Her life?
Not worth a hair on his head.
“He’s just posturing, Maya.” Nik laid his hand over the back of hers and squeezed her fingers gently. “I’ll talk to him again later.”
Unable to look him in the eyes, she nodded and pulled her hand free, patting the top of his in reassurance. Neither of them believed his uncle could be persuaded to change his mind. She had five days to get everything she needed done and everything in place to take Alexsandr down with her.
“I should get to work.” She pushed her chair away from the table and stood on trembling legs. The result of her run? A reaction to the new surge of adrenaline coursing through her veins? Guilt about using Nik, her only friend, to get what she wanted? Whatever. Didn’t matter.
She had shit to do.
A Russian empire to destroy.
And popcorn to make.
She should’ve turned left, but distracted by her racing thoughts, she turned to her right, and lightning quick, Roman captured her by the wrist, twisting her arm until it hurt, and yanking her down toward him. “You’d better not be fucking lying, Maya.” His grip tightened, crushing her bones together.
“I’m not,” she said through gritted teeth, refusing to give him what he wanted by crying out and begging for release. “I said I needed a month to crack the code, and I do.”
“Then I guess you’d better find Jay Mann real quick, suka.”
She huffed. Roman calling her a bitch? Nothing new. Neither were his threats. He hated Maya. Had always hated Maya. And he’d like nothing more than to be the last face she ever saw.
“Let her go,” Nik ordered.
Roman’s grip tightened for a fraction of a second. A warning. He could snap her wrist like a twig if he wanted to. And he definitely wanted to. But then he’d have to explain to his vengeful billionaire boss why his coder had only one functional hand to type on the keyboard with.
She smiled—exactly the way Maya would’ve smiled.
A slow, taunting grin.
Roman was a lot of things, chief among them, a violent asshole who got off on hurting others, but he wasn’t stupid. He couldn’t harm her. Not really. Not before her five days were up. After that, he could do whatever the fuck he wanted to her. And they both knew it.
But right now, she had the upper hand.
And they both knew that too.
He surged from his chair, and in a flash, he had her by the neck, fingers and thumb jammed into her carotid arteries as he pushed her toward the wall until her back hit the plaster next to the door.
The light switch dug into her shoulder blade, and her skull thumped hard enough to set a cascade of stars tumbling across her vision. His cold stare cut into her, everything he wanted to do, every lick of pain and ounce of misery he wanted to inflict, as easy to see as the flecks of ice in the depths of his eyes.
They matched the non-existent warmth of his soul.
His fingers tightened. Her mouth parted. Her nostrils flared. She couldn’t breathe. Not even the tiniest particle of air could pass through the vice grip he had clamped around her throat.
“Stop!” Nik rushed forward, coming to her aid.
Roman pulled a gun from the back of his pants and aimed the barrel at Nik’s chest, freezing him in his tracks. “I could kill you both, right now.”
“Do it,” Nik snarled. “And you won’t live long enough to get off this island.”
Both hands clamped onto his sinewy forearm, she felt the twitch of Roman’s corded muscles before he released her. She doubled over, gasping for breath and drawing some much-needed oxygen down her raw throat and deep into her lungs.
“Pussy,” she wheezed.
“Maya, don’t,” Nik begged, knowing she liked to tempt fate by provoking the beast.
Fair enough.
