretended I didn’t know how to work a coffee machine to distract a guard and steal his keycard.
Deep down, I knew I wouldn’t be able to escape.
I just had to test the theory to know for certain.
And now…well, now I’m glad that I failed because the time I’ve spent with Dominik has come to mean more than I expected.
He makes me feel important in a world that’s tried its best to forget I exist. He sees me when I’ve spent most of my life on the run with Archer, trying to be invisible.
Dominik would come after me every time I tried something ridiculous, not send one of his guards to drag me back, because for some reason he cares about me.
Speaking of guards…I know they must be lurking nearby, worried about their injured boss. I glance around and find one standing against the wall of the living room, silently staring at his phone.
Apparently, I’m no longer as much of a flight risk.
There are deep voices coming from the study, probably Viktor and Petrov who rarely left the other side of Dominik’s bedroom door last night.
I take a few steps closer to the door once I have a full mug of steaming coffee.
It’s wide open, so they must not be discussing anything too secretive.
Still, my ears strain to hear their words, which are just a grumbling whisper.
They must not know I’m lurking around or I’m certain they would be speaking in Russian instead of English.
“…doctor said no exertion for a week, but we have to find him and the guns now, today,” one says, accent thick.
“He’ll move anyway,” the other answers. “You know he only sits still when he’s plotting how to ruin someone.”
“The Pakhan will not like that he bled for anything other than the family,” the first says, and then lowers his voice even more. “He’ll like it less if the week passes without recouping the money and guns and she’s still here.”
A thin shard of ice slips under my skin.
I stand absolutely still, breath tight. Gavriil expects results from Dominik by the end of the week, not just for the money but the sold guns too.
The deadline to provide an update on Archer is about to expire.
I know all that, I tell myself. I overheard Gavriil say it yesterday.
But hearing it again from someone else makes it more real, like a date being carved into stone.
When my hands tremble, I clutch the warm mug to my chest and let the heat seep into the cold places inside as I make my way back to the kitchen before I’m caught eavesdropping.
I return just as the elevator dings on the other side of the apartment door, and then the air changes.
It’s a small thing—one set of footsteps in the hallway—but my body registers it before my ears do.
I brace my spine against the counter, the island in front of me, as if it’ll provide a barrier to protect me from the storm about to blow through.
Gavriil strides into the apartment like he owns every inch of the room.
He’s not wearing a pristine suit jacket this time, just a crisp gray button-down that fits like it was made specifically for his hard chest, and his wide shoulders.
The sleeves are rolled once to show forearms carved with muscle and marked by a trail of white circular scars.
His gaze moves over the space and lands on me just as I hear the footsteps of the men leaving the study.
When our eyes meet, there’s some sort of intensity there, not interest, but friction.
An involuntary pull, like gravity that I didn’t agree to.
“What are you doing here so early?” I ask as if it’s my penthouse he’s crashing. As if he’s a bum off the street and not the head of the Bratva.
“Why do you think? I came to see my little brother,” he says. His voice is calm, deep, commanding, the kind that makes men straighten without meaning to.
Regardless, I step into the hallway entrance to block his way, with only my coffee mug full of hot liquid as a potential weapon.
When Viktor and Petrov come up behind me, I expect the guards to physically remove me from their boss’s way.
Instead, they’re silent brick walls at my back—choosing neutrality like men caught between two dangerous loyalties.
“Dominik is fighting off an infection and shouldn’t be disturbed,” I tell him, forcing my fingers to unclench around the mug before I break it and scald my own hands.
The flicker of surprise in Gavriil’s blue eyes is so fast I might have imagined it. People don’t refuse him and stay breathing long enough to repeat the mistake.
“Move,” he says. It isn’t loud, but the single word is a demand full of all his authority. I lock my knees to keep them from buckling, from obeying the man who doesn’t have any power over me. I hated the way danger makes my spine straighten.
“No.” The word is much smaller than his and not as certain, but it exists in the air anyway. “Dom needs to rest. Yelena said—”
“Yelena works for me,” Gavriil’s words are clipped.
“Then you should listen to her,” I reply, and then want to bite my tongue since it may have been the final inch too far. My heart slams into my ribs so hard it hurts, as if I’m experiencing sympathy pains for Dominik.
Gavriil exhales, not quite a sigh, and steps closer to me.
He doesn’t crowd; he doesn’t need to. Up close, he smells like expensive cologne and gun oil.
It’s a powerful scent that somehow elevates him from handsome to striking.
Since finding out they were brothers, I’m starting to notice little similarities to Dominik—the broad shape of his nose, the fullness of his lower lip.
And I hate that his sky-blue eyes are just a touch prettier than his brother’s stormy gray ones.
I’m sure he has an army of men downstairs waiting for their ruthless leader, but up here he’s currently outnumbered. From the way Viktor and Petrov watch him, I’d bet Dominik’s men answer to him, not Gavriil. At least I hope that’s true.
“Well, aren’t you…feisty,” he eventually says breaking the silent standoff, head tilting as if to study a new painting from a different angle. “That explains a few things.”
Dominik told me not to ask him questions, to only answer with brief responses when dealing with his brother. My mouth is going to get me killed, and I can’t seem to make it stop running.