by SR Jones
“I’m going to Cassie’s apartment and need some back up; you okay to ride with?”
“Yep, of course. Let me get my things.” I know he means weapons.
“Where’s everyone?” Konstantin asks.
“The guys you hired are outside on patrol. Andrius is sleeping. Alexei and Kasper are in the den watching some shit on TV, but also watching the gate monitors, and Reece is working in his room. You want me to bring one of them?”
“Yeah, ask Reece to come too, will you?”
“Of course, oh and,” he pauses, then launches into Russian.
Konstantin nods, and Bohdan jogs up the stairs, taking them two at a time.
“What was that about?” I ask.
“Business stuff.” Konstantin takes out his phone and fires off a text to someone.
I’ll have to get used to this sort of thing, if I want to be with him. This will be the reality. I keep telling myself I want to leave as soon as it is safe, and he keeps saying he’s going to let me go. Yet, he’s having us tested for STDs, which isn’t the actions of a man about to let someone go.
Yet, if I stay, this will be the life. There will be things he won’t tell me; probably can’t tell me for my own safety. It’s not going to be like having a regular partner where they come in and you ask them about their day at work, and they tell you all about it.
There will be whole swathes of his life I can’t know about. Do I want that? No matter how alive and right I feel in his arms? Will it be enough for a lifetime of danger and being hidden from the truth?
Reece comes down the stairs with Bohdan. He’s got such a friendly demeanor, but it belies a will of steel, I’m sure. If he was special forces and now works in high-end security, he’s as hard as Konstantin and his men in his own way.
We head out to the car, and I sit in the back, next to Reece. Bohdan drives, and Konstantin takes the passenger seat. All three men are armed, I realize, when I see the distinct bulge of a weapon mid-torso on Reece.
He sees me looking. “Legal,” he says in his deep voice. “It’s part of the job. You should learn to shoot.”
“Why? I can’t legally carry a gun here in the UK, can I? I have no wish to carry one illegally.”
“Not to carry, but to use in the house if you needed to.”
“He’s right.” Konstantin turns to me. “One day I’ll teach you, and we’ll get you set up with something. Then you can use it when you need to, if anyone ever breaks in.”
“You forget,” I say sweetly. “I’ll be home in a few weeks if your plans work out, and I won’t need one then hopefully. No way can I keep at gun at my grandparents.”
“You live with your grandparents?” Reece asks.
“I will after things are safe for me to return to my life. I have no job now, or rather, I won’t.”
“You still have your job.” Konstantin frowns at me.
“I don’t want it.” I shrug. “It’s not for me.”
“What the hell is then?” Konstantin asks.
You, I want to say. Instead, I shrug again. “I don’t know,” I say truthfully. “I think I might travel some. I have a friend who lives in Spain. She might know of some work I can do. I’ll spend some time with my grandparents and then decide what to do next.”
“Traveling is amazing,” Reece says. “Changes us forever. I think everyone should travel if they can.”
“Yes, I’ve always wanted to. I want to see so much of the world. I could take a year and work my way around the world.”
“That’s not safe,” Konstantin growls.
“If you neutralize the threat it will be,” I say.
“I mean generally, it’s not safe, for a young woman.”
“Oh, get with the program. We’re not in the 1950s. Loads of women travel alone these days. I’ll be fine.”
He downright scowls at me. “You ought to stay in your job. It’s a good job, and the company needs you.”
“I’m not working for you,” I say. Damn, is he so cold, he can walk away from this, but still have me working for him, seeing me often? Then it hits me. He wants me there so he can keep an eye on me. Let me go, but not properly let me go. He wants me where he can see what I’m doing, who I’m with, but without being in my life in any meaningful way. He can’t make his damn mind up what he wants. One minute, he’s telling me I’m staying, then he says he’ll let me go, but only partially. He still wants me where he can keep track of me.
Fury ignites in me. He doesn’t get to do this. He doesn’t get to come into my life with his presence, his charisma, his innate damned understanding of what I need at times, the calm dominance that makes me okay when I’m falling apart, then simply walk away. He most certainly doesn’t get to walk away and keep me close. If we’re really going to end this, then we end. Closure. I’ll need to get far away and lick my wounds for an awful long time. It’s going to hurt.
When we reach my apartment, I stare at it, feeling strange and off kilter. This place seems like somewhere from another life now. Familiar, but strange, like a long-lost memory come back to haunt me.
We all clamber out of the car and walk toward the downstairs entrance. The glass doors reflect our forms back to us, and I stare for a moment. I’m flanked by three huge men. I’m not tiny, but I look childlike next to them. Vulnerable. I don’t want to use a gun, ever. However, learning to defend myself, that wouldn’t be such a bad thing.
“Do you know how to fight? I mean like self-defense stuff?” I ask Konstantin.
“Yes,” he answers, not looking my way as his gaze sweeps the garage and the doors in front of us into the basement foyer.
“Will you teach me?”
That has his gaze snapping my way. “What?”
“I don’t want to learn how to use a gun, but I do want to learn how to protect myself. When I was little, I took a judo class. I only completed a few weeks because I broke my wrist, not in the class, but it meant I couldn’t go for a couple of months. I never got back into it. They taught us, in this class, that your body size and innate strength doesn’t matter. So long as you know the techniques you can defeat your opponent, using their strength against them.”
“I can teach you, but the stuff I know, it’s more brutal. It’s…” He stops walking for a moment. “I’m not trained to deter someone, Cassie. My training? If we got to the point of fighting, we were trained to use deadly force.”
Oh.
“I can teach you,” Reece says. “I’m a black belt and can easily teach you some basic moves that would buy you time in any situation.”
“Okay, great, thank you.”
We ride up the elevator in silence, and when we get to my door, I’m nervous. My God, the place must stink. I haven’t been back here since the day Konstantin made me go with him. There will be my breakfast plate, still unwashed, probably growing a forest of mold by now.
We enter the apartment, and I stop dead. It’s clean. Spotless. I don’t understand. I walk in and turn to Konstantin. “Did you do this?”
“Do what?”
“Clean the place?”
He shakes his head.
There’s a note propped up by the kettle. I rush across the small space and read it.
Hey bitch,
Well I’m officially worried now. This is not normal. I don’t care how confidential your work is, you don’t simply disappear for weeks on end! No, bitch, you don’t get to do that. I’m worried sick. Your place was a mess. I let myself in with my key to frankly do some snooping ’cause Vanessa and I are convinced you’ve been taken and are being held against your will.
In all seriousness, Cassie, if you read this, be careful. I investigated our new boss, and he’s scary. Very bad connections! Dangerous people. If you read this and need help, call me. If you can’t talk, but need me to call the police, put broccoli into one of your sentences and I’ll know you need help.
If I don’t hear from you in another week or so, I swear I’m calling the law.
Be careful. You�
��re my number one bitch. I love you.
Suze.
The note gives me a moment of happiness. Suzy’s worry and care warms me. I need to make sure she knows I’m okay or she’s going to do something dangerous.
Bohdan comes up behind me and reads the note. “I cannot begin to unpack the ways your friend would make a dreadful law enforcement officer, spy, agent, or anyone who needs to use their brains to stay alive. She says clearly, she has read that Konstantin is a dangerous man. She believes you are missing, but leaves a note here, on the counter, where anyone can read it?”
He turns to Konstantin and bursts out laughing. “English women,” he says. “They are so funny.”
I don’t like the disparaging way he says this, but I have too much else on my mind to get into a row. Like … broccoli? That’s not an easy word to fit into a sentence. At all. Suze is lovely, but sometimes her mind moves in mysterious ways. She’s a good cleaner, though. My place has never looked so spotless.
Ignoring the great hulking lumps of male meat in my living area, I hotfoot it to my bedroom and gather some of my favorite clothes, along with my passport and other items I need. It’s silly but some things, small things like my trusty lip balm, bring tears to my eyes; they’re so familiar. So comforting.
I shove everything into a cotton drawstring bag and head back out to the testosterone-fest raging in my living space.
“I’m ready,” I announce.
“Let’s go.” Reece smiles at me and opens the door, making a sweeping gesture with his arm.
I exit my apartment with a last glance back at it. Who knows when I will see it again? I head down the hallway and knock on Mr. Clarke’s door. He opens it, and his brows raise in surprise.
I can tell he would have been a very handsome young man. He still possesses a thick shock of white hair, one strand of which falls rakishly over bright brown eyes. His bone structure is still good even in his eighties.
“Cassie!” he exclaims. “How good to see you.” Then his gaze lifts beyond me to the three men standing a few feet back in the hallway. “Are you alright?” he asks.
“Yes, I’m fine, thank you. This is my boss, Mr. Silvanov, and these men work with us.” I indicate Bohdan and Reece with a sweep of my arm, trying not to smile at Bohdan’s incensed expression at being lumped into the working class with me.
“Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Clarke, sir.” Konstantin shocks me with his impeccable manners as he shakes Mr. Clarke’s hand.
Mr. Clarke eyes the three men suspiciously. “You too, Mr. Silvanov. Please take good care of Cassie while she’s working with you. I’d so very much hate for anything to happen to her. She’s loved by a great many people.”
It’s a threat, and one Konstantin acknowledges with a dip of his head. Mr. Clarke focuses on Bohdan, and his eyes narrow.
“Young man, I served in the British Military for a great many years, and I know what a concealed gun looks like under clothing. If you’re putting Cassie in any danger, you will all have to answer to me.”
I expect the man to break into guffaws of laughter at being threatened by an octogenarian, but instead Reece steps forward. “As you worked in the military, I can tell you, from one serviceman to another, Cassie is safe with us. I’m Reece, and I’m SBS, currently private security, and this is my card. If anyone comes sniffing around here, can you let us know? Also, if you are threatened in any way, call me immediately. We can’t go into specifics, which I’m sure you understand. No one else in Cassie’s social circle knows what’s truly going on, but we’re working to protect Cassie.”
He hands Mr. Clarke a card, who studies it and then nods, putting it in his pocket. “SBS, you say?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I can’t think of anyone better to guard Cassie’s life, so I won’t be saying anything, and of course I’ll call if anything remotely suspicious occurs. Mark my words, though, anything happens to Cassie, and you three, your names and descriptions will be given to the police by me.”
“Nothing will happen to her,” Konstantin says seriously. “Not so long as I’m living and breathing.”
We leave after I assure Mr. Clarke that we will be back to our dancing soon.
As we head down in the elevator, Bohdan says something in Russian, and Konstantin answers him, then turns to me. “He was asking if he’s coming to Paris, and I told him, yes. With Vasily out of commission, I’m going to need Bohdan and Reece to come with us, and two of the hired guns. I’m going to leave Andrius in charge here, at the house with the other men.”
I nod. “Thanks for letting me know. I understand that I can’t be privy to business discussions between you … men.” I nearly said Bratva, but corrected myself because I’m not sure Konstantin would like me calling him that in front of Reece. “But it’s nice to know the basics of what’s happening, if it affects me. Such as who is coming with us to Paris.”
Bohdan rolls his eyes, but doesn’t say a word. I smile to myself and turn away. Once back at the house, it’s a whirlwind of activity as I pack and get ready for the trip. I’m nervous and not sure what to take. If this Maya woman is glamorous and gorgeous, I don’t want to look like some awful frump, so I do pack a few of the bits Konstantin bought me. I add some of my own comfortable clothes because I hate feeling like someone playing dress up, which is how I feel in those expensive clothes.
Once I’m packed and ready, I wait, nervous about the trip. I open my Kindle and read. I’m currently taking a break from my normal diet of depressing literary tomes and am reading a fantasy novel, which is brilliant as it takes me out of myself and my day-to-day worries.
“Cassie?” Konstantin pushes the door open to find me lying on my bed, reading. “You ready?”
“Yep. I need to ring Suze, you know.”
“Yes, I thought about that. Call her on the plane. Facetime her, let her see you’re with me, and we’re going to Paris; we can say it’s for business.”
“Oh, she’s either going to be utterly convinced that you have kidnapped me, or she’s going to be crazy jealous.” I laugh.
“Show her the plane, and she’ll be crazy jealous.”
“Why, are we going British Airways or something?” I ask.
He laughs. “Jailbait,” he uses that name for me, but he says it with affection this time. “We’re going by private jet.”
Oh. My. God.
“Erm, okay.” Shit, I’m wearing jeans, running shoes, and a t-shirt. “Do I need to change?”
He shrugs. “Nope, it’s a private jet, so you could wear your nightdress for all anyone cares. If you’re comfortable, keep those on.”
“Okay.” I must disappoint him sometimes. I bet he’d love to board his private jet with some gorgeous, Amazonian supermodel type on his arm, wearing nothing but head to toe Gucci, and here I am in my boring clothes.
He wants me, I know he does, and I’m convinced enough of the chemistry between us to believe this is as powerful for him as it is for me when we’re together. However, in public? I expect I come far short of what he expects from one of his girlfriends. Maybe that, along with his general trust and feelings issues is partly what’s getting in the way of us being more?
Maybe if I changed, became the glamorous, sexy kind of woman a man like him fits, I’d become someone he could see himself with long-term. I can’t, though. One thing I can’t and won’t do is change myself for a man. I’d do a lot for him, and give up a lot of things, but not who I am deep down. Not that. Then I circle back around to my dilemma. Do I want long term? I’m so torn. So conflicted. It’s draining.
I sigh, grab my bag, and follow him out of the room. He turns to me in the hallway, one brow raised. “You seem kind of downbeat for a girl about to take a private plane to her lover’s Paris bolt hole.”
And there it is. The difference between us. He thinks I’m like Liza. That I want the plane, the Paris home, the glamor… I don’t. I’d just take him and that would be enough.
I can’t tell him that, though; he’ll
probably run a mile. Instead, I give him a half truth. “I’m not the kind of girl who is impressed with private jets and second, or third, homes.” I shrug.
“What does impress you then?” he snaps.
“Kindness, integrity, strength, loyalty.”
“Yet you like me, and I’m not kind.”
“Konstantin,” I say, pausing for a moment. “You’re a force of nature. A woman would have to be blind, deaf, and missing vital hormones if they’re not impressed by you. You also have strength and loyalty, and I believe deep down you have integrity too. Kindness … you could work on that one.”
“Work on? As if it’s something you can develop?” He laughs softly.
“I believe it is. If you did one kind thing a day, just one, that would be a start.”
“I do kind shit all the time. I took you in, didn’t I?” And with those distinctly unkind words, he grabs my bag and jogs down the stairs, leaving me staring at the back of his head.
Asshole.
PART TWO
War is father of all and king of all; and some he manifested as gods, some as men.
Heraclitus
Chapter Twelve
Konstantin
It’s been some time since I’ve been to my Paris home. It’s nestled within an exclusive modern development of new houses, but made to look old. The architecture fits in well with the classic houses and apartments surrounding the development. The community is gated and guarded. It’s one reason I went for this. The other is it is quiet and private. No one snooping around, which with some of the women I’ve dated in the past matters.
I keep more staff here than I do at my property in England. I think of this place more as home, and it most definitely has more of my personal stamp on it. It’s one reason I wanted to bring Cassie here, because deep down, if I’m honest. I want to impress her.
I’d live here full-time if work weren’t in London. I love Paris. Love the life here, the beauty, the galleries, all of it. I get why Andrius likes his home in Corfu so much, but to me Paris offers the perfect mix of beauty, and quiet, if you know where to look for it. It also has plenty of big city vibrancy, but on a more refined scale than London.