Adrian
Sleep feels impossible tonight, so I pace the hotel room some more before I think to call Nadia and let her know I’m on my way.
“Hi Adrian,” she says in English. Goodshe’s practicing the language. That will be a huge step in her feeling more comfortable in Chicago.
“Hey. How are you?”
“Everything’s fine here. How about you?”
“I’m heading back tomorrow.”
“So…what happened? Did you…finish it?”
I sit on the bed and rest my elbows on my knees. “Ah…no. No, I didn’t, Nadia.” I clear my throat. “I’m going to let it go.” Guilt and shame crowd me from both directions.
“What happened, Adrian?”
“No, nothing happened. Everything’s okay.”
“Adrian, can you do something for me?”
I swallow down the lump in my throat. “Yeah, anything.”
“Stop lying. I know something happened, and I know something’s wrong. I’m not so fragile that you have to protect me. I deserve to know what’s going on.”
My heart thuds painfully against my sternum. “Yeah. You’re right. Okay…” I take a deep breath and let it out, stabbing my fingers through my hair. “I had a lead on Leon Poval. He has a daughter who is about the same age as you living in England.”
Nadia sucks in a shocked breath but says nothing.
“I, um, I kidnapped her.”
“What? Adrian! Oh my God, you are out of your mind! How could you do”
“I didn’t hurt her, Nadia. I mean, I only planned to make Poval think she was in danger, so he’d come and rescue her, but, ah…”
“You came to your senses.”
A whisper of relief hits me at her understanding. “Yes. Exactly.”
“Where is she?” Nadia asks. “Is she with you?”
Fresh pain seeps in at me from all sides. “No. I returned her to her father.”
“Is she safe with him?”
A cold slithery snake moves through my stomach. Is she?
She’s his daughter, so of course she is. Yet memories of all the things she said about him creep back in, especially the last onewhere she broke down with the realization that he’d probably killed her mother.
Is she safe with him?
The question rattles around in my head, and with every second that passes, awareness creeps over me. What if I left her in the lion’s den? I thought I was doing her a favor, I thought I was returning her to safety. But ultimately, she’s not safe with that man. Not emotionally. And maybe not even physically. After all, she suspects he killed her mother.
Maybe I didn’t do her any favors by letting him go free.
“I don’t know,” I manage to say to Nadia. My voice sounds choked. “Fuck, I hope so.”
“You care about this woman, don’t you?”
I don’t know how Nadia was able to read that into my words. But I admit it. “Yes.”
And because it’s Nadia, who’s shown so much vulnerability in the last year just telling her stories, I’m willing to say to her what I barely have admitted to myself. “I think I fell in love.”
“You think, or you know?”
“I love her, Nadia. And I fucked it up.”
“Adrian, you need to go back and fight for her,” Nadia says with total clarity. In fact, she sounds stronger and more sure of herself than I’ve heard her in years. Like this is the one thing she knows about. I’m inclined to believe her. I sure as hell know that trusting my own plan hasn’t turned out well.
“Yeah. I should…I should just make sure.”
“Make it right, Adrian.”
“I thought I was,” I lament as I shove my feet back in my boots. “But it feels all wrong.”
“You’ll figure it out. Don’t come home until you’re sure, okay? I’m doing fine here. I have a routine and …friends.”
My chest tightens. It’s the first time she’s called the people in our building friends, and I’m so grateful she feels that way.
“Okay, I’ll call you later.”
“Tell her you love her,” Nadia calls out as I’m hanging up.
I don’t know if she wants that. But I do need to know she’s okay. I put a location tracking app on her phone before I gave it back. I pull it up now. She’s back at the Radisson. Maybe I’ll head over therejust to see that everything’s fine. I’m sure it is. Poval’s her father, after all. He wouldn’t hurt her. Why would he?
Yet, something has me running down the stairs instead of using the elevator. I’m already calling up a ride share app on my phone, but when I get outside, I find a taxi dropping someone off from the airport, and I jump in.
“Take me to the Radisson Blu Astrid,” I tell him.
The taxi driver grunts in acknowledgement and moves swiftly through the quiet, dark streets. I jump out at the hotel. The doorman recognizes me and holds open the door.
Inside, I take the elevator up, knowing how stupid this is. If I’m seen here by Poval or any of his men, they will kill me. I don’t even have a weaponI dropped the gun in a garbage can on my way to the airport because I knew I couldn’t get it through security.
And yet I can’t turn back.
Every time I think of Kat, panic rises up in my throat.
I step off the elevator, all my senses alert. No one is in the hallway. I creep toward the room. There’s probably no one here. Maybe they’ve left the country already. Poval probably has a private plane.
And then I hear a cry of pain from our room, and I rush forward.
Kat!
I still have the keycard to the room since I never checked out, and I yank it out of my back pocket now and hold it to the keylock.
The pad flashes a green light, and I throw the door open wide. Kat’s on her knees, her face bruised and bloody. Her father has her by her hair.
His focus jerks to mine.
I have surprise on my side, and I use it, rushing at and tackling Poval to the ground. He shouts something in his native tongue. I bludgeon his face with my fist, breaking his nose, knocking in teeth.
I hear Kat’s voice, and it fuels my fury. I can’t make out what she’s saying, only know that he fucking hurt her. He deserves to die.
He fights me, but he’s short, older and has a big paunchy gut. He’s clearly out of shape.
“You like to hurt women?” I hiss.
“He has a gun!” Kat cries out. I battle him for it, slamming his wrist back against the floor until it shakes free.
She picks it up and points it at his head.
Poval barks something at Kat in Ukrainian, and her lip lifts in a sneer.
“Where’s. My. Mother?” I don’t even recognize her voiceit carries so much venom. Gone is the wild, rambunctious girl I met a few short days ago. The one who couldn’t be dented by me or anyone else in her path.
This one is owning her pain. Embracing it. And using it to fuel a firestorm.
I dig in my pocket for a stray zip tie while she delivers a kick to Poval’s ribs.
“I asked you a question, old man. Where is she?”
He spits out blood and gives her a nasty grin. “In her grave.”
Kat tries to shoot but the safety is on. Poval flinches, seemingly shocked that she actually wanted him dead.
“Don’t. Don’t, malyshka.” I flip Poval to his belly and yank his wrists behind him to zip tie them together. “You don’t have to. Interpol wants him. He won’t walk free.”
I zip tie his ankles, then drag him toward the bed and attach his wrists to the frame of the bed.
Kat doesn’t lower the pistol. She keeps it aimed at Poval in trembling hands, her eyes bright with unshed tears, her mouth set in a grim line.
“Give me the gun, sweetheart. Please.” I stand and hold my hand out.
She doesn’t look away from her father.
“We’ll go. You and I. Together, if you’ll have me. Give me the gun, and we can walk away. You shoot him and things get complicated. Please, malyshka. Let me have it.”
She remains indecisive for another moment, but when I slowly move to take it from her, she lets go and falls into my arms.
“That’s it, Kit-Kat. You’re free of him now. We both are free. We have each other.”
She turns her face up to me, and when I see the blooming bruise on her cheekbone and swollen lip, I almost regret my decision not to let her kill him.
Except I don’t want her to live with that, nor can I ask her to live with me if I’m the one who shoots him.
Worse than all the bruises is the hurt shining in her eyes. “You left me,” she says through trembling lips.
“Mistake,” I blurt, so incredibly relieved to have her in my arms again. “Big fucking mistake. I was stupid. I never should have walked away.”
She tries to rest her cheek against my chest, then winces and changes sides.
Her father spits some kind of vitriol our way, but I can’t understand him.
Kat’s body shakes against mine. I keep an arm around her as I text the Interpol number Ravil sent me with the hotel and room number and a photo of Leon Poval.
“Let’s get out of here.” I tuck the gun in my waistband at my back and retrieve my jacket from the shopping bag on its side by the door. I take her hand to lead her out of the room.
“His men are at the hangar,” she says when we shut the door behind us.
“I’ll tell Interpol.” I send another text to the number with that information. “I’d rather leave before they get here, though.” I lead her to the elevator, and once we’re inside, I gather her against me again.
“Why was he hurting you, Kat?”
She lifts her chin. “I told him I kidnapped myself.”
“Kat,” I breathe in dismay. “You shouldn’t have.”
Her lips tremble again. “Did you really think I’d give him your name?”
I smooth her hair down where Poval mussed it. “No,” I say softly. “But I would not have blamed you if you had.”
“I could forgive everything, Adrian,” she says, eyes tear-bright again, “except you leaving me.”
My heart lurches and trips then races ahead.
“Never again,” I swear.
“You were supposed to keep me.”
“I am keeping you,” I say immediately. “I’m taking you to Chicago with me. You’ll have your clay studio where you can teach me how to center.”
“Adrian.” She sounds broken.
“I’m sorry, Kateryna. I wanted to make things right, but I fucked that up, too.”
“You’re keeping me?” She’s doing a sulky-weepy thing that soaks me with love.
I scoop her into my arms as the elevator doors open. “Yes. Forever. Are you keeping me?” I stride out.
She tucks her face against my neck, her slender arms looping over my shoulders. “I don’t do the keeping. I’m kept.”
“Right, of course,” I soothe. “Will you be kept by me?” The doorman holds the door open for me and smiles, not seeing Kat’s bruises.
“Can I call you Daddy?”
“No.”
“Master?”
I make a sound of distaste.
“Why not?”
The sound of sirens approaching the building hastens my steps toward a taxi in front.
“Maybe Master,” I concede as I lower her to the ground and open the back door to the cab. “We’ll see.”
She claps her hands together with glee. Her tears have already dried up. “You do it so well.”
I give the driver the name of my hotel and tuck her into my side. “I have asshole down to a T.”
“Wouldn’t that be an A?” I love that she’s getting cute. It’s a sign she’s feeling more like herself. “You’re not an asshole. Okay, sometimes you are, but I like it.”
“I know you do,” I murmur against her temple. “And I like giving you what you like.”
She tips her face up to me and flutters her lashes. “How do you get me so well?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe because I’m close with my sister.”
Kat gasps in excitement. “I get to meet Nadia! Oh nodo you think she’ll hate me?”
“No. She told me not to come back until I’d made things right with you.”
“She did?” I love Kat’s expression of awe.
“Da. She somehow guessed that I was madly in love with you and gave it to me straight.”
Kat’s face crumples, and she’s suddenly sobbing.
“Malyshka. Baby. Gospodi, what is it?” I pull her onto my lap and press my lips to her hair.
“Are you? Madly in love with me? Really?” Her wet face nuzzles into my neck.
“Really and truly. Madly, Kit-Kat.”
She sniffs. “But you barely know me. What if we get to Chicago and you change your mind?”
I scoff. “I know you. I know you, Kat. I may not know all the details, but I know the essence. I know you possess all the qualities I don’t. You’re bright and happy and resilient. You remain cheerful in the face of great adversity. You attach quickly and forgive easily. You’re playful and kind and kinky as fuck.” I lower my voice on the last part, so the cab driver won’t hear.
She gives a watery laugh. “Are you really in love, or do you just feel responsible for me? Because I know you, too, Adrian. You function from guilt.”
My stomach jumps a little with the heave of that very emotion. “I do feel guilty, yes.” I massage the back of her neck with my fingers. “But I want something from you, Kat. More than forgiveness.”
“What do you want?” she whispers.
“You,” I murmur back. “I want you. I want you underneath me, making those enthusiastic sounds before you come.” My lips are against her ear, so the words are for her alone. “I want you on your knees with that pouty little mouth around my cock. I want you over my lap getting your pretty ass turned pink.”
She squirms on my lap, her belly shaking with soft laughter.
“But it’s not just sex. I want you, Kit-Kat. I wantfuck, I needto be your center. The axis you spin around. The place where there is no wobble.”
“Adrian,” she whispers.
“I want to be around when you’re filling up every room with your big personality.”
“Are you calling me extra?” she demands with mock offense.
“You are definitely extra.”
She holds my gaze. “What happens when you change your mind?”
My sweet Katerynaso wounded by her father’s abandonment. I will teach her to rely on me. I’ll be her rock. “I won’t change my mind. Nothing you do or say will ever make me leave. You know why, malyshka?” I take on a teasing tone.
“Why?”
The corners of my lips tug upward. “Because I know how to handle you when you misbehave.”
Her thighs squeeze together, and she wiggles again.
“I’m going to take good care of you, Kat. I promise.”
“I’m going to take good care of you, too.” She turns on her sex kitten eyes, and now I’m the one who needs to readjust in his seat.
The cab pulls up in front of my hotel, and we get out. “Wanna go start?” I ask, taking her hand.
“Start what?”
“Taking good care of each other.”
She smiles back at me with that easy trust. “I think we’ve already been doing that.”