Maggie #3
I lean my forehead against the cool window glass and close my eyes for a second. This whole situation is absolutely insane, and somehow, the worst part might be that a small piece of me feels safer knowing he put someone out there.
Two hours later, I’m curled sideways on the sofa wearing an oversized shelter T-shirt and fuzzy socks while pretending to read one of my romance paperbacks. Pretending being the key word. I have reread the same paragraph six times.
A knock sounds at my door, and every muscle in my body tightens before I can stop it. My heart starts hammering hard against my ribs while I push myself up from the sofa, staring toward the entryway as another knock follows a few seconds later.
I move carefully toward the door and look through the peephole.
Alexei.
Relief washes through me so fast it almost makes my knees weak, which feels a little alarming considering the man standing outside my apartment just admitted to putting security on my building like that’s a perfectly normal thing to do. But, I unlock the door anyway.
Alexei stands in the hallway, wearing black slacks and a black button-down shirt, the sleeves rolled to his forearms.
Then my eyes land on his hands, and my stomach drops at the sight of the fresh bruising across his knuckles.
“What happened?”
His eyes drop toward his hand before lifting back to mine. “Nothing that requires concern.”
“That’s not a reassuring answer.”
A faint exhale leaves him. “I came to check the apartment.”
“At eleven o’clock at night?”
“Yes.”
I stare at him for a heartbeat before stepping aside. “Come in before my neighbors start spreadin’ conspiracy theories.”
Alexei walks inside slowly, his attention moving over the apartment in that intensely observant way of his.
The windows. The locks. The fire escape stairs.
Even here in my tiny apartment with mismatched throw pillows and dog fur permanently attached to half my furniture, he notices everything automatically.
The realization sends another uneasy twist through my chest because no matter how normal he can seem sitting across from me, eating peach pie, this part of him is not normal at all.
His attention finally lands on the romance novel I left open on the sofa. One dark eyebrow lifts.
I quickly snatch the book up. “You saw nothing.”
“I saw a shirtless man holding a woman against a lighthouse.”
“Oh my God.” I can feel my cheeks redden.
“There may also have been wind dramatically blowing through both of their hair.”
I glare at him. “I hate you.”
“No, kotyónok.” His eyes meet mine again. “You don’t.”
The confidence in his voice sends heat straight to my core.
I motion toward the sofa before my brain can short-circuit completely. “You want coffee?”
“It’s almost midnight.” He smiles faintly. “You have vodka?”
I snort low. “In this economy? No.”
“Whiskey?”
“All I’ve got is beer and questionable orange juice.”
That earns the smallest laugh from him. “Beer is fine.”
“Well look at that. The mysterious billionaire drinks like a normal person after all.”
His eyes meet mine again. “I never claimed otherwise.”
The low roughness in his voice follows me all the way into the kitchen, leaving my stomach doing foolish little somersaults while I grab two beers from the fridge.
A few minutes later, we sit across from each other on my sofa with cold bottles in our hands and tension stretched tightly through the room.
I notice the bruises again as he sips his beer. Alexei notices me noticing.
“You want answers.”
It’s not phrased like a question.
I pull my legs beneath me. “Yes.”
He studies me quietly. The lamp beside the sofa highlights the exhaustion beneath his composure tonight. Older grief lives there, too.
“You already know enough to suspect the truth,” he says finally.
A knot tightens low in my stomach. “The truth about what?”
“My family.”
The room suddenly feels smaller.
Alexei leans back against the sofa. “My brother, Roman, is pakhan of the Agapov bratva.”
The Russian word hangs there between us.
I swallow before repeating the word. “Pakhan.”
“The boss,” he clarifies.
Even though part of me already knew, hearing him say it aloud still knocks the air from my lungs.
Suddenly, every instinct I’ve had around him clicks painfully into place.
The bodyguards. The constant security. The tension that seems to follow him everywhere.
Even the way he walks into a room already prepared for trouble before anybody else notices it coming.
And beneath all that polished billionaire charm sits the quieter truth I’ve been trying not to look at too closely.
Violence.
I stare down at the beer bottle between my hands before lifting my eyes back to him. “And you?”
Alexei drags a slow breath through his nose before answering. “I handle Black Tide Logistics.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“I was raised inside that world,” he admits.
I study his bruised knuckles again. “Did you do that tonight?”
His expression doesn’t change. “Yes.”
Sitting there on my sofa with a beer in my hand and a dangerous man calmly admitting violence to my face, I realize the scariest part is that I still want him to stay.