“And then?” Elena sounded positively riveted now.
I exhaled slowly. “He came to get me.”
There was a pause.
“I’m almost scared to ask … define ‘get’.”
“Kidnappedmight’ve been a term that was thrown around.” I closed my eyes briefly. “But it’s complicated. Ididn’t reallystaykidnapped. Honestly, it’s really hard to explain.”
Now I was rambling. Great.
I could almost feel her processing my word vomit.
“Soooo you chose to stay?” she asked finally.
“Yeah. I know it sounds insane.”
“It does,” she agreed. “But so does just about everything else in my life.”
“I meaaaan … from what I’ve seen so far, you’re probably not wrong.”
A small smile tugged at my mouth.
We sat with it for a moment — the absurdity of it all, the overlap, and the fact that, somehow and against all odds, we had ended up in the same kind of mess, albeit from completely different directions.
“What are the odds of all this happening?” Elena mused softly.
“Still probably zero,” I deadpanned.
That got a quiet laugh out of her.
“… We’re still doing Thursdays, right?” she asked after a moment.
I didn’t even hesitate. “Obviously. You can’t leave me to fend for myself with all these Russians.”
Chapter 41
Sasha
Thebrightmorningsunlightspilled through the tall windows overlooking the water. Pale gold reflected off the tiled floors and polished steel kitchen counters, creating a deceptively peaceful scene — like a painting intended to convince the outside world violence and power struggles didn’t exist beyond the gates.
It was, of course, a lie, but it was a pleasant one.
The villa had been crawling with contractors for the past week as they repaired all the damage from the ambush. I was sorely tempted to send Rafael the bills but Addy thought it would have been too petty.
I didn’t think there was such a thing as “too petty” but I wasn’t going to fight with her over the matter.
Addy stood barefoot in the kitchen, her sleeves rolled up to her elbows and flour smudged across one cheek, a detail she clearly wasn’t aware of. She was humming faintly to herself as she leaned over the counter, displayingthe kind of concentration most people would reserve for bomb disposal.
The bomb, in this case, appeared to be dough.
I leaned against the doorway and watched her for a moment longer than necessary, committing the scene to memory, as I had begun to do with these small domestic moments.
The way the sunlight played on the edge of her shoulder, the way her hair was already falling loose from its half-up, half-down ponytail, and the faint furrow between her brows when she was thinking through something complicated.
“Good morning, baby.”
I stepped into the kitchen slowly, folding my arms as I glanced at the tray she was assembling with suspicious precision.