Chapter Six
Konstantin’s POV
I stood outside her door, listening. I couldn’t deny feeling the first crack in my resolve, and the crazy part was that I didn’t even understand why.
Do I want to break her? Or protect her?
I found that I didn’t have an answer to that question, either.
I always entered every negotiation, deal, or even torture rooms with a clear motive. Whether it was to get someone to spill a secret, achieve the most profitable outcome, or inflict pain, I always knew what I was going in for. However, with Alina, the motive kept shifting.
At the very beginning, the only motive was to seize her and get Vitya’s information from her.
It was a clear-cut abduction to retrieve information and seal up loose ends.
But then, somewhere between how pained she clearly was about a role I played in her sad history and the intrigue I felt at her audacity and confidence, the second option, which should have been automatic, began to feel wrong.
The motive made a shift from strictly doing what the Bratva needed to being fair to her.
It moved from dealing with her as a leak to pausing to consider the safest option for her.
And now that I had made a marriage arrangement with her, I still couldn’t pinpoint what my motive was.
None the wiser on what was going on, I walked away from her door, leaving the two guards on either side.
It’s a good thing I don’t have to explain my motive to anyone. For now.
I knew I was kidding myself immediately after my body landed on my bed.
With the myriad of unresolved thoughts in my head, there was no way sleep would come anywhere near me.
It didn’t matter that dawn was just a few hours away, and I hadn’t had any sleep; I needed to coax my body to relax enough to go into sleep mode.
Getting off the bed, I took my clothes off as I walked into the bathroom.
As the cool water rained on my skin and ran down in rivulets to the floor, I took a deep sigh in an attempt to silence my mind temporarily.
Just like always, it worked; the noise in my head began to subside.
It would have been a relief had it not been that the few lingering, muted thoughts in my head still revolved around Alina.
But they did. And it was more than a little disturbing. For many reasons.
I rarely, if ever, thought about a woman.
I didn’t have anything against the gender, like Sergei and some of my other men often concluded.
I just never knew how to align with them—and I really never cared enough to discover how.
I had met a few women whose presence I could bear and even like, but nothing good ever came out of it.
I had found that my path, what I was wired for, was simple, uncomplicated exchanges; just sex and money, no more, no less.
That way, I never had to think about someone whose face or name I couldn’t even remember in the daylight.
So, thinking about a woman now, even though it was in a work capacity, felt very unusual.
The fact that I now had an image of her younger self in my memory was another disturbing factor. It felt like I was involved in a part of her I shouldn’t even know.
I sighed again as I ran my hands through my hair.
What the hell have I gotten myself into?
I tried to shut my mind off as I stepped out of the shower and went to the mirror above the sink. I rinsed my toothbrush and put toothpaste on it. As I brushed my teeth, I realized I was hungry.
I’ve been too busy making life-changing decisions to think of eating.
There go these ‘life-changing’ thoughts again!
It’s just a containment strategy, just work, why would it change anyone’s life?
I walked back into my bedroom and headed to my wardrobe, wearing the black pajama trousers I pulled out before going back to bed.
I moved the pillow into the right position and inwardly groaned as my questions turned into answers.
This marriage might be just a safe option now, but it was going to affect both of our lives. Maybe forever.
The Alina I saw in that room with so much anger and pain over a man she’d lost several years ago didn’t look like someone who’d treat marriage as nothing or as something casual.
The glimpses I’d had of her caring for Liza were enough for me to peg her as the type that did things the way they were supposed to be.
Getting married would change her life forever, regardless of how long it lasted.
But, it’s either that or she’s gone, without a life to be changed in the first place.
It’s not my fault she decided to have a relationship with a bastard like Vitya.
In fact, from Siroc to Vitya, the girl seems to have something for people who put her in danger.
She should have made better choices.
My phone vibrated on the nightstand, and I turned to pick it up.
Viktor.
The missed call icon in the notifications pane definitely came from him.
“Konstantin,” my brother grated, irritation clear in his voice. “The fuck have you been? I’ve called you twice.”
“I was in the bathroom after a long night, brother,” I replied.
As I sat up against the headrest, I thought of the copper-haired woman who was in this same position just a few moments ago. I found myself wondering if she was back against the headrest or if she was still lying down.
“Without thinking to update me?”
“I was going to do that. Sorry, brother.”
“You do know I don’t need any fucking apologies. Do you have a confession now or not?”
“Not yet. But I will. Very soon,” I promised.
“And how would you do that if you were unable to do it until now?”
“I have a different tactic to keep her alive and within reach,” I said. “I’ll have the truth soon.”
“You'd better. I don’t need to remind you of how crucial this is.”
“I know.”
“Good.”
I returned the phone to the nightstand and lay back.
It’s not weakness; it’s strategy.
She wouldn’t have anywhere to hide or run to as my wife. I would get the truth, whatever that was.
But, if that’s all there is to it, why didn’t I share my plans with any of my brothers?
However, whether there was something else or not, I would rather deal with it later.
I’ll tell Viktor when we arrive in New York.
**********
It was still dawn, but I was changing into dark jeans and a T-shirt already. Grabbing my jacket from the couch, I left my room and went downstairs.
“Good morning, sir!” Georgiy greeted, his hand pausing mid-air with the glass of juice.
“Morning,” I replied, walking past the dining room and into the kitchen.
“Good morning, sir,” Russie greeted, turning whatever he was scribbling on a sheet of paper beside the gas cooker.
“Morning.”
I took out a bottle of water from the tall refrigerator and left the kitchen. After taking a few refreshing gulps, I dropped the almost-empty bottle on the dining table.
When I got into the guestroom Alina occupied, I was met with a surprising scene. There she was at the foot of the bed, her legs crossed as she looked up at me like she knew I’d come. She had changed into a simple, plain blouse and a skirt that covered her knees.
Her expression was nothing like the resistance I’d expected. It was calm.
I was about to speak but she beat me to it.
“So, when is this farce happening?”
I took a few steps closer until I was right in the middle of the room, facing her.
“In a few days. But it’ll be here in Russia. It’s going to be a small affair,” I answered.
“How small?” she inquired, her eyes not looking away from mine.
“Very small. It’ll be at the safehouse chapel here. We’ll fly in a priest from nearby to conduct it.”
“What about your brothers? Liza?”
“We’ll meet them in New York,” I uttered, hoping my evasion was successful and she wouldn’t press further on that area.
“It’ll be civil, right? I don’t suppose you’ll want to get married in a church,” she asked, chuckling.
“This is not about what anyone wants. It’s what we have to do to keep other factions off your back. The only alternative to killing you for not having any valuable information about the intel Vitya laid his hands on. You know that.”
“Yeah,” she breathed.
“It’ll be a rushed civil ceremony. We’ll have a few witnesses, and that’s it. Just signatures; no rings or press.”
“Okay,” she answered, shrugging.
If her confidence intrigued me before, her composure doubled that effect.
She threw questions at me and took in my declarations like we were just talking business.
It irritated and puzzled me that she seemed to be okay with how everything was going.
That she didn’t break or bend in the face of the new reality.
In my head, I contrasted my disturbed thoughts and her current calm—and it intrigued me even more.
It felt like she had some kind of control that I didn’t understand.
“But, since the aim is to keep the other guys from coming for me, why are we keeping it hidden? Wouldn’t it be better to clarify that I'm busy honeymooning or whatever and not hiding like a suspect? I mean, does it work differently in the criminal world?”
The world you’re about to enter.
“We’re not hiding it,” I corrected. “But what you just described is a very common tactic. It has happened too many times that a mafia boss marries someone to protect them from rivals. To cover the lie and sell it as the truth, it’s often made an extravagant wedding.
Destination weddings, even. It just takes a look at the circumstances around the union to see that the whole thing is a hoax. ”
“So…doing the opposite is how to make it believable?”
“Exactly.”
She shrugged, looking around the room.
“And if I say no?” she asked.
My steely gaze met her steady one as I told her calmly, “Saying no will put you in the ground.”
Instead of flinching, she simply nodded.
I stepped out of the room and shut the door behind me.
“Boss! Boss!!” Sergei Malenkov rushed over to me as I exited the hallway.
“Sergei, what’s going on?”
“I just got intel that Russian forces are looking for Alina. They’ve gotten the information that you have her. She’s already on the wanted criminals list in Russia,” he divulged, falling into step with me as I ascended the stairs.
This just got more urgent.