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A moment later, Lyon returned to the room. He approached Kira’s bed cautiously, sat on the edge of it like it was a bomb that might detonate.
He took her hand. Rage was a firestorm in his eyes. “It was him, wasn’t it?”
She nodded.
“Was he alone?”
She nodded again. “But Lyon… don’t — ”
He reached out, stroked her cheek with the back of his hand. He looked different, like the Lyon she’d come to know before she left.
Like her Lyon.
He bowed his head, lay it on her chest like a little boy seeking solace from his mother. She stroked his hair, noting the cuts and bruises on her hands.
Defensive wounds. Wasn’t that what they were called?
“I thought I’d lost you again,” he said. When he lifted his head, the rage had receded from his eyes, replaced by a remote coldness that scared her more. “He’ll never hurt you again. I swear it on my life.”
She almost felt sorry for Musa Shapiev.
37
He’d spent the last twenty-four hours doing something he’d never done.
He prayed.
He prayed that Kira would live. That she would be okay. That he would have the chance to hear her laugh or give one of her ridiculous toasts.
It was the only bargain he made. He didn’t even attempt to make the bargain of sparing Musa’s life, because the moment he’d seen Kira’s face — her beautiful face cut and bruised — he’d known he was going to kill Musa Shapiev in the most savage way possible.
Now he sped through the city toward the warehouse where David Chaban was being held. The red curtain of rage that had fallen over his vision when he’d seen Kira’s battered face and body had given way to a calm determination that was comforting in its familiarity.
He couldn’t deny his feelings for Kira, although they still confused him.
But this, this cool resolve, he understood.
He hadn’t wanted to leave the hospital, but Kira had fallen into a deep sleep after her last round of painkillers, and he’d known it was now or never.
He pulled to a stop outside the warehouse and had the door open before he even turned off the engine. By the time he reached the door, Alek was opening it, like he’d been watching for Lyon on the security cams.
Alek opened his mouth to say something, took one look at Lyon’s face, and stepped back to give him a wide berth.
“Will she be okay?” Alek asked, following in Lyon’s footsteps as he stalked across the warehouse floor.
“She’ll be okay.” It was the mantra Lyon had repeated to himself when she’d been unconscious, when he’d held her hand through the long day and night he’d spent at the hospital, wondering if she’d wake up, wondering if she’d be herself when she did.
She’ll be okay, she’ll be okay, she’ll be okay.
“So listen,” Alek started as Lyon approached the door, “Chaban is — ”
“Don’t care.”
Alek sighed and stood aside. “Markus is in there. Door’s unlocked.”
Lyon opened the door. The work light was on and pointed at David Chaban, slumped over in the metal chair, hands and feet still tied.
Markus was fiddling with something on a silver tray. The clink of metal bounced off the room’s concrete floors and walls.
