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“We have to leave.” I grab Paige’s arm. “Right now.”
She looks up incredulously. “Excuse me?”
My hard tone loses all charm. “You’re coming with me. Now.”
“Like hell I am!” To my surprise, she wrenches from my grip with practiced ease. “I have a gig tonight.”
In two steps, I grab her tight, not letting her move. She wiggles against me, but I ignore her useless attempt as I tap my phone with one hand.
“Boss,” replies Dmitri after half a ring.
“Drive to the back of the building,” I say in Russian. “Not the front.”
“Let me go!” Paige struggles against me, but this time, I give her no space or leverage.
The seconds are ticking. Alone, I could handle the three men on my own. But with Paige—unarmed and untrained? Those are odds I don’t want to risk. But I can’t help wonder: what the hell aretheydoing here?
And then the obvious becomes apparent.
That bullet I took was meant forher.
She isn’t an innocent bystander; she’s a target.
She slams her fists into my chest again. “Let me go.” Her gaze narrows, and she grabs my injured shoulder. I watch her shocked reaction when I don’t flinch. Her eyes widen as I hoist her over my shoulder and carry her toward the back stairs I saw earlier, hoping the Karamazov soldiers don’t know about it.
Paige grabs onto the railing as we pass the second-floor landing. I know just where to hit a nerve. She yelps as my fingers pinch her side, and instantly, she lets go. Out the window, I see Dmitri’s Rover ease into the alley behind the building.
“You’re in danger.” My words intermingle with my breath as I run out the back door toward the Rover.
“Yeah, from you!” A word huffs out on each of her breaths. When we reach the car, she shrieks. “Help!”
I swing open the car door and shove her unceremoniously in. I jump in the back beside her as a bullet snaps a branch above me, splintering the wood.
Dmitri casts a questioning gaze toward the back seat, first at me and then at Paige.
“Drive,” I order as a bullet ricochet off the armored surface. “And don’t stop until I say so.”
The Rover peels down a narrow alley riddled with potholes as another black jeep follows behind us.
“I am not the one you should be afraid of.” Paige’s eyes widen as I push her to my side of the Rover and pull out my gun. “There are worse people to be afraid of than me, Little Ms. Lucky.”
Chapter 7
Paige
He’s not the one I should be afraid of?Yeah, like I’m going to believethat.
I only stopped by my apartment to change my clothes after taking Dad to the hospital for his chemo treatments. My plan was to buy a camera with my credit card and return it the next day so I could work tonight. I told Emma I would pick her up from school today.
How am I going to explain why I didn’t hold up my end of the bargain?
Sorry, kiddo, couldn’t come get you because the sexy stranger I met at that shitshow wedding just kidnapped me.
Andrei has me pinned to his side while the Rover barrels down the streets of downtown Twin Rivers. I yelp as we almost plow into the back of a slow-moving electric bus. The driver makes a face in the rearview mirror and then says something in Russian, probably about me.
I try to move against the opposite door, but the driver takes a turn too fast, narrowly missing a Tesla, and blows through a red light. I land against Andrei, and his musky scent fills my nostrils as his dark eyes look down on me.
Shamefully, a thrill trembles through me when I feel the warmth rolling from his muscular body and my heart beats as if it will burst. Slowly, I edge away, but he grabs my wrist and keeps me by his side.
