Page 71 of The Pakhan’s Unwanted Bride

"The best person to protect you is someone who can think clearly when your life is on the line." Samuil stops walking again and turns to face me, and there's something in his eyes that makes my breath catch. "Someone who won't hesitate or second-guess themselves because they're too busy feeling things they shouldn't feel. I need people around you who will do their jobs without letting emotions cloud their judgment."

"Like you?" The words slip out before I can stop them, and I immediately regret the challenge in my tone.

But Samuil doesn't rise to the bait. Instead, he looks at me with a wry tilt to his mouth. "I'm the worst person to protect you, Princess. Because when it comes to you, I'm starting to realize I can't think clearly either."

The admission hangs in the air between us, heavy with implications. My heart pounds in my chest, and I'm acutely aware of how close we're standing and how the afternoon sunlight makes his dark eyes look almost warm.

"Then maybe," I say quietly, "we're both in trouble."

Samuil's mouth curves into something that's almost a smile. "Maybe we are."

We start walking again, and the silence between us feels different now. Less tense, more comfortable. I find myself wanting to know more about this man I married, this Pakhan who keeps so much of himself locked away behind walls I'm only beginning to understand exist.

"How did you become Pakhan?" I ask after a few minutes. "My father said you weren't born into the position. That you had to fight for it."

Samuil's expression darkens slightly, and I wonder if I've pushed too far. But then he speaks, his voice low and measured. "My father was Pakhan before me. But he wasn't a good man, and he wasn't a good leader. He was violent and unpredictable, especially when he drank. Which was often."

I listen without interrupting, sensing that this is something he doesn't talk about easily or often.

"When I was sixteen, he came home drunk one night. My mother said something he didn't like, something small and meaningless that I don't even remember now. He started hitting her." Samuil's jaw tightens, and I can see the muscle jumping beneath his skin. "I tried to stop him. I tried to get between them. But he was bigger and stronger than me then, and he threw me across the room like I was nothing."

My chest tightens with horror at the image his words create. I want to reach out and touch him, offer some kind of comfort, but I'm afraid that if I interrupt, he'll stop talking.

"By the time I got back up, she was on the floor. Not moving. Not breathing." His voice drops even lower, and I have to strain to hear him. "He'd beaten her to death right in front of me. And then he looked at me like he was deciding whether I was next."

"Samuil." His name comes out as barely a whisper, my throat tight with emotion.

"I ran. Got out of the house and went to the only person I thought might help me. One of my father's captains, a man who'd always been decent to me. He hid me for three days while my father tore the city apart looking for me. And then he helped me do what needed to be done."

I don't ask what that means. I don't need to. The answer is written in the hard set of Samuil's shoulders and the way his hands have curled into fists at his sides.

"Your father killed himself?" I ask carefully.

"That's the official story." Samuil looks at me directly, and there's no apology in his eyes. "The truth is, I put a bullet in his head while he slept. And then I spent the next ten years proving to every man in the organization that I was strong enough to lead them. That I wasn't the scared sixteen-year-old boy who'd run away and I'd earned the right to be Pakhan."

My heart aches for him, for the boy he was and the man he had to become. I can't imagine carrying that kind of weight, that kind of trauma, and still managing to build the life and the power that Samuil has built. "I'm so sorry. I had no idea. No one ever talks about what happened to your parents."

"Because I don't let them." His voice is flat, matter-of-fact. "The past is the past. It made me who I am, but it doesn't define me anymore. I learned early that showing weakness gets you killed in this world. That the only way to survive is to be stronger, smarter, and more ruthless than everyone around you."

"Is that why you're always so controlled?" The question slips out before I can stop it. "Why you keep everyone at arm's length?"

Samuil considers this for a moment, and when he speaks again, his voice is softer. "Control is the only thing that separates me from my father. He let his emotions rule him, let his anger and his demons turn him into a monster. I swore I would never be like that. That I would never let feelings cloud my judgment or make me weak."

"But feelings don't make you weak." I stop walking and turn to face him, needing him to understand this. "They make you human. And there's nothing weak about caring about people or letting yourself feel things."

Samuil's expression is bleak. "Every person I've ever cared about has either died or been used against me. My mother, the captain who helped me. Even Gregory, in his own way. The more you care, the more vulnerable you become. The more weapons you give your enemies to use against you."

I understand what he's saying and the logic behind his walls and his distance. But I also see the loneliness in his eyes, the isolation that comes from keeping everyone at arm's length. "That sounds like a terrible way to live."

"It's the only way I know how." He reaches out and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear, and the gesture is so unexpectedly tender that it makes my breath catch. "Until you showed up and started making me question everything I thought I knew about myself."

Before I can respond, his phone buzzes in his pocket. He pulls it out and glances at the screen, and I see his expression shift back into the controlled mask of the Pakhan.

"I need to take this." He steps away, and I watch as he answers the call with a curt greeting.

I turn away to give him privacy, walking a few steps down the path and pretending to admire the roses while my mind races with everything he just told me. The image of a sixteen-year-old Samuil watching his father kill his mother, then having to kill his father in turn, makes my chest ache with sympathy and horror. No wonder he's so controlled, so careful about letting anyone get close. He learned at the worst possible moment that love and emotion can destroy you.

Samuil finishes his call and returns to my side, but the moment of vulnerability has passed. His walls are back up, his expression carefully neutral. "I need to handle some business. Gregory will escort you back to the house."