“By the garden wall…near the hedge,” I manage, voice trembling despite my defiance.
He doesn’t speak again. He picks up his phone, calls Nik, and speaks in clipped Russian. I don’t understand most of it, but the tension in his voice is deafening. I catch phrases like reinforcements and flood the mansion.
A sweep. Guards everywhere. Every angle covered.
He ends the call, slipping the phone back into his pocket. I stand frozen, chest hammering, realizing something terrifying. Konstantin isn’t just in control. He’s afraid. Terrified. And it’s all for me.
He turns toward me, expression taut. “You should have come to me immediately.” His voice is tight, edged with frustration and worry.
“I did!” I snap, stepping forward, fists clenching. “I shouldn’t have had to find a note in the first place!”
“You should not have been alone!” he shoots back, stepping closer. His eyes are hard, almost panicked.
“I don’t want to be imprisoned!” I yell, fury spiking through me.
“Imprisoned?” His voice is incredulous, low and dangerous. “I’m trying to keep you alive!”
“I can protect myself!” I fire back, voice cracking. “I don’t need you hovering over me every second, dictating my life!”
He takes a sharp step toward me, pinning me against the desk with his hands braced on either side of my head. I flinch, heart racing. “Do you understand what’s coming, Raelyn? Do you understand what they’re capable of?”
“I don’t care!” I shout, breath ragged. “I care that you treat me like I’m nothing but a pawn!”
His jaw tightens. His chest rises and falls rapidly. I can see the control slipping at the edges—the perfect mask cracking. “You think this is easy for me?” he hisses. “Do you? Every second I leave you alone, every second I let you out of my sight, I feel them closing in!”
I stare up at him, fury and fear mingling. “Then don’t keep me in the dark.”
He swallows hard, eyes flicking away for a fraction of a second, before returning to mine. “I’m not keeping you in the dark for nothing. I’m keeping you alive,” he growls.
“I’m not yours to keep alive!” I spit back.
That’s when he steps toward me.
Not fast. Not violent. Just inevitable.
The air seems to tighten as he closes the space between us, pinning me in place with nothing but his presence and that look—half fury, half something darker, more consuming. His eyes burn into mine, unblinking.
“You don’t get to decide that,” he says quietly. Too quietly. “Not right now.”
My pulse stutters. I hate that it does.
“I don’t care if you hate me,” he continues, voice low, brutal with certainty. “I don’t care if you never forgive me. I will keep you safe anyway.”
I shake my head, breath coming faster. “You don’t get to—”
“I will burn the world down,” he cuts in, jaw tightening, “before I let Markov—or anyone else—put their hands on you.”
My heart slams against my ribs. I hate the way my body reacts to his words. Hate the heat that rushes through me, the way my skin prickles like it recognizes the threat and the promise all at once.
He moves closer. Too close.
I can feel his breath against my cheek now, warm and steady, in sharp contrast to the chaos spiraling inside me. I feel trapped. Shaken. Pulled toward him in a way that terrifies me.
Then he says it.
“I will find your father,” he says, each word deliberate, carved in stone. “And I will kill the men who took him.”
My breath catches.