Killian
Before
When I hear the restroom door open, I know it’s not Katarina.
While I’ve been hiding out in one of the stalls, I tapped into the restaurant’s CCTV, skills I’ve learned from Mace.
I have eyes on Katarina’s table and I’ve been willing her to drink more so she’ll make a trip to the bathroom.
I should have known her pelvic floor muscles would be my downfall.
She knows I’m leaving for Boston tomorrow, but she hasn’t answered my messages and is refusing to see me, apparently preferring the company of Duke and a certain interior designer.
Duke’s personal assistant is with them to even out the numbers, and Danyl is stationed at a nearby table.
Andrey pulled the short straw and is on guard duty outside.
No one, not even Katarina, knows I’m here but she’s very aware I’m thinking of her. She startled in her seat a couple of times because, despite telling me we’re done, she’s wearing her egg vibrator.
I follow the tap of heels as the new arrival crosses the restroom. When she’s about to pass my stall, I swing the door open and grab Grace from behind, smothering her mouth with my hand before dragging her inside.
“It’s OK, honey, I’m not going to hurt you,” I say, leaning into an American accent.
Grace pays fuck all attention to what I’ve just said and her muffled scream vibrates across my palm as she fights against my hold.
She’s shorter than Katarina and thankfully has zero defense skills.
If I was dealing with my woman, I’d be headfirst in the toilet bowl by now. Knowing her, she’d flush Patrick away.
“I’m a friend of Katarina’s,” I insist, only to hiss as one of Grace’s sharp heels connects with my shin. Fuck that hurt. I try again, more specific this time. “I’m her hairdresser.”
Grace stills.
So, Katarina’s told her about me. It’s good to know she trusts Grace because I’m about to put my trust in her too. I take my hand from her mouth and rest it on her throat while keeping her back pressed to my chest. I don’t want her describing my appearance to Duke later.
Her pulse flutters in her neck as she gasps for air. “What do you want?”
I take a folded piece of paper from my pocket. “It’s a note. For Katarina. I need to see her. Please,” I say, not afraid to beg when it comes to my Russian princess.
Grace shakes her head. “Absolutely not. If you’re caught here, all hell’s going to break loose. She has bodyguards.”
“I promise, I won’t be any trouble as long as you keep to our plan.”
“We don’t have a plan.”
“Sure, we do,” I persist. “You’re going to help get Katarina in here. This could be our last chance to talk.” I hate that that’s true. “I’ll do anything to see her, Grace and this is the lesser of many evils. Trust me.”
There’s a warning in my tone that makes Grace consider the folded note in my hand. I think she’s still going to refuse, but then… “There’s just one small problem.”
“Which is?”
“I need to pee.”
In another life, before Katarina, I might have offered to pull down her panties. Grace is a pretty, little thing, but she’s not my woman. “You can’t go in here.”
Grace does a half-twist to give me a side eye. “I didn’t mean this stall but I do need to go. And I don’t want you listening.”
I consider my options for a moment. “Do you promise to pass on the note? Without letting anyone else know?”
“If you behave, yes.”
“Then fine, go next door and I’ll stick my fingers in my ears.”
Grace huffs as she leaves the stall and uses the one next door. I put my fingers in my ears because I can be a gentleman, and wait until I hear the toilet flush.
We don’t speak again and when Grace leaves the restroom, I use the CCTV to track her return to the table. She sits next to Katarina and I see the moment she passes the note. No one else shows any sign of spotting the exchange and a few seconds later, Katarina gets up and heads my way.
She barks an order to Danyl to stay the fuck out of the restroom before she enters, and her steps are slow and measured as she approaches my stall.
I’ve ambushed plenty of enemies in restrooms over the years, and been attacked in one myself, but Katarina scares me in a way no man ever could.
Sweat beads my brow. It could be the anger radiating through the closed door.
She’s so close to getting her freedom and I’m putting all her plans in jeopardy.
My swallow is painful. My brothers would be pissing themselves laughing if they saw me quaking like this.
I get ready to protect my balls as I pull the stall door open. I’m expecting her to lunge at me like she did for running Rory off the road, but when I see her eyes glistening, I know I haven’t fucked up. I’m just fucked.
“Come here, Kitty.”
The words are barely out of my mouth when she launches herself at me, wrapping her arms around my neck as I cup her face and slam my lips against hers.
Our kiss is voracious. We consume each other as I twist us around, bringing her inside the stall and pressing my back to the door to close it.
Her guard dog won’t let anyone else into the restroom, but it doesn’t mean Danyl won’t poke his head in if I keep Katarina too long.
Our final goodbye has to be standing over a fucking toilet and I hate it.
I hate that her name condemns her to a life hiding from her uncle, and my name condemns me to living apart from the woman I…
“I fucking love you, you mad, crazy bitch,” I say, peppering my declaration with expletives so it doesn’t sound like I’ve completely lost my mind. Which I have.
“Don’t say things like that. Not now,” she pants.
“Why? Because you might just tolerate me too?” I ask, knowing she’ll claw her way out of the stall if I make her use the L word.
“Because it already hurts, Killian. It hurts too much,” she says, voice cracking. “You have to let me go.”
“Until when?” I demand.
“Until forever.”
I shake my head, my lips cutting a thin line. “Sorry. Never going to accept that. Give me a timeline, Kitty. Give me a goal. You want Vasili dead? I’ll hunt him down and kill him.”
“Do you think others haven’t tried before you? Do you think I haven’t tried? And I will try again, but it could take years. We can’t do that to each other. Let. Me. Go.”
I stroke her cheek with my thumb, tracing invisible tears she’s learned not to shed. “Only if you promise you’ll come back to me one day. Because if you don’t…”
“You’ll what, Shorty?”
“I’ll go to the ends of the earth searching for you. Or I’ll just ask Ash.”
“He wouldn’t tell you.”
She might be right, but I’d wear him down eventually.
“And even if he did tell you,” she continues. “What would you do if you found me? We’d be back in the same position we’re in now. Our families would put a price on both our heads.”
This is a circular argument we’ve had too many times, but I won’t stop searching for an answer that doesn’t end with us being apart. “Then I’d stay in hiding with you. Sounds like heaven to me.”
There’s a flicker of light behind her eyes that suggests she’d gladly join me, but she snuffs it out with her next words. “You’re your father’s heir. You don’t get to walk away from that.”
My scalp itches from the weight of the crown I never wanted. “I always wondered what it would be like to choose a different path. Maybe…”
Katarina takes my hand so she can kiss my palm. “It might be a dream you’ve harbored, but it’s one you’ve never acted on, and you never will. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re wrong.”
“I’m never wrong, zhizn moya.”
The Russian phrase isn’t one I’ve heard her say before and I commit it to memory as she rests her cheek against my palm and closes her eyes. “I will miss you,” she whispers. “Every day for the rest of my life.”
“Look at me, Kitty.” When she peels her eyes open, I want to repeat everything I’ve said and more, but time is never on our fucking side. “I love you. This isn’t over. Don’t you ever forget that.”
When she opens her mouth to shoot me down again, I clamp my mouth over hers. We kiss like it’s our last, which it isn’t. Not a chance. Not happening.
I trail my tongue along her lower lip then push deeper until it tangles with hers. I savor her taste, her smell. Rich chocolate and roasted coffee beans. Dark, bitter and utterly addictive.
She pulls away before I do. “I need to go before Danyl comes in here looking for me. There’s been an alert that you’re in the area.”
My brow creases. “That’s not possible. No one even knows I’m in Chicago.” I’ve been a practical prisoner in my apartment except for the times my alter-ego has visited the beauty salon.
“We’re never going to be as careful as we need to be. No more risks. Please Killian. This is the last time.”
“Sure it is, Kitty,” I say and kiss her again, swallowing her sob.
My hands slide up and down her body, craving her more with each tick of the clock counting down our time together.
I want to do more than kiss her, but I’ll be damned if our last fuck is in a public restroom.
There will be no lasts, certainly not over a toilet.
It kills me to let Katarina go and I regret it the second the restroom door closes behind her. I barely contain the fury building inside me, and later, when I finally escape the restaurant, I search for a potential target to unleash my wrath.
It’s dark when I slip into the alley at the rear of the restaurant. Katarina and her goons left twenty minutes ago. It was cold comfort when Duke didn’t leave with her. The fucker got to stay behind so he could take Grace home. And here I am, the anti-hero who was never going to get the girl.
Up ahead, the headlights of passing cars cast shadows down the litter-strewn alley and I clock the figure lurking between a couple of industrial garbage units. He’s wearing a baseball cap and a puffer jacket that gives him extra bulk he doesn’t need. He’s big.