“You’re mine. The only reason anyone should look at you is to make sure you’re unharmed. Not to make fucking small talk,” he rasped, sending a shiver down my spine.
There was that word again.Mine.
It should feel archaic. Seriously, it’s such a caveman thing to say, and it’s even borderline concerning in the real world. But instead, it felt like someone had poured warm honey straight down my spine.
I turned my head just enough to look at him. “What do you have against small talk?”
“Aside from it being useless? I’m not a fan of you gracing everyone and their fucking mother with that gorgeous smile of yours. If you feel like smiling, fucking smile at me. They’re unworthy of it anyways.”
I blinked.Oh. Okay, then.
His big hand pressed against my lower back like a white-hot brand, guiding me to one of the waiting vehicles.
The drive up into the hills felt unreal in a way I couldn’t quite categorize. Puerto Rico unfolded around us in soft pastels and bright-green hills, the ocean widening behind us as we climbed.
I kept waiting for the descent, the moment when we reached the safe house, the pivot into secrecy. Instead, we pulled up at iron gates which opened without us having to stop.
We drove up a curved stone driveway, carved into the hillside and lined with palms and flowering bougainvillea, the tires crunching over pale stone. The morning sun bathed the villa in honeyed light, illuminating the white stucco exterior and the deep, dark clay roof tiles. Carved wooden doors were set into graceful archways.
Modern glass walls faced the ocean, reflecting the open sky and water in clean, long lines. Below, the city was waking up. Beyond that, the endless blue of the Caribbean Sea stretched out before us.
I stared at the water, quickly looked at Sasha, and back at the sea again.
“This is not really the shady hiding place I was imagining.”
“No,” he agreed.
“This looks more like a magazine spread.”
He just shrugged.
The SUV rolled to a quiet stop beneath a shaded portico and one of the men moved to open the doors before the engine had even settled.
This didn’t feel like a place to hide. It felt like a place you stayed and maybe even built a life. And that realization slid under my ribs in a way I wasn’t prepared for.
I’d thought this would feel reckless and temporary and doomed. Instead, I was standing in the morning sun, breathing in the salty air, and staring at the ocean from a hilltop villa. I was wondering how I’d ended up in this place — and why it didn’t feel wrong.
I hadn’t planned on ever being in a place like this. Not in this lifetime, and definitely not while holding hands with a man who’d broken out of prison.
Yet here I was, and, as with most things in life, I chose to embrace it before I could overthink it and become paralyzed by indecision.
We stepped inside slowly. I peered around like I might set off an alarm by breathing wrong, like the house itself was expensive enough to reject me on principle.
Pale stone floors stretched beneath exposed wooden beams, and sunlight spilled in through massive glass panels framing the ocean like a living mural. Sheer linen curtains shifted softly in the breeze, bringing in the salty air and the faint rustle of the palms outside.
“Okay,” I said under my breath. “I need a minute. This is … a lot.”
Sasha stayed close enough for me to feel his presence without looking. The others moved through the space with quiet efficiency: luggage disappeared upstairs and brief exchanges in Russian took place near the terrace.
“Take however long you need,” Sasha drawled, his fingertips ghosting across my shoulder as he stepped to the side to strike up a murmured conversation with Kyrill.
The problem was, I had time. And if I had time, I would think. And if I thought, I would spiral. So instead of spiraling quietly like a stable adult, I chose violence.Socialviolence.
I marched toward the nearest tall, silent man and introduced myself like this was a PTA meeting.
“Hi again.” I waved awkwardly. “Sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”
He hesitated, then answered. “Ivan.”