Page 60 of Bratva Baby

“Yes. He didn’t build clean and new. He built on top of old rot and used family freight to hide what he was doing.”

Her hand comes out and catches my wrist before she can think better of it. “That means he tied the current corridor to the old killing on purpose.”

I look down at her hand on me, then back at her face. “Yes.”

She lets go slowly.

For one second, neither of us says anything. We’re both sitting inside the same realization now. If we prove this cleanly, Maks isn’t just a cousin stealing off the books. He becomes the man who used old blood as cover while he built private power. That changes how every room will hear his name.

“That’s why they gave you time,” she observes as the realization dawns on her.

“That’s part of it.”

She leans back against the seat, but the energy coming off her has shifted. She looks less trapped and more like a huntress, and I like her this way far too much.

“You’re staring,” she suddenly says, narrowing her eyes at me.

“I’m thinking.”

“You can do that without looking at me like I’m a loaded weapon.”

I let my eyes move over her once, from the loose hair at her temple to the shirt slipping off one shoulder and the long line of her bare legs under it. “No. You’re harder to assess dressed like that.”

A flush climbs her throat. “You’re impossible.”

Chuckling deeply, I snag the arm of her chair and drag it flush with mine, wood squealing until she’s nearly in my lap. “Tell me you didn’t stroll into a negotiation wearing my shirt, sweetheart.”

She’s so pretty when she’s this cornered and she’s still trying to play coy. “I’m in your house under guard. You don’t get to be precious about cotton.”

I laugh once and shake my head. “This argument is getting old, Milaya. I’d find an argument, but I’m tired.”

Her eyes soften immediately and she touches my chin. “They really put you in a corner, didn’t they?”

“Yeah,” I sigh. “But it’s nothing compared to what you’re doing to me right now.” In this precise moment, watching the light drift in and out of her eyes as they sink and align with the lights in the study, I think I could love this woman.

I think I already do.

Her hand comes up to my chest, not pushing, just there. “Maybe I think you’re too comfortable.”

“Maybe I am.”

She laughs softly. “That should worry me.”

“Does it?”

Her mouth parts, and I look at it longer than I should. “Not as much as it should.”

I bend and kiss her before she can decide whether to take that back. She tastes like Coke and pizza and nerves she’s trying to hide. Her hand fists in my shirt immediately. I deepen it, and she gives me what I wanted in the first place, that little angry sound she tries to bury when I’ve got her exactly where I want her.

When I pull back, her eyes are bright and annoyed and not nearly steady enough to make the point she wants to make. “You’re a menace.”

I cup her chin in the palm of my hand. “And you’re distracted.”

“By force.”

“By preference.”

Her fingers slide from my chest up to my collar and stay there.