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That hope plummets like a rock in a lake. Of course he doesn’t want to go until business is over. Now that I know Helena is alive… that’s got to be why he uprooted everything. He was only moving on because he was coming to grips with killing the woman he loved… who betrayed him. He had moved on. To me.
At least I thought that he had.
How long has Nikolai known that Helena is alive? Is that why he moved us here? How do Daniel and his father’s mafia fit into all of this? There has to be more to this story. I’m supposed to be his person, the one he tells everything to and I have clearly been excluded from a lot more than he’s let on.
Is Nikolai lying to me?
I look up at him and his dangerously, painfully handsome face. The same eyes that I fell in love with. The man who I took vows for and tied my life to. I never had any reason to doubt him before right now, but the man in the basement had no reason to lie to me. I can’t help him, I can’t set him free. There’s nothing to gain from being anything other than honest. If Helena is his sister… there’s just too much that I don’t know.
But more importantly… who the hell is Lilian?
CHAPTER THREE
ANYA
Lilian. Lilian. Lilian.
The name rattles around my head over and over like a mantra. Like a song that I just can’t get out of my mind as I wrack my brain over and over again in an attempt to figure out if I have ever met a Lilian in my life. She’s not somebody that Nikolai has ever mentioned to me. I thought that I knew everybody he worked with - his past, his history. I thought that he had opened up to me, that we were a team.
Was I wrong?
I don’t want to think that he’s capable of lying to me… no matter what he does for a living. Everything that he does is to protect me, to keep me safe and to build a life for us. A future. He’s always saying that. Yet, this morning he refused to stop long enough to even have breakfast with me. He rushed through the dining room and ignored the plate that I had set out for him. He didn’t even bother to ask what plans I might have made for us… today he was supposed to be home with me.
Instead, all I got was a rushed afterthought of an explanation that there had been a development in the war. He had grabbed a pastry and winked at me as he breezed through and then he was gone.
I’m sick of war. I’m sick of everything that splits his focus and even more I hate that he won’t include me. It’s not like I wasn’t raised in a similar environment. I could be useful to him. I do know a thing or two about what he’s busy with. But no, of course not. Not something that a girl like me should worry about.
I think that was the comment that got to me the most.
I can’t stop pacing. I would sit, but my ass is still raw from the punishment that I had received last night. He had spanked me until I screamed. Granted, I had cum just as hard as the pain stung but now I’m paying the price for it. At the time, I had been all for it. I had thought nothing of it because that was the nature of our relationship. But given how cold Nikolai has been to me all morning? Refusing to answer my calls or texts, location off? Now I’m starting to think that it’s something more. Something worse. I feel like a crazy person. Does he want me to worry about him? To stay here in this prison disguised as a mansion? Is this some sort of punishment for not following his orders?
I am not one of his soldiers.
I am his wife.
And as such, I will do as I fucking please.
If Nikolai isn’t willing to talk to me about Helena, I know somebody who will. Nikolai outright refused to tell me what Alek did to deserve such treatment. He refused to tell me what happened or how long he was planning on keeping him prisoner. In fact, he had started to seem rather pissed off that I was daring to ask such questions in the first place.
Then he had distracted me with his hands… and his mouth… and, dammit, I had caved.
In the light of morning my mind is clear. Clear enough anyway. There’s no reason to keep Helena’s brother alive if he doesn’t need him for something. The rest of the Ivankov line is dead, so clearly, Nikolai is using him to locate his sister. My only guess, if not hope, is that Nikolai wants to finish the job that he started.
It’s easier to sneak down into the dungeons the second time because so many of Nikolai’s men are out doing whatever it is that is so damned important that he can’t have breakfast with me. At least, I think that it’s going to be. It feels colder down here this morning than it did the last time. I’m overly aware of the thin fabric of my leggings as I go down there. The t-shirt that hangs off of one shoulder is comfortable, but maybe I should have grabbed something warmer like a sweater . I can feel my nipples hardening against the cold the further I walk. Even my thick, comfortable socks aren’t enough to keep the cold from biting at the soles of my feet as I move silently toward Alek’s cell.
No sooner have I started to fiddle with the annoyingly loud new keypad that Nikolai had installed last night then the front door alert chimes. Loud and insistent, I hear Nikolai swearing from the entrance. Adrenaline spikes battery acid into my veins as I run away from the basement stairs and up to see why he’s yelling.
Nikolai is covered in blood.
Not an uncommon sight, but still shocking every time I see it.
My feet skid to a stop in front of him as my hands fly to my husband’s chest in search of where he’s injured. Nikolai ignores me until he disables the security system and re-arms it. He catches my wrist with a wry smile.
“It’s not my blood.” Nikolai says smoothly. “Do not worry.”
His accent is always thicker when he’s still high on his bloodlust.
I wonder absently how many people he must have killed today. How many families will be missing men because of my husband? Is it always justified?
