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He looks pathetic. That doesn’t make me feel better.

It makes me want to finish it.

He spits blood onto the pavement, then looks up at me like he still has the right to be shocked. “You psycho,” he says, breathing hard. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

I step toward him.

He flinches.

“Don’t fuck with me,” I say. The words come out flat.

He hears the promise in them anyway.

His good eye moves over my face, my clothes, the blood on my knuckles, the men coming into view near the front of the house behind me.

Recognition changes his expression.

He straightens slowly, using the wall to hold himself up. “You’re Niko Volkov.”

I ignore him. I turn to Elara instead.

She’s still standing in the same place, but she looks as if one wrong movement might make her fall apart. Her face has gone pale in a way I don’t like, and she is staring at the man like she expects him to keep coming even after what I just did to him.

I take off my coat and put it around her shoulders.

She doesn’t argue.

“Elara,” I say quietly.

Her eyes lift to mine. For once, she has no comeback or little quips to throw at me.

I put my hand on her back and guide her toward the front of the house.

Behind us, the man laughs once. It sounds ugly with his mouth split. “Elle,” he calls.

She freezes. I stop with her.

“Do you have any idea who this is?” he says.

Her breathing changes.

I turn around slowly.

He stands straighter now, or at least tries. His face is a mess, one eye swelling, blood smeared from his nose to his chin, his shirt collar pulled out of shape from where I grabbed him. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and looks between us like he has found a way to hurt her even from there.

“You think I’m bad?” he says to her. “Then what does that make him?”

My hand moves before I decide what to do with it, towards the gun under my jacket. I have half a mind to put him down right here.

The narrow space between the buildings is quiet enough. The party noise covers more than people realize. Sergei would handle the rest. A man like him could disappear in this city very easily if I wanted him gone and, in that moment, with Elara shaking under my coat, my bloodlust is so high that I have to curl my palm to stop myself.

Then she touches my wrist. Barely. Just her fingertips against my sleeve. “Nikolai,” she says.

I look at her.

She’s afraid.

Not of me, I tell myself. But I don’t know that. The thought is enough to keep my hand where it is.