Chapter Ten
Irina awoke to an annoying chime from her phone and a glorious woodsy scent. Warm, strong arms were wrapped around her, comforting her.
A few seconds passed before she remembered she was in bed with Malcolm. She frowned and grabbed her phone from the nightstand, annoyed that someone would call in the middle of her night and ruin her perfect date with the man of her dreams.
She was about to shut the phone off when she spotted the number. The Caller ID didn’t inform her who was calling, but the number was from Moscow, and it wasn’t her parents. That suggested one of very few possibilities. Her heart kicked up.
Terror constricted her throat, and she took a few deep breaths desperately trying to calm down.
There could be another explanation. Maybe it had nothing to do with a certain obsessive supernatural ex-lover. Maybe someone else was calling her who still cared, an old acquaintance. Not that she had many left thanks to Yuri.
After grabbing the phone, Irina made her way toward the bathroom, glancing over her shoulder at the slumbering Malcolm in the darkness. The man was as deep a sleeper as he was a good lover.
That was useful. She didn’t want to have to answer too many questions about her darker past. During dinner, they’d managed to focus so much on dancing and amusing places in Moscow that there was little time to go off into tangents about their romantic pasts. That’s how she kept the conversation flowing for all their dates that week.
Maybe he noticed that she was trying to avoid the subject, but if he did, he’d given no indication. For a man who seemed so coarse in many ways on the surface, he could be surprisingly sensitive.
Irina connected the call and stepped inside the bathroom. “Hello?”
“I’m very disappointed in you, my little carnation,” Yuri growled over the line in Russian. “To lower yourself to be with a man like that. Disgusting, but I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.”
Irina gasped, and her hand started shaking. There’s no way he could know she’d slept with Malcolm. Yuri was thousands of miles away on another continent. He had to be.
Emma was the one who’d trashed her room. She’d proven it the other night. That was why she’d stopped worrying so much about Yuri.
“W-what are you talking about?” Irina stammered back in Russian.
“I’ve always knew you had a bit of a free spirit in you, a small fire. I liked it, even encouraged it in a way. It makes you more beautiful. I’ve excused many of your flaws because of your loyalty to me in the past, but this… this I cannot let pass so easily, my little carnation.”
Irina couldn’t help but laugh despite her fear. “Loyalty? You don’t own me, Yuri. You forced me out of my own country, away from my family with your obsessiveness and overbearing need to control me.”
“I did no such thing,” he thundered.
The woman flinched even though the man wasn’t there.
“You betrayed my trust, but I always thought you would come back to me,” Yuri continued, his voice low and calm but filled with implied menace. “But now I find that I was wrong about you the entire time. That you’re nothing more than a slut and a whore who will open your legs to any man once you’re out of my sight.” He clucked his tongue. “This will need to be punished, Irina.”
She blinked and tried to force words out, but nothing came. Instead, her tears dripped onto the ground.
Free? What a farce. She’d never be free as long as Yuri lived, and she wasn’t even certain how anyone could kill the man.
“Please,” Irina whimpered. “Leave me alone.”
“You think I don’t know, do you? You think I didn’t see you come home with that man? You think I don’t know that you fucked him, you disloyal whore?”
“Leave me alone,” Irina screamed, sobbing. “Why can’t you just leave me alone? There are so many women you could have. Beautiful women. Russia is filled with them. Moscow is filled with them. I’m not what you need. You told me I wasn’t before. Please, I beg of you, if you have any mercy in your heart, let me be free. Give up on me. I just want to be free.”
A dark chuckle followed. “I told you before. I own you. I will never let you go. Once I grow tired of you, you’ll wait until I grow interested again, but, no, you will never be free of me. Possessions don’t get freedom.”
“I—”
Irina gasped as Malcolm ripped the phone out of her hand. She’d been so focused on the call she’d not even noticed him open the bathroom door and creep up behind her.
“Who the fuck is this?” Malcolm growled into the phone, his face contorted in anger. “Speak English, motherfucker.”
A few seconds passed, and the man’s face darkened even more. “She’s not your property, asshole. She’s her own woman, and if you’re some stalker asshole, you should know she’s with me now, and I will take your ass out if you get within a mile of her. You understand me?”
Malcolm listened for a few more seconds before laughing. “You think you’re the first asshole to threaten me? Bring it, fucker. I don’t know how to make this clearer. I’m gonna find out what you look like, and then if I see you around her, I’m going to break every single bone in your body, then stick you on the slow boat back to Russia. So stay the hell away from her.” He ended the call and tossed the phone on the side of the sink.
He gripped the sink hard for a moment, taking several deep breaths, red-faced and visibly trying to calm himself.
Panic swallowed the brief swell of hope in Irina that Malcolm’s rebuke of Yuri summoned. She realized what her new lover had just done: signed his own death warrant.
Irina leaned against the wall, wiping away tears. “Y-you shouldn’t have done that. You don’t understand who you’re dealing with.”
Malcolm took a few deep breaths before turning toward her. “Who is that guy? Just some stalker asshole? Some deranged fan?”
She wiped away a few tears. “His name is Yuri. We used to be together when I still lived in Russia. We were lovers.”
“But you aren’t together now?” There was no anger in his voice or face, just concern. That almost made it worse. He cared, and that meant he’d suffer because of her.
Irina shook her head. “No. I left Russia to get away from him. He doesn’t even love me. I’m nothing to him, a trophy, a thing. By the time I realized that, it was too late. He’d become obsessed with me, and he refused to let me go.”
“Okay. I get it.” Malcolm nodded. “It’s fine. I’ll protect you from this asshole. You don’t have to be afraid anymore.”
She let out a nervous laugh. Malcolm was brave, but he had no idea what he’d be facing. If only she could tell him the truth, he’d run, but if she did, it was certain that Yuri or the monsters who even he feared would come and kill them both. The only thing that had kept her alive was her ex-lover knowing she would never dare reveal his secret.
Irina took a deep, shuddering breath. “Yuri is dangerous. He’s a criminal and a powerful man. He will kill you without hesitation or mercy. He’s killed so many people that I don’t even think he believes it’s special to murder anymore.”
Malcolm smirked. Irina blinked, confused at his reaction.
The man shrugged. “I’ve been dealing with thugs and criminals for all my life. I’ve told you stories about the neighborhood I grew up in. I’d like to see Yuri try and kill me. He wouldn’t be the first guy who thought he could take me out and got a rude surprise.”
Irina rushed over to Malcolm and stared up into his eyes. “You don’t understand. He’s like no man you’ve ever encountered. He is… more dangerous. You will not win. He’s not some biker or common thug. If you try and fight him, you will die.”
He snorted. “Bullshit. I’m a lot tougher than you think. I’ve met more than a few assholes like Yuri, and I’ve always been the one who walked away from the fight.”
Irina sighed and looked down. She couldn’t tell Malcolm the truth, but she also couldn’t risk him trying to take on Yuri. It was obvious now that her ex-lover was in the area and spying on her. It was only a matter of time before he made his move. She had to do something to save Malcolm. He wouldn’t last thirty seconds against Yuri.
“You need to leave.”
Malcolm shook his head. “Fuck that. I’m not leaving you so some mobster stalker can drag your ass back to Russia.”
“Tonight didn’t mean anything,” Irina snapped. “Just because we fucked doesn’t mean anything. I don’t need your help. This is my problem to solve.”
Malcolm winced. Daggers of guilt stabbed at her heart. She hated hurting this man who’d been so kind to her and saved her before, but it was for the best. A normal man couldn’t win against a monster. Real life wasn’t a fairy tale.
Irina turned away. “Leave.”
“I’m not leaving.”
She spun and slapped him hard across the cheek. “Leave, or I call the police. I’m tired of men thinking they can ignore what I want.”
Malcolm blinked and shook his head. He stepped toward the bathroom door. “You’re making a mistake.”
“It’s my mistake to make. I don’t love you. It was just sex.”
He frowned and nodded slowly. Without another word, he stepped out of the bathroom.
About a minute later, she heard the front door slam shut. Irina emerged from the bathroom and collapsed onto her bed. She sobbed into her pillow.
For a brief shining few days, light had broken through the darkness, but now the storm was coming to destroy her. She’d thought she could escape it, but it was hopeless.
Now the only question that remained was if she would survive.