“Understood,” Nikolai begins, but I cut him off.
“I’m twenty minutes out. “ I swerve around a slow-moving truck, ignoring the blaring horn.
“So what’s your plan? Walk in alone and hope he honors the exchange?” Nikolai’s voice drips with skepticism. “You know better than that, Gagarin.”
“I know Pablo,” I counter. “He has a code, twisted as it is. The exchange buys time. After that…” I leave the rest unsaid. We both know what happens after.
“This is suicide,” Nikolai says bluntly.
“Only if I fail.”
The road stretches before me, each mile bringing me closer to Mila and whatever fate awaits us both. Images flash through my mind—her smile, her challenging gaze, her sleeping form against my side.
For months, I’ve hovered in limbo, neither Bratva enforcer nor reformed man. But in this moment, racing toward what might be my end, I find clarity at last.
I am whatever Mila needs me to be.
Minutes blur as the landscape rushes past. I divert from the main road, taking shortcuts through forest service paths I memorized years ago when mapping Bratva territories. TheAudi wasn’t built for this terrain, but I push it mercilessly, feeling the suspension protest as I navigate rutted tracks at speeds that would terrify most drivers.
A mile from the lodge, I pull over and continue on foot. Pablo will have scouts watching the roads. Moving silently through the undergrowth, I approach from the west, using the terrain for cover. The afternoon sun casts long shadows that work in my favor, obscuring my movements as I circle the property.
The lodge comes into view, a sprawling log structure that would look rustic if not for the state-of-the-art security features hidden within its design. Four perimeter guards, cartel-trained but sloppy compared to Bratva standards. Pablo must have left the most skilled for interior protection.
Smart.
Through binoculars, I catch glimpses of movement inside. A figure passes by a window, too tall to be Mila. Then another. Counting, I estimate at least eight hostiles inside, plus Pablo himself.
And somewhere in there, Mila and Aleksander, alive or?—
No. I refuse to consider any outcome where I don’t get her out alive. Any future where she doesn’t return to my arms.
I check my weapons one last time and make my decision. I won’t be walking in the front door unarmed as Pablo demanded. I won’t be playing by his rules. This ends today, one way or another.
“I’m coming for you,milaya,” I whisper into the gathering dusk, a promise to the woman who holds whatever remains of my soul. “Hold on.”
With cold determination, I move toward the lodge, a shadow among shadows, death incarnate for anyone who stands between me and Mila. Time for talking is over. Time for mercy long past.
Now comes the monster the Bratva feared. God help anyone who’s touched her.
39
BAIT
MILA
Ican taste blood in my mouth, metallic and warm. My wrists burn from the zip ties cutting into my skin. Each breath feels like a small victory as I struggle to stay conscious. To survive.
The Sokolov hunting lodge was supposed to be our sanctuary. When Aleksander brought me here, I believed we’d be safe. Remote enough to be hidden, fortified enough to be protected. How wrong we were.
Pablo’s men must have followed us here or had inside information about Bratva safe houses. Now he’s turned our sanctuary into his trap, knowing Yakov will come to the exact location the Bratva would expect to find us.
“Comfortable, Dr. Agapova?” Pablo’s voice slithers across the room, smooth as a blade and twice as deadly. “I do apologize for the accommodations. So…rustic, no?”
I don’t answer. I won’t give him the satisfaction of hearing fear in my voice. But my silence only amuses him more.
“Such dignity,” he muses, circling my chair like a predator. “I admire that in a woman. It makes the breaking so much more…satisfying.”
My eyes dart to Aleksander’s motionless form across the room. Blood matting his buzzed hair, face swollen from the beating he took trying to protect me. He hasn’t moved in over an hour. I don’t know if he’s unconscious or?—
