Chapter Nine
Rain tapped steadilyagainst the windows as Maksim checked the locks of the warehouse one final time.The new safehouse sat at the edge of the city near the industrial docks, buried between abandoned warehouses and rusting shipping containers nobody bothered looking at twice.Not even his brothers.
Lena stood near the kitchen counter watching him silently.Maksim could feel her eyes following him around the room.Ever since their last conversation, something between them had shifted again.
Marriage.Even thinking the word still felt strange in his head.Hell, it felt unreal.Maksim had spent years mocking men who willingly chained themselves emotionally to another person.His brothers had once joked he would probably die alone with a gun in his hand and blood on his shoes.
Now he was hiding a woman from the Bratva and contemplating putting his family name on her permanently.Life was funny like that, or cruel, perhaps possibly both.
Maksim opened a drawer beneath the counter and placed a handgun inside carefully.When he looked at her, she widened her eyes slightly.
“You’re leaving me a gun?”Lena asked.
“You know how to use one?”Maksim had to ask.
“My dad taught me basic safety.”She hesitated.“I’ve never actually shot anyone.”
“Good.”Maksim closed the drawer halfway but left it accessible.“Let’s keep it that way.”
Next he placed a thick envelope beside it which contained enough cash to disappear quickly if things went wrong.Lena stared at it.
“Maksim,” she whispered.
“If someone comes here besides me,” he interrupted calmly, “you take the money, the gun, and leave through the back stairwell.There’s a taxi depot two blocks east.No trains.No buses.Understand?”
Her throat moved as she swallowed.“You really think something could happen?”
He looked at her evenly.“I always think something could happen.”
That was the problem.In his world, paranoia kept people alive.Maksim stepped closer until only a small distance separated them.
“This location isn’t tied to me officially,” he said.“Dimitri and Alexei don’t know about it.”
Yet, anyway.The thought lingered unpleasantly in the back of his mind.Nothing stayed hidden forever.Lena folded her arms tightly across herself.
“You’re really intent on seeing Dimitri?”
It was not a question.Maksim nodded once.
“He needs to understand this situation clearly before Alexei escalates things further,” Maksim explained.
Lena’s expression tightened faintly.“You mean before they decide to try and kill me again.”
Maksim flexed his jaw.That was not happening, not under his watch.
“No one is touching you again,” he said with a growl
Lena looked at him quietly for a moment after that.She nodded.“Please be careful.”
Something inside him paused unexpectedly.Maksim stared at her.Most people feared for themselves around him.Very few fearedforhim, but Lena looked genuinely worried now.
“I don’t want you walking into something dangerous,” she admitted quietly.
