Chapter 5 - Konstantin
Standing outside the door, I just slammed on Tati, my hands clenched into fists.
She jiggled the knob like I expected her to, but what I didn’t expect were the heartwrenching sobs that started a moment later.
The pitiful sound tore up my guts and had me reaching for the door again.
If anyone else had made her cry like that, they’d already be dead. What the fuck was I doing?
But what if it was a slick manipulation tactic?
Everything I believed had been turned upside down in the last week.
People I thought of as friends were now foes.
Could that be Tati? Not the Tati I knew, or thought I knew, which was really only hearsay from Grigor, and how long had he been expertly feeding me lies?
She looked like a woman, but was as sheltered as a child. Or was she? If she was telling the truth, or even what she believed to be the truth, she was begging to end up dead, or worse, if she got into Riku’s building.
And what if she was lying? What if she knew everything I needed to find out in order to regain what was mine and punish the one who’d betrayed me? What if letting her meet with Riku gave me the answers I came here for?
The same red-hot lava that made me take her off the street filled my veins. Something stronger than desire or need. The thought of Tati anywhere near Riku Yoshida had me about to combust.
Whether she was lying or not, whatever she might know and be carefully hiding, I wouldn’t let her fall into the hands of my enemy, who would tear her to pieces once he squeezed out what he needed from her.
Worse, so much worse. The Yakuza didn’t play around.
A beautiful woman like Tati would fetch a very fine price, and then when that man was tired of her, she’d be sold again.
And then again. No quick death for a commodity like that.
Those thoughts only made me feel sicker than the sounds of her crying through the door, and not solely because I watched her grow up alongside my daughter. The fire inside me, that drove me to this wild urge to protect her, had nothing to do with that.
No one was going to touch her.
Once again, I reached for the doorknob, but came to my senses and fought down the bizarre urge to comfort her somehow. How could I comfort her when she believed I was her enemy? When she very well could be mine.
Damn it. Bad idea from the start, but there was no turning back now. She was here in LA and full of ridiculous ideas. Right now, I have to protect her from herself more than anyone else.
Storming away so I could no longer hear her sobs, I paced the length of the balcony, working up a sweat in the balmy LA air.
What the hell was I going to do with one very stubborn, very naive, extremely beautiful woman who could be working with the crime syndicate that had been trying to kill me for the last couple of months?
No matter how I paced, I couldn’t come up with anything useful, and the things my mind kept circling back to, I hurriedly pushed away. When did she get so fierce, so fiery? So damn sexy?
I let out a roar that drifted off to the other high-rise buildings surrounding me, and stared in the direction of the ocean, hidden behind the ever-present smog clinging to the edges of everything.
Scraping my hair back off my brow, my palm hit the sore spot from Tati’s heroic headbutt attempt.
I winced and laughed at the same time. How could I not admire that, even though it had given me a small, painful lump?
And the way she tore across that abandoned gas station parking lot in her bare feet, totally focused on getting away.
That had been an amazing view, and clasping her close when I caught her was the reason those intrusive thoughts kept popping up.
Along with something else, every time I remembered the soft warmth of her lush body, even as she fought to get away.
Not just suddenly sexy as hell, but when did she get so brave? The few, scattered memories I had of her were always of a timid mouse keeping to herself in a corner. She wasn’t like that anymore. Everything I ever knew truly was a lie, or I had to consider her a completely new and different person.
I didn’t hate the idea of that. It kept her separate from Grigor. I wasn’t keeping her safe for him. The fire that burned inside me to protect Tati had nothing to do with the past.
I had to get my mind off of her. She wasn’t the reason I came to LA, after all, just a detour from my plan. An annoying, consuming detour that was sure to be full of potholes and might end up destroying me.
To distract myself, I checked in with Mat and Aleks, who had nothing new to report. Their teams were all in place at various stakeout locations, and we were waiting to see what happened next.
No running in with guns blazing, more like waiting for the fish to swim into their net.
I always hated fishing, had no patience for it.
Ever since my nephews had all married and started having families of their own, they had become…
cautious. If I even breathed any other word, I’d be paid back for it with flying fists.
Had I been like that when my kids were young? It seemed so long ago I couldn’t remember, but also like the blink of an eye. My youngest was already a grown woman, hounding me to be safe and make good decisions, all while dodging every good decision I made regarding her.
My sons were the same, building their own empires in Moscow and Milan, and in the case of the twins, raising hell wherever they went.
Sofiya railed against my plans for an arranged marriage so she could finally settle down and have the kids I knew deep down she craved.
Why else would she run after her brothers and me like we were her wayward children?
No matter how hard I tried to distract myself, my thoughts always circled back to the problem locked in the guest bedroom.
Tati was a distraction in herself. One I didn’t need, and yet wouldn’t give up.
Was she still crying, thinking all was lost?
Or putting together a cunning plan? Perhaps that plan was already in motion.
With a sigh, I hoisted myself off the lounge chair I had fallen into, realizing with a jolt that the sun was dropping below the buildings, the red glow burning through the air pollution to make quite a stunning display. I had spent too much time ruminating and had no plan of my own.
All I knew for sure was that right now, I had to consider Tati an enemy, even down to the fact that she might have set me up, playing on what she knew was my protective nature.
She certainly couldn’t have expected me to go so far, though, could she?
Not when I was taken by surprise at how strong that protective nature became where she was concerned.
If she thought she could play me that way, perhaps in order to infiltrate this place or gain information, she messed up.
No one was getting into this building that my nephew Nik owned.
They’d be lucky if they were able to park across the street for two minutes before being spotted and sent on their way.
She was stuck with me because she was mine now.
No, damn it. I shouldn’t like that idea so much. She was my problem, nothing more.
With a huge sigh that should have rattled the sliding glass door, I went back into the apartment as night fell.
It was getting late. I had been lost in fruitless thought for too long.
Whatever Tati was to me, I couldn’t let her starve, and I headed to the kitchen, trying to remember what this new thorn in my side liked to eat.