Leaving the shop after finally getting my first taste of Dahlia after ten years was nearly impossible. Only her words stopped me. I needed to show her I’d changed. I left the shop and waited for her to leave after locking up. Luca’s guys were in a black sedan parked an acceptable distance from the shop. Anyone on the street might not have known who they were, but I did. I’d been taught from a young age lots of things you needed to survive in my world.

I walked over to their car.

“I’ll handle her walk home.”

They nodded and drove off without a word. She came out of the shop a little while later and locked up. I gritted my teeth as she stuck her earbuds into her ears and started her walk home. It was past two in the morning, and she was walking and listening to music, completely exposing herself.

I kept a safe distance until she made it to her building. I’d known the address, but I hadn’t been here before. A light flicked on a few stories up and I crossed the street to get a better look. The window behind the fire escape of her apartment was covered in flowers. I watched her for way too long, moving from room to room in the apartment, turning the lights off as she made it to her bedroom. The evening chill set in for me.

After long enough that anyone paying attention probably would have called the police for a suspected stalker, I finally left. I’d had a taste of her, but I knew it wasn’t going to be enough. I wanted more, and I’d do whatever I needed to do to get it. If she wanted a truckload of pelmeni, I’d make it happen, but it was happening.

Sergei’s message blared on my phone the minute I rolled over in bed, and I nearly chucked the phone when I saw it, but I couldn’t ignore Sergei. Not now. He’d threatened to send someone after me if I tried to ignore him, and I knew he’d keep his word. I sent a message letting him know I was coming. And another to Alexei. We still hadn’t heard anything from Elena, even after practically stalking the mail. Not knowing how long it would take her to get here had me even more on edge.

Ensuring that Dahlia was safe eclipsed almost everything else other than the same for Elena. But with Dahlia I was here. Sitting in front of her almost every day other than the times when my skin needed to heal. But each scar on my skin healed something else in me. The plans Alexei and I had for Sergei looked less appealing as the days wore on. I’d be the one Alexei and Elena would look to handle the bratva once he was gone.

Alexei knew I wanted out, but he also knew I was the one who needed to step up. I needed to ensure that the rest of my family and Dahlia would be safe. Leaving her again was not possible. Covering over everything about my past one session at a time meant staying in would always be a risk. These tattoos were earned. A symbol of pride and devotion to the bratva. Desecrating them by having her tattoo over them was like shouting from the rooftops that I had no honor and didn’t want my place in the family. I’d known I was fucked the minute I saw her picture, and it had never been clearer than right then.

Igor practically growled as I passed him on the way to Sergei’s office. Ever the loyal lapdog. His arm was in a sling, not that he was any less useless without it. I knocked on the door and pushed it open without waiting for an answer.

Sergei slid back in his chair and glared at me as I sat in the high-backed chair in front of him. Igor took a spot beside the door. I kept him in my peripheral vision. Sergei snapped his fingers, and a light-brown-haired woman’s head popped out from under his desk. Sergei zipped up his pants as he stood. I did my best to ensure that my imagination didn’t wander to what had been going on under that desk. A shudder of revulsion shot through me.

“Get out. I told you to be faster,” he said, dismissing her. She scurried out of the office and slammed the door behind her.

“Why do you keep disappearing on me, Ivan?” He sat on the edge of his desk in front of me.

“Late nights mean I’m sleeping in.”

“Late nights doing what?” His eyes were hard and cold as he glared at me.

“Late nights doing who would be a better question.”

“Things would be so much easier if you stayed here.” We’d been over this before and I wasn’t coming back. Not until it was my house. He wanted me under his thumb where I was at his beck and call at a moment’s notice. It wasn’t happening again.

“Just because you are married does not mean you can’t still fuck whoever you want, but certainly not as conveniently as you can when unmarried.” He raised his eyebrow and nodded toward the closed door.

“I know you have plans for me. Plans for who would make a good wife. I should get all of this out of my system now, right?” I hedged, trying to appease him. He scoffed.

“Yes, it seems that way.”

“Your sister is still missing, and I have everyone at my disposal in Moscow combing the city looking for her. You still haven’t heard anything?”

It took so much effort to keep my body relaxed. To keep the slightest hint of any anger out of my voice and body. I shook my head.

“Nothing. I’m beginning to worry. Perhaps I should go there to try to find her.”

He stared at me for a long time. Evaluating. Weighing his options and my loyalty. The uneasy crawl in my stomach ramped up a notch, and then he broke off his intense stare.

“No, it’s fine. I have the best men on it. She will be found and put back somewhere safe where we all know she should be.” His way of threatening always made me want to rip out his throat. She’d get here, and the minute her plane touched down, he’d find out how much of a mistake he’d made all those years ago.

“Good. I’ll feel much better knowing my sister is under the watchful eye of the family.” I kept my teeth from grinding and my voice level.

“We have some developments in the bookkeeper situation. I thought you took care of it. I’ve never known you not to handle a situation.” The disappointment in his voice was laced with a threat that was there for any person he talked to.

“I went there, and I handled it. You didn’t say how I needed to handle it. He had no issues with understanding exactly what I told him.” I crossed my hands on my lap, and Sergei’s eyes darted down, checking out my cut and bruised knuckles.

Sergei sat behind his desk.

“Fine, but if this comes back to bite us, it’s your ass on the line, Ivan. Don’t make me regret not sending someone else. Someone like Igor.”

Igor’s shoulders straightened like a happy pet.

“If he hadn’t gotten himself shot, maybe that would be a possibility, but as it is right now, I’m the best option.”

Sergei took a gulp of his drink and sighed.

“You’re right.” Sergei pinched the bridge of his nose. I could feel the waves of resentment and embarrassment radiating off Igor. “He is a good bookkeeper. Hard to find good help these days.”

“Am I dismissed?” I said, my jaw aching. Sleep deprivation was getting to me. I needed to stay sharp. I couldn’t afford to make a mistake. Sergei nodded and offered me a drink. I chugged it down as quickly as I could to get the hell out of there. The smell of death got stronger every time I stepped over the threshold. I didn’t know whose I was smelling, his or mine.

* * *

“What did you find?” I asked, sliding into the sleek black town car.

“Well, hello to you too,” Luca said, throwing a manila folder onto my lap. I shot him a look, but he just chuckled around the lollipop in his mouth and tapped away on his phone. The hard candy clicked against his teeth as I tried to concentrate, flipping through the pictures.

These were guys I didn’t recognize. The car had been parked across the street from the shop on three different days. I had no way of knowing if this was a popular dealing spot or if something else was going on.

Had Sergei gone with outside help for this? Or were these other guys I needed to worry about? It was bad enough trying to figure out if I had already destroyed her life again, but I at least wanted to know which enemies I was up against.

Luca’s lollipop kept clacking against his teeth as he laughed at one thing or another on his phone.

“Can you stop with the fucking lollipop?” I glared at him. “And what is so funny, anyway?”

“It seems you’ve lost all sense of humor in your old age, Ivan.” Luca crunched the hard candy between his teeth until there was nothing left except for the stick. “So, what’s the verdict?” He grabbed the pictures off my lap and flipped through them as the driver pulled into traffic.

“Do you know any of those guys?”

“No. I haven’t seen any of them before. You don’t recognize them?”

“No.” I squeezed the bridge of my nose.

“That could go either way then.”

“I know.” I leaned back, resting my head against the headrest. “This is all you have?” I gestured to the stack of pictures. “They didn’t come near the shop or do anything like that?”

“No, my guys would have gotten pictures of that for sure. All they did was sit. Four different sets of guys so far. Could be something. Could be nothing.”

“Could be a hit squad waiting for the right time to strike.” I closed my eyes, and my leg bounced up and down, rocking the car as we weaved through late afternoon traffic.

“This is why I will never get involved with a woman. It’s like painting a giant bull’s-eye on your chest and letting your heart roam free in the world.” He tossed the pictures on the seat beside me, disgust lacing his voice.

“Sometimes it just happens.” I shook my head, keeping my eyes closed.

“You always have a choice. There isn’t a woman out there who can make me freak out the way you are.”

I opened my eyes and leveled them at Luca.

“You think you get a choice? You think you get to decide what woman you fall in love with? You don’t, my friend. That would make life too easy, and we all know life is never easy. When you fall for someone, there’s barely time to breathe, let alone decide you’re not going to do it.”

“I stick to partying, fucking and taking care of business. I only have a few years left until I’ll be expected to settle down. Have a family and then all that has to be a lot more discreet.”

“It seems you have it all planned out.”

“I’m not going out like my dad. I have no intentions of eating a bullet over a woman.” He chucked his phone onto the small bar setup and grabbed a glass, pouring himself some vodka. He held the glass out to me. I threw it back in one gulp, letting the smooth burn flow through me.

“You were supposed to wait for me, asshole. I even went to the trouble of buying vodka and everything.” He poured me a second drink and held out his glass to me.

“To not being so completely blinded by love that you can’t handle your business,” he said, grinning ear to ear, with his glass ready for a toast.

“I cannot fucking wait.”

“Wait until what?”

“Until you meet the woman who isn’t going to take your shit and is going to completely wreck you for all other women. Come to me then and ask me how fucking easy it is.” I clinked my glass to his and downed my second drink. He gulped his down slower, looking a little like he’d seen a ghost.

“You’re going to be fucked, my friend.” The car slowed as we pulled up in front of my building. “Thanks for the ride.” I climbed out of the car and stopped short just as the door closed behind me. Taking my hands out of my pockets, I knocked on the glass, and he lowered the dark tinted window. Luca raised his eyebrow as I leaned into the car.

“What do you know about art galleries?”

He furrowed his eyebrows and looked at me like I’d grown another head. I knew just what I could do to prove to Dahlia that I’d changed. Luca would make some calls for me to see what could be done. I didn’t know what it was going to look like when he finally called in his marker for all these favors, but I couldn’t think about that right then.

I had a one-track mind, and it was focused on Dahlia.

On making her mine once and for all.