I don’t answer. The way she’s looking at me undoes me.
“You don’t need a therapist anymore,” she says quietly. “You need to start seeing yourself the way I do.”
“And how do you see me?”
“As someone worth trusting. Worth wanting.” She takes a step toward me. “Worth choosing.”
The words hit like a physical blow. In all my calculations, all my strategies for getting close to her, I never considered this: that she might choose me, not despite who I am, but because of it.
“You should go back to your room,” I say, but there’s no conviction in it.
“Should I?” She takes another step until there’s barely a breath between us. “Or should I stay and let you show me how much you want me?”
I don’t answer immediately. Instead, I let the silence stretch, watching her face in the dim light filtering through the windows. She holds my gaze without flinching—no small feat, considering I’ve spent the better part of a month systematically dismantling her defenses.
“You think you know what you’re asking for,” I say finally, moving closer. Close enough that she has to tilt her head back to maintain eye contact. Close enough that she can feel the heat radiating from my body.
“Don’t I?”
“You’re asking a killer to stop pretending he’s harmless.” I reach up, fingers barely grazing her cheek. “You’re asking me to show you what I look like when I stop holding back.”
Her breath catches, but she doesn’t pull away. “Yes.”
“And after? When you realize that I’m not the broken man you’ve been trying to heal, but the monster who was never really tamed?” My thumb traces the line of her jaw. “What then, Dr. Agapova?”
“Then we’ll figure it out.” Her voice is steady, but I can feel her pulse racing beneath my touch. “Together.”
The word lands like a promise I don’t deserve but desperately want to believe.
The way she says it—soft but certain, like she’s made peace with allowing danger—shifts the stakes in the room. Because she’s offering herself to me.
And every instinct I possess recognizes it for what it is: surrender disguised as choice.
I nod once. “Then stay.”
Her hand lifts and her fingers curl into my shirt, gripping the fabric like she can’t decide if she’s anchoring herself, or pulling me under.
“Yakov,” she whispers, her voice in shreds.
I should let her go. But when she looks at me like that—like I’m a man worth saving—every rational thought crumbles.
“This will change things,” I warn, rough with want.
“I know.” She reaches up, fingers grazing my jaw. “I’m counting on it.”
The touch breaks my last thread of control. I catch her hand, pressing it flat against my cheek, letting her feel the way my breath hitches at her contact.
“Ask for it,” I demand, needing to hear the words. Needing to know this isn’t therapy or sympathy or some misguided attempt to save my soul. “Tell me exactly what you want.”
“You.” The answer comes without hesitation, clear and unflinching. “I want you, Yakov. Not the patient I’ve been assigned to heal. Not the broken man hiding behind psychological warfare. I want you, the one who delivered his nephew with bloody hands. The one who spent years planning revenge and then chose mercy instead. The one who made sure I was safe today even though it meant revealing his hand.
“I want the man who’s been hunting me since the day we met, who made me feel alive in ways I didn’t know were possible.” Her fingers find the front of my shirt, fisting in the fabric. “I want you to finally take what you want.”
The honesty in her voice—raw, unfiltered, unafraid—destroys the last of my restraint.
She wants me.
Not because I’ve manipulated her into it. Not because she pities the broken man I’ve shown her. But because somewhere in all my calculated moves and careful revelations, she’s seen thetruth—that beneath the monster is a man who would burn the world down to keep her safe.
