Chapter 7 - Misha
“You are going to sit here in front of me and tell me the truth about what happened at the docks on that day, and what exactly you were doing there.”
His voice cut through the quiet before I even turned around.
I was at the kitchen counter, one hand braced lightly against the marble as I poured water into a glass.
My movements were steady now, and I had better control over them.
The limp had reduced to something manageable, and I could walk a little more normally.
The brace on my foot was still there, doing most of the work my body was still catching up to.
A week ago, I wouldn’t have trusted myself to stand this long. Now, I barely noticed it. That was enough to tell me that my healing was steady and I would not be caught in this situation much longer. I took a sip before answering, letting the silence stretch between us just enough to irritate him.
“I thought we had moved past all these questions and demands,” I said, setting the glass down with quiet precision.
“You thought wrong. We haven’t.”
I turned then to look at him, leaning back against the counter, arms crossing loosely over my chest. Kliment stood across the room.
His posture was relaxed, but his eyes were anything but.
There was nothing casual about the way he looked at me.
It had been like that for days now, and there was no more pretending that this was temporary.
No more silence stretching between us without purpose.
He walked towards me, clearly deciding to push.
But I, too, had decided not to make it easy. Misha Chernykh would not give in.
“You’ve been asking that question in different forms for three days now,” I said. “You are going to have to get more creative.”
“I don’t need to be creative,” he replied evenly. “I am going to ask it simply with no other pretense because I don’t have time for your little games. I just need you to answer.”
“And I need you to accept that I won’t answer. Live with it.”
His jaw tightened slightly. “This isn’t an optional question anymore, Misha.”
There it was. His name on my tongue again.
I did not know what it was about the way he said my name, tinged with his Russian accent, that made it impossible for me not to ask him to say it again.
A part of me simply wanted to hear him repeat it on loop.
I shook my head, willing these thoughts to go away.
None of it was helping. His proximity. The way he looked in his maroon Henley, which hugged his muscular body in ways that left nothing to the imagination.
And the sound of his voice. His smooth, silky voice.
Focus, Misha.
“It is for me,” I said, gulping in saliva.
“You knowingly walked into something that could have killed you,” he said. “And you still haven’t explained why.”
“I don’t owe you an explanation.”
“You do when your actions start affecting my world.”
That made something in me sharpen.
“Your world?” I echoed. “You mean the part where you are lying to your brothers and rearranging your operations to hide me?”
His expression didn’t change, but something colder settled behind his eyes. I knew I had hit a nerve with my question.
“Yes,” he said. “That part.”
I pushed off the counter slowly, ignoring the faint pull in my side.
“That sounds like a you problem,” I said, feeling like a child for something so immature.
“It became my problem the moment I had to clean up your mess, even if you refuse to acknowledge it.”
“My mess?” I let out a quiet, humorless laugh.
“You mean the situation I was handling before you decided to intervene? I don’t remember asking you to walk into that warehouse, gun in your hand, and shoot everyone in sight.
I don’t remember asking you to save my life.
And I definitely don’t remember you telling me exactly why you were following me that day. ”
“You were outnumbered.”
“I was managing just fine!” I shouted, my voice rising.
“You were seconds away from dying,” Kliment replied, no hint of anger in his voice. He was calm and composed, still measured.
“But I didn’t. Did I?” I was beginning to make no sense, and Kliment knew that.
But backing down from this argument meant agreeing to tell him the truth, and I wasn’t ready to do that.
Not yet. Probably not ever. I hadn’t trusted my own brothers with this, and I definitely could not trust Kliment Romanov.
“Yes, you didn’t,” he sighed. “Because I stepped in.”
There it was. I tilted my head slightly, studying him.
“And now you think that gives you the right to interrogate me?”
“It gives me the right to understand what I’ve involved myself in, Misha. It gives me the right to know the truth about this whole situation. And I have every right to ask this from you!”
“You involved yourself in this, Kliment,” I corrected. “I didn’t ask you to. So don’t hold me accountable for the questions that you suddenly need answers to.”
My retort was met with silence, sharp and tense, that weighed heavily between us. Before I could determine what was happening, he moved. His movement was neither quick nor aggressive, but he still came closer.
“You think this is separate?” he asked quietly. “That whatever you’re doing exists outside of everything else? That you are removed from this world you are born into?”
“It does.”
“It doesn’t.”
“It does for me.”
“And that’s exactly the problem.”
I held my ground as he closed the distance between us in two long strides.
“I know enough to recognize patterns,” he continued.
“You were looking into port activity and questioning rerouted shipments. You probably went there in search of some unregistered cargo moving through controlled territory because that is exactly what happens at the south docks. You weren’t there for a random meeting, Misha. Accept it.”
“No,” I said calmly. “I wasn’t. I am accepting it. Now what?”
“Then what were you there for?”
I smiled slightly. “I was curious about something and needed answers.”
His expression darkened. “I’m not interested in games, Misha.”
“Then stop playing them.”
“Who were you meeting?” he asked. “Tell me.”
“Someone who had answers for me.”
“That doesn’t narrow it down.”
“It wasn’t meant to.”
His gaze sharpened. “You’re protecting someone or something.”
“Yes, I am.”
“What is it?”
“That’s not your concern.”
“It becomes my concern if it intersects with my operations.”
“But it doesn’t intersect with your operations!”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
“You’re making assumptions.”
“I’m making decisions.”
His jaw flexed slightly. “And those decisions almost got you killed.”
“And yours didn’t?” I shot back. “You were there, Kliment. You were there to watch me and follow me, and from what I know of the Romanovs, your intentions could not have been noble. Don’t pretend this was some holy intervention and you are my knight in shining armor.
You were there because you probably wanted to kidnap me or kill me as well! ”
Something flickered in his eyes, and that was all the confirmation I needed.
“Were you tracking me from the start?” I asked. I stepped closer this time, closing the remaining space between us. “Did you know I was going to the docks?” I pressed. “Or did you just follow me until you figured it out?”
“You move like someone who doesn’t want to be followed,” he said.
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s enough of one.”
“It’s not.”
I searched his face, reading every microexpression and shift in his posture.
“Let me ask you something, Kliment. Why didn’t you let me die that night?
Why did you come to save me when my death would have benefited your cause?
” I moved closer, closing the distance between us.
“The Chernykhs would have been devastated, and you would have gotten what you wanted without getting your hands dirty. So why did you save me?”
“You were more useful alive.”
I held his gaze, unimpressed. “That’s the answer you’re going with?”
“It’s the truth.”
“No,” I said softly. “It’s the version of the truth that makes you feel comfortable with yourself because even you know I am not supposed to be alive right now. At least not safe and sound and recovering in your goddamn safehouse like you are my savior and protector.”
Something in his posture slightly shifted, but it was enough for me to see.
“You’re deflecting my questions,” he said.
“You are ignoring mine.”
“I asked you a question first.”
“And I asked you one as well.”
Silence snapped tighter, making me feel more frustrated than usual. Our arguments had only been escalating with every passing day as if Kliment was running out of time before he was given answers. I could not blame him. If the roles were reversed, I might have done the same thing.
“You’re making this harder than it needs to be,” he said.
“And you are making the mistake of thinking you are in control of this conversation.”
“I am.”
“You are not.”
His eyes darkened.
“I am the one who decides whether you walk out of here or not,” he said.
“And I’m the one who decides whether staying here benefits me,” I replied. “You are forgetting that I am choosing to stay here until I recover. I am not your prisoner or your prey.”
We stood there, inches apart, the air between us thick with something that had stopped being just tension days ago.
We both could feel it even if neither of us commented on it.
I had noticed his glances and the way he always asked the housekeeper if I was eating.
He must have noticed it, too, because I was doing a rather poor job at hiding it.
“You think your family would approve of what you are doing?” he asked suddenly, and I stilled.
“My family doesn’t need to approve of everything I do.”
“Especially this, since they don’t even know.”
“No.”
“You are hiding Bratva operations from them. How exactly do you think Iosif will react when he finds out?”
“I am protecting them from information they don’t need yet.”
“That’s not protection,” he said. “That’s control through personal narrative.”
That hit closer than I expected.