by Lana Sky
He could easily fit in with the entertainers Maxim hired for his makeshift carnival—except for his expression. It’s calculating, matching his easy, cautious posture. He keeps his hands in his pockets and scans the interior of the house in a way that makes me suspect he’s memorizing every single detail.
But overall, he looks more cold than comical. Physically cold, hunched beneath the sweatshirt as if freezing despite the heat.
“I apologize for my ensemble,” he says with a contrite nod. “Oh, how I wish I had the foresight to pack my own priceless suit before dear Milton forced me onto his private plane. Luckily, his sweet flight attendant gave me the use of her clothing—”
“Get the fuck out! And you—” Eyes flashing, Maxim whirls on Milton, poised on the balls of his feet. “What the hell were you thinking, bringing him here? Have you lost your fucking mind—”
“My mind? No.” Milton smooths his hands along the sleeves of his suit, inspecting the ebony cufflinks, securing each one. When he finally meets Maxim’s gaze, there’s no hint of fear in the dark irises of either man. They stare each other down coldly, two opponents equally matched. “My patience, on the other hand? I’m running out of it. You could have avoided this if you picked up my calls. I made myself fucking clear to Lucius.”
“Clear?” Maxim exhales sharply, his body practically humming with anger. “Don’t speak in fucking riddles,” he commands. “You want to say something, then fucking say it. Start with why you would dare to bring him here. Around my—” He grits his teeth, his eyes narrowing to slits. “You bring him here, knowing the risk you just put me in. Why?”
“Dima won’t hurt you,” Milton says tiredly, as if bored by the mere thought of it. “No one else will learn of this location. Proven wrong—which I won’t be—I will personally fix it.” He turns his head in Dima’s direction, the politest version of a lethal threat I’ve ever witnessed burning in his eyes. “You have my word. But you know who does intend to harm? Danil. The motherfucker landed in Fair Haven not too long ago. Rumor has it, he’s planning an assault, with or without Anatoli’s backing.”
“All of this over fucking Danil?” Maxim turns on his heel, leaving me at the doorway, his hands in fists. Several thunderous steps carry him across the room, parallel to Milton’s position—but no further. It’s as if the man serves as an invisible wall, preventing him from reaching his actual target. So he paces. “That bastard can’t button his own fucking fly without Anatoli’s blessing. You think he threatens me?”
“Your cousin may be a fool,” Milton concedes, “but others will follow. Dima is the least of your concerns.”
“If you believe that, then you really have lost your fucking mind—”
“I lost my fucking mind a long time ago. As you did. As Dima did.” Milton says through clenched teeth, the unspoken history between them rotting the air. “Do you honestly doubt me?” There’s a few seconds’ silence. “I thought not. Now, let’s get this over with. Give Dima the girl. End this childish idiocy between the two of you. Accept his assistance, and together, we can take Anatoli down.”
Maxim stops short. “Were you anyone else, Milton, I would kill you for what you’ve just said.”
“But I’m not anyone else, am I?” A hint of irritation disrupts Milton’s polished façade. He’s just as angry as Maxim, but in a very different way. “These are the facts you need to face. Anatoli has gotten bold in your absence. He’s planning to attack your suppliers directly—a full-on assault. And, I apologize, but I don’t want an open war. Not now. Not while…” He cuts off, shaking his head. “He and those loyal to him need to be dealt with. I suggest you return to the city as soon as possible.”
Maxim laughs. “Give him your woman then. What? You thought I didn’t notice her? The blond you’ve kept so close to you? Give her to Vadim, if you are so eager for peace.”
A shadow falls over Milton’s face, and this room becomes the world’s smallest cage despite its size. They’re both wolves, snarling for dominance in the center of it, leaving little room for anyone else.
All I can do is pray that none of the kids wander into the house—but I seem to be the only spectator concerned. Meeting my gaze from across the room, Vadim playfully waggles his eyebrows. “Brothers,” he mouths with a smile.
I cringe away from him, returning my attention to Maxim. If I thought the hidden room upstairs brought out the worst in him, I was wrong.
“What is it, then?” he demands, cocking his head. “Your little whore is too good for precious Dima, but my woman isn’t? In fact, shall we ask her?” He extends his hand toward me. “Francesca, are you my whore to be utilized as I see fit?”
All three men turn to me. Stunned, I clear my throat. “N-No.”
“Good,” Maxim hisses. “Then it’s settled. Unless you want to force her, Milton? Perhaps you and Dima prefer to reenact the very bonds of slavery you escaped from?”
“I suggest you watch your words as well,” Milton warns, advancing a single, dangerous step in Maxim’s direction. “As for Dima, you know he won’t hurt her—” He nods toward me. “You know he won’t hurt you either. All he wants is to toy with you. Entertainment. And you’re all but providing him the shit show he wants by resisting. I could easily convince him to relent, but I won’t. Do you know why?” His eyes cloud over with an unreadable emotion. “You owe him. You owe him this one fucking request, no matter how childish and spiteful it might be. We both know why. What was it you called it? The bonds we all escaped from?”
“Is that so?” Maxim clenches his hands into fists, cracking the knuckles in the process.
“Yes.” Milton merely observes him, seemingly lacking the energy to match his vitriol. All he does is sigh. “I’ve humored this grudge of yours for over a decade, but I’m telling you now, I’m tired.” Another layer of his persona falls away, betraying his words to be the truth. Worn lines strain the flesh around his eyes, enhancing an expertly disguised exhaustion. Even Maxim’s can’t compare. “My little blond whore, as you call her? Is under my protection. And I won’t stand aside and watch Anatoli turn his attention to her to get to you. I fucking won’t, Maxim. End this fight with Dima—”
“Get out.” Maxim storms past Milton, but rather than head for Dima, he comes for me. His hand cinches my wrist, yanking me to his side. “Both of you. Now. As for Anatoli, I will return to the city in the morning and handle this myself.”
Milton sighs again, more heavily. “You and I both know that you can’t.”
“So, you’ve come to insult me as well as threaten me?” I’ve never heard Maxim’s voice so guttural. “I suggest you leave. You want to turn on me? Fine. I don’t need you, or your pet—”
“You do,” Milton insists. “You need me just like when we were kids, and we had no one but each other. Or have you forgotten that, too? I do not doubt your strength or ability to defeat him on your own. You just never had the will to. Dima isn’t the pet here. You are. You’ve always been that little boy pining under Anatoli’s shoe, desperate for his attention. His acceptance. Even if it bloody kills you.”
“Don’t use your fucking degree on me,” Maxim snarls, his lips curling from his teeth. “Go!”
“My degree?” Milton laughs, a disarmingly beautiful sound. With his head held high, he faces Maxim directly and moves to stand within his path. “One of many I got from an education that wasn’t free. That I paid in blood for. You want me to use it? Fine. You never hated Dima, not truly. You just can’t stand what he signifies. Freedom. Independence. Someone who can live outside the shadow of your grandfather unscathed by his poison. You’ve let jealousy consume you for over twenty years. Dima never wanted his name—and that’s what bothers you. Anatoli bred you like an animal, and you don’t know a life outside of that brutal, violent existence. Do you deny it?”
He waits, but Maxim says nothing.
“I thought so.” Flicking his collar, he strolls for the front door, deliberately unhurried. “When you change your mind, contact me
, and I’ll make the arrangements.” He stops and cocks his head before adding. “What happened today doesn’t change anything between us. Not to me, anyway. You know I’ll always stand by you—but I won’t enable you. I can’t.”
“Well, this was lovely,” a cheerier voice cuts in, a surreal contrast to the anger crackling in the air. “A wonderful reunion, much better than I could have ever hoped for—”
“Race ya!” The high pitched, childish shriek cuts through the tension like a knife. It takes my brain a second to identify it as not belonging to any one of the three men before me. Which can only mean…
“Fuck!” I race to the glass door leading to the terrace to find Ainsley skipping toward me, her hair streaming behind her. She waves, giggling even as I shake my head and fumble for the door.
“No! No, no, no…”
Suddenly, a deeper voice calls out, and Lucius appears in her wake, running to catch up.
Whatever he says makes Ainsley turn to him, and he manages to take her hand and lead her away. Relief rips through me, and I brace my palms against the glass just to stay standing.
“Thank God.”
“A child? Hers?” The question comes from Dima, or so I assume, given the lightness of the baritone. But his voice sounds different, suddenly devoid of amusement. Surprise colors it instead. Alarm. “You brought a child here. With him?”
He isn’t speaking to Maxim.
“No. No one could be that reckless…”
“Come, Dima,” Milton snaps, sounding farther away. When I finally have the strength to look back, he’s halfway across the entryway. “Now!”
But Vadim doesn’t move. His dark eyes remain fixated on me, narrowed with disdain. “You trust him with your child? I’d assumed you were his victim, but perhaps I was wrong. No real mother would ever put her children in danger—”
“Maxim!” In a blur of motion, Milton reappears as if from thin air to physically shove the other man back.
“Get out!” Eyes like coal, Maxim pivots, nearly barreling past Milton, who has to grasp his shoulders just to keep him back.
“Go, Dima!” Milton snarls.
Vadim doesn’t seem to even notice the commotion. Or care. An expression crosses his face almost too quickly to process. Only my time with Maxim gives me a faint hope at interpreting it—an icy veil of memory, trapping him in the past.
“Your little daughter? He’ll carve her to pieces,” he tells me softly, while brushing his hand along the scar on his throat. “But you know that, don’t you? You know he’ll see her beaten. Raped. He’ll sell her to the highest bidder himself, if his true master tells him to. You know this to be true.” He nods as if my expression alone gives him all of the confirmation he needs. “And yet you stay. How dare you put an innocent in harm’s way?”
Pain lances through my chest. It feels as if he punched me though he never moves a single inch. My lungs throb regardless, and it’s harder to breathe. Think.
Is that what I’m doing? Selling…
Maxim bellows something, followed by another frantic warning from Milton.
But all I hear is Dima’s calm, relentless murmur, sneaking past the clamor to easily reach me. “If you keep your child around him, you’re no better than he is. You condemn her, and any other children you may have. The Koslovs. That name is more than just a name,” he insists. “It is a creed. A brutality. And you’ve already sold your daughter to them just by taking his ring—”
“Get… Out!” My chest heaves as I spit out the words one by one, surprised by their ferocity.
From the corner of my eye, I see Milton and Maxim pause, panting in their struggle.
“As you wish,” Dima says with another gallant nod. He turns on his heel, strolling for the door. Once he’s out of view, Milton follows, adjusting his mussed suit. Near the threshold, he pauses.
“I’m sorry. You may not think Danil as a threat, but you didn’t ask why he—of all Anatoli’s pawns—would be so desperate to attack you directly. But he wants the bounty, Maxim.” He sets his gaze on me and then back to Maxim. “And if you want to protect yours, as I am mine, reconsider this place. If I found you, he will, fool or not.”
Finally, he exits the house, and both men leave, taking all hope of normalcy with them.
Chapter Fourteen
Milton’s visit shatters what little semblance of peace we’d managed to cobble together—but the most alarming part in the aftermath is how everyone, from Maxim to Lucius, still manages to pretend like nothing is wrong. At least around the kids. It is “normalcy” pushed to its very fucking limits.
I should be grateful for that.
Maxim doesn’t brood around them, becoming a vicious stranger in a heartbeat. He disappears instead, leaving me alone to keep up the façade.
But I’m a sleepwalker, trapped in the nightmare of Dima’s insinuation. How dare you put an innocent in harm’s way?
When the kids return from the beach, we eat pasta around the center island in the kitchen, courtesy of Lucius, who serves as head chef in Maxim’s absence. They chatter on about jet skis and swimming, innocently oblivious to the looming danger. Danger, I put them in.
That guilt robs me of my appetite. All I can do is pick at my plate while my mind spins in turmoil. When the kids finally trickle off to bed, I’m on edge, and Maxim is nowhere to be found.
Unease creeps in as I start to search for him.
He isn’t in the bedroom or the bathroom, or even the infamous “other room” when I gather the nerve to check. For all I know, he could be gone already, heading back to the city without so much as a goodbye.
Would that bother me? I’m surprised by the ache knotting in my chest at the possibility. Yes. It would.
It fucking would.
Even as the fear sets in, I can’t ignore the intuitive sense that he’s still here—as if there’s a taste lingering in the air, unique only to his brand of rage. My nostrils flare as I try to pinpoint his exact location. In a way, doing so feels a bit like some creepy, childhood game. Find the mafia boss in the haystack. And yet…
There’s a skill to it. Knowing where he’d go to rage in peace. Somewhere where he can presumably do the least amount of damage to avoid alarming the kids—if he truly does care about their comfort. Somewhere open and unconfined, too, like the wild expanse of lawn beyond the terrace…
I slip out through the kitchen doors and cut past the pool, guided by the last shreds of daylight. A blood-red sunset bathes everything in a fiery glow, enhancing every nuance of the landscape.
Namely the lone figure pacing on the very outskirts of the property, far beyond the view from the house.
The dusky glow ignites his golden hair, illuminating the panes of his face and enhancing the rage shaping them. When he spots me, his entire body goes rigid, a creature apart from the man I spent the last few days in paradise with.
Fear nearly paralyzes me. Only God knows what keeps me moving, tiptoeing through the grass on bare feet.
“I’m leaving in the morning,” he declares when I approach him. I jump at his tone. His voice resonates as deeply as a roar of thunder, and I half expect lightning to strike. “You and your siblings will be moved to another location. I’ll send for you when I’m ready.”
My heart lurches. Another move. Another gameboard. Another stint as a pawn. “Please, just slow down,” I say. “We should talk about this—”
“Talk?” He whips around so swiftly I stagger an instinctive step back. Alarm stimulates every nerve in my body, urging escape. Run! “Do you really think you can dictate to me?” he wonders, his teeth bared.
No, a part of me whimpers in defeat. I’m no match for him when he’s like this. Some things can’t change. You can’t cage a wolf—eventually, it will go for your throat.
The only option is to give in. Surrender to the inevitable fact that we’ll always be back at square one. He’ll always be a stranger, lost to rage. To him, peace was never worth chasing.
And a future with him will
never be normal.
“Go into the house,” he growls, resigned to the same outcome. “Now—”
“Please…” I take a step toward him. Then another as he falls silent. Cracks disrupt my brave façade however—my fingers shake when I reach out, finding his chest…
And all of my fear vanishes, replaced by a throbbing, inescapable concern. His heart is hammering, his chest heaving with shallow breaths. Up this close, I can sense everything he uses the rage to mask. He’s panicked. He’s breaking. He’s losing control.
“You believe him, don’t you?” he surmises, his eyes narrowed. “That I will hurt you. Hurt your children. I saw your face. You believe him—”
“I don’t know what to believe,” I say, taking another step. “But I want to trust you.”
“Go.” He turns away, glaring into the distance. “I need to be alone.”
“You need me,” I whisper, surprised by how true that statement seems the more I touch him. I slide my hand up to his shoulder, tracking how he flinches in response. “Talk to me—”
“Go!” He shrugs me off so violently that throwing my arms out is the only way I can keep my balance. “Don’t be a fucking fool, Francesca.” He toys with the syllables in my name to inflict the harshest sting. “I need you in the sense that I require the use of your cunt at my discretion. Now go into the fucking house—”
“You need me now.” This time I step into him, lacing my arms around his neck. Before he can react, I feel along his jaw. It’s a reckless move—he could bite me; he looks so fucking unstable. Lost. But he doesn’t, and the slightest contact is enough to keep me talking. “You need to talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”
His hands fall to his sides, but he’s still staring into the distance, far beyond here.
So I stand on tiptoe, bringing my lips near his ear, so it’s harder for him to ignore me. “If you need to leave, fine, but you owe me—us—the chance to hear why. Do I worry about the kids? Maybe. But they trust you. Ainsley trusts you…” Emotion thickens my throat. I swallow hard and choke out each confession one by one. “Don’t you dare forsake that. Ever. We don’t deserve to be tossed around like objects. I won’t let you throw them away, either. I can’t. So talk to me, if you want us to work. This is what real families do. Talk—”