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Caressing his cheek again, I leaned forward slowly. When he didn’t jerk away, I brushed my lips to his. He responded in kind, as tentative as I was. Sliding my fingers through his hair, I curled them around the back of his neck and pulled him closer, completely pressing my lips to his.
My cell phone rang in my pocket, forcing me to take a step back. I knew it was Anton, so I didn’t bother pulling it out to check. “I’ll be back later.”
Marek nodded, folding his arms over his chest. “Ok. Um, be careful? I don’t know what to say. Is that, like, bad luck? Should I say break a leg? Or is that too on-the-nose?”
I smiled softly. “I’m always careful.” I was a couple of steps away when he cleared his throat again and blurted out my name. Pausing, I looked over my shoulder, eyebrows raised in question.
“I love you,” Marek said in a rush. His chest rose and fell quickly and his fists balled at his sides. While he looked like he was on the verge of throwing up, my heart sang.
Closing the distance in long strides, I gripped the back of his neck and yanked him against my chest, kissing him deeply. He clung to the front of my shirt, his body molded to mine.
The second my phone started ringing again, I pulled away from him with a small, apologetic smile. If I didn’t have an interrogation to get to, I would have stayed with him all day to mend the cracks in our relationship, but I couldn’t. “I love you, too.”
Giving him a final, brief kiss, I stalked back to the front door before I lost my focus. I was so damn happy, though, I probably could have floated down to the ground floor.
* * *
“Where to now, boss?”Anton asked from the driver’s seat.
I wiped the blood off my knuckles with a baby wipe and tossed it in the little trash can in the backseat. One Neon King down; half a city to go. “Maxim and Valery are waiting to make the hit on the diner in Colomb. I want to be there.”
“You got it.”
As Anton maneuvered the car southbound, my phone rang. I frowned at the caller ID.
Sergei.
“Privet?” I answered, praying he didn’t have some bullshit for me to deal with at that very moment.
“Come to the club. Now,” Sergei said curtly. “There’s something important we need to discuss.”
“Can it wait? I’m on my way out of the city.”
“No, it can’t.”
I withheld a sigh and forced myself to reply as evenly as possible. “I’m on my way.” I tucked my phone back into my pocket and propped my elbow against the door, rubbing my forehead. “Turn around. We need to go to Delirium instead.”
Anton dutifully turned the Escalade in that direction. “Everything ok?”
“Probably not.”
“You want me to call the men?”
“No. Keep them where they are. I’m sure this won’t take long. He already sounds worked up, so I’m sure I’ll be out of there as soon as he’s done screaming.”
“About what?”
“No idea…” Whatever it was, my gut feeling told me it wasn’t going to be good.
The entire drive to Delirium, I tried to theorize about what Sergei wanted and what the solutions would be to his hypothetical problems. He didn’t know what was happening with the Neon Kings, nor did it affect him or his business. He also didn’t know about the progress I’d made in finding the anonymous leaders of his Nirvana competitors, because I wasn’t updating him until I was absolutely sure I had all of the information. So what the hell did he want?
For some reason, Sasha sprang to mind. It was the only thing I could think of that would have him so pissed at three in the afternoon. Or something completely unrelated, like the political maneuvering of the fucking aldermen of this city. And Americans claimed Russians were corrupt. They had fifty oligarchs ruling one city alone and no one said a word.
“Want me to come with you?” Anton asked as soon as we rolled to a stop in the alley behind the club.
“No. Stay here. If I’m not out in a half hour, warn the others.”
“Boss…”
