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LUKA
Natasha puts her hand on my shoulder and rests her head against my back. “Can’t what?”
I squeeze my eyes shut for a split second. She needs me to look at her. Hell, I need to look at her. But the truth, fuck. It’s killing me. And if I confess, it might kill her, too.
I finally twist around to face her. The flickers of hope in her eyes make my gut clench because she doesn’t know I’m about to extinguish all of them.
“I can’t be in love with you, Natasha.”
I shouldn’t be, but I am.
Helplessly and hopelessly.
And that means we’re both fucked.
“You can’t be in love with me?” Natasha asks, her voice tinged with hurt. “Or you aren’t?”
“Does it matter?” I shake the envelope in the air. “There might be something inside here that confirms what my family suspects, that your father is in on a plot to destroy my family. If that’s true, my love won’t do a goddamn thing to protect you.”
“Protect me from who?”
“From the rest of my family. Some of my brothers are vindictive fucks. And if they figure out the truth, that there is some kind of takedown in progress, they’ll kill us both to protect the Malikov name. Dima would have done the same thing if he were alive.” I leap off the bed and fist my hair. Dima’s last words come rushing back at me. “Fuck, is that what he meant…?”
“What, Luka? Tell me, please. Don’t shut me out again, okay?”
I pace the length of the room, stopping to pick up a broken picture frame on the floor. I hurl it against the wall in a fit of rage. “Before he died, Dima said it’s up to me to protect the family. I couldn’t ask him what he meant by that. He went into cardiac arrest, and then the nurses and doctors all ran in. Did he know there was even a threat?”
I stare at the envelope clutched in my hand. I can’t ignore the contents for much longer. There is information inside of it that may dictate the future of my family. And it’s a future Dima may have known about. But once I open it, once I uncover the truth, it’ll be up to me to make the hard choices.
My eyes tangle with Natasha’s.
“I have to open it. I need to know what the fuck is about to happen so I can stop it.”
“Where did you get it from? Can you trust the person?” She grabs the comforter from the mattress and pulls it up to her chin, a fear-filled expression clouding her face.
“It came from a family friend. He gave it to me the night of the wake. He’s one of the few people I do trust.” I sigh, slapping the envelope against my forehead. “He told me to reach out after I read what’s inside. Said I needed to marry you as soon as possible. It was a cryptic conversation, one we never really finished.”
Natasha’s flushed face drains of color. “So he didn’t say why you need to marry me as soon as possible?”
“It wasn’t exactly the time or place to have a heart to heart.”
She rolls her eyes. “You don’t have to be an ass about it. I’m asking because I’m involved, too, and I deserve to know what the hell is going on. It’s bad enough that I was kidnapped and snatched out of my life.”
“Maybe this was all premeditated, Natasha.” I grab a pair of shorts from a nearby chair and pull them on. “Maybe you were never supposed to marry into my family. Maybe it was all a fucking ploy.”
“I don’t understand–”
“If there was a plot to destroy us, then that attack at the wedding would have killed any wedding plans for you. Taking out the head of the family on his own daughter’s wedding day? Then the underboss? Whoever was responsible would have never expected us to recover. Besides, showing you off as some trophy wouldn’t have mattered at that point since it was my dad and Dima’s grand plan in the first place.”
“So I was just a pawn in all of this?”
“Maybe.”
She glares at me, springing up from the bed. “Why don’t you just open the damn envelope so we can find out the truth? And then you’ll know whether or not you have to kill me. In the meantime, I’m going to have some coffee. I’d like to be well caffeinated for the slaying.”
Natasha grabs the tank top I stripped her out of and pulls it on. With a fiery glare, she stalks out of the bedroom, the hem of the tank top skimming her ass cheeks.
My cock doesn’t understand the gravity of the situation because the idea of her walking around panty-less already has me half-hard.
