Epilogue
Katya
Dubai
The Dragunov estate wasn’t designed for parties, but tonight it had become one anyway.
Warm evening air spilled in from the open terrace doors, carrying the scent of citrus trees and faint desert heat.
Lantern lights glowed along the stone columns.
The long dining table was covered in dishes I couldn’t pronounce, crystal glasses, bottles of champagne, and enough silverware to arm a small rebellion.
The TV in the background replayed the same breaking news clip every ten minutes: a shot of the smoldering remains of Revenant’s headquarters in St. Petersburg, emergency lights flashing across twisted steel, as well as lists of all the crimes they’d committed in the last decade.
We’d won.
Revenant was finished.
And for the first time since any of us had crossed paths, none of us were running.
Kara raised her glass. “To destruction,” she said.
Roman clinked his glass against hers. “And to not being the ones destroyed.”
“Barely,” Lev added dryly as he uncorked another bottle.
Dmitri sat beside Kara with a rare, genuine look of contentment.
His hand rested lightly on her thigh, and she didn’t swat it away.
Their entire dynamic tonight had been soft glares, hidden smiles, and simmering heat.
Roman kept tossing an arm around her shoulder whenever she said something smart.
Lev kept brushing fingers along her back when he passed behind her chair.
Kara pretended not to notice any of it.
She failed spectacularly.
Across the table from me, Viktor lifted his glass, a cigarette balanced between two fingers on his other hand, ash threatening to spill onto the white tablecloth.
“I’d like to toast to our collective badassery,” he declared.
“To surviving Revenant and ARCHEON. To arson. Explosions. And to our girl here,” he nodded toward me, exaggerated flourish and all, “for being easily the hottest woman to ever break a man out of captivity.”
I groaned. “Never say that again.”
He winked. “Too late. Burned into history.”
Andrei nudged him. “Burned into your brain, you mean.”
“Into yours too, little brother,” Viktor shot back.
Andrei didn’t deny it. Instead, he caught my hand beneath the table and brought my knuckles to his lips in a quick, soft kiss. My heartbeat stuttered, warm and traitorous.
Mikhail watched the whole exchange with that calm, knowing stare that made me squirm. Then he leaned closer, his knee brushing mine under the table. “I believe what Viktor meant,” he said quietly, “is that you saved his life.”
“I saved all of your lives, except maybe Mikhail’s. He seems to be the only one who knows how to stay out of trouble,” I corrected.
“And we are very proud and very grateful,” Andrei murmured.
The heat climbed up my neck so fast I nearly hid in my wineglass. All three Dragunov brothers saw it, of course. They always saw everything.
Kara pointed her fork at me. “Apparently, Dragunov men are like stray dogs,” she told me. “Feed one, you get the whole pack.”
Roman snorted. “You’re one to talk. Look at yourself.”
Kara glanced down. Dmitri’s large hand was still resting there, possessive in that quiet, infuriating way only he managed. She turned her head slightly to Lev’s hand resting on her shoulder as he stood behind her chair. She huffed and rolled her eyes. “This is just temporary.”
Dmitri arched a brow. “Is it?”
Lev smirked. “It’s cute watching her try to deny it.”
Kara threw a grape at him. Lev caught it.
I leaned back in my chair and let the warmth settle into my chest. It was surreal, watching everyone relaxed instead of running for their lives. I watched Mikhail loosen the top button of his shirt. Viktor laughed without a weapon in his hand and Andrei stretched out like a satisfied wolf.
Mikhail turned toward me, voice low. “How do you feel?”
“Free,” I admitted. “Strange, but free.”
He nodded once, as if that answer mattered more than the destruction of a global shadow network.
“And now what?” I asked him.
His eyes softened. “Now we decide what we want without someone pointing a gun at our heads.”
Viktor leaned in over the table. “I know what I want.”
Andrei sighed. “Please don’t say something inappropriate in front of everyone.”
“Inappropriate?” Viktor said. “Me? Never.”
Kara made a strangled noise.
Even Dmitri smiled, and I couldn’t help but smile too.
Viktor pointed his wineglass at me. “I want our girl to stay right here with us. Where she belongs. Where none of the psychopaths from ARCHEON or Revenant can touch her ever again.”
Mikhail added, “She stays because she wants to.”
All three sets of Dragunov eyes were on me again. Warm. Hungry. Devoted in ways that made my pulse do stupid, erratic things.
I lifted my glass slowly. “I’m not going anywhere.”
That earned three very different reactions—Viktor’s cocky grin, Andrei’s smug knowing smile, and Mikhail’s quiet, satisfied exhale.
At the far end of the table, Kara leaned against Dmitri and raised her glass too. “To peace,” she said.
Roman raised his. “To new beginnings.”
Lev lifted his own. “To the fact that we’re all somehow still alive.”
For the first time, sitting between the Dragunov brothers with their warmth pressed into my sides and their eyes burning into mine, I realized something simple and terrifying and wonderful.
I felt like part of a family.
A dangerous, chaotic, ridiculous family.
But they were mine.
And for tonight, that was more than enough.