Page 105 of Marrying the Savage

He nods seriously. “Good. The navy is losing.”

I look at the tiny soldiers lined along the planter. “To whom?”

“The sea monsters.”

I take one step farther onto the terrace. The wind immediately lifts my hair and drags cold fingers down the back of my neck. The water below surges against the cliff.

I look down by mistake. My stomach flips.

Nope. Absolutely not.

I take one step back.

Maksim frowns. “Are you scared?”

“Yes.”

He blinks, clearly surprised by my honesty. “Of sea monsters?”

“Of gravity.”

He looks over the railing, then back at me. “Gravity is not a monster.”

“That’s what gravity wants you to think.”

He seems to find this reasonable. “Uncle Damir is not scared of heights,” he says.

I try not to react to the name.

I fail, probably.

“Uncle Damir is probably not scared of taxes, bullets, or emotional intimacy either.”

“What is emotional intima⁠—”

“Never mind.”

Maksim goes back to arranging his soldiers. “He went out.”

“So I heard.”

“He comes back.”

My throat tightens unexpectedly. I look at the sea instead of the child, which is terrible because the sea is still very far down and doing nothing for my nerves.

“Does he?”

“Yes. Papa says Uncle Damir always comes back.”

Children say things like that, with faith, and with the absolute confidence of someone whose world still has rules adults can obey.

I wonder when I lost that.

I lower myself onto a stone bench safely away from the railing and fold my hands in my lap. The Volodin ring sits absurdly large on my finger, the black thread holding it in place. Maksim spots it immediately because children, like crime lords, notice inconvenient details.

“That’s Uncle Damir’s ring.”

“Yes.”