“What?” Yulia’s lips part in shock. “What do you mean?”
“I’m going to oversee the expansion of Esguerra’s organization,” I explain. “There will be quite a bit of travel involved, so we won’t be living here. We’ll set up base somewhere in Europe or the Middle East—you can help me figure out exactly where.”
Her eyes are impossibly wide as she stares up at me. “You want to leave here? But it’s your home. What about—”
“I’ve lived here less than two years,” I say, amused. “Another place can be home just as easily. This is Esguerra’s estate, not mine.”
“But I thought you liked it here.”
“I do—but I’ll like it elsewhere too.” Moving one hand to her chin, I tilt her face up. “Anywhere you are will be my home, beautiful.”
She exhales shakily. “But—”
“No buts.” I press my thumb to her soft lips. “I’m not sacrificing anything, believe me. I’ll be Esguerra’s fifty-percent partner on these new ventures, so if all goes well, we’ll get filthy rich.”
“We?” she whispers when I take my thumb away.
“Yes, you and me.” And before she can ask, I add, “We’ll take your brother back to his parents. Things are quieting down in Ukraine, so it’s safe for him to return. We’ll visit him as often as you want, of course, and if he wishes to stay with us, that’s also an option.”
“Lucas…” Her forehead creases in a frown. “Are you sure about this? If you’re doing it for me—”
“I’m doing it for us.” Lowering my hands, I cup her ass and pull her against me, my cock hardening as I feel her legs press against mine. Holding her gaze, I say, “I want to know that you’re safe, that no one will ever be able to take you away from me. You’ll have the best bodyguards money can buy, men who are loyal to me and me only. We’ll build a fortress of our own, beautiful—a place where you won’t have to fear anyone or anything.”
Yulia’s palms press against my chest. “A fortress?” Her eyes gleam with hope and a strange kind of unease.
“Yes.” I tighten my grip on her ass, enjoying the feel of her firm flesh even through the thick material of her shorts. Forcing my mind off the lust pounding in my veins, I clarify, “Nothing as extreme as Esguerra’s compound, but a safe place of our own. Nobody will be able to touch you there.”
“Except you,” she murmurs, her slender hands fisting in my shirt.
“Yes.” My lips twist into a dark smile. “Except me.” She’ll never be safe from me, no matter where she goes or what she does. I will protect her from everyone else, but I will never set her free.
“When…” She runs her tongue over her lips. “When are we leaving?”
“Soon,” I say, my eyes following the movement of her tongue. “Maybe in a month or less.”
And before my balls can explode, I reach for the zipper of her shorts and capture her lips in a deep, hungry kiss.
46
Yulia
The next month zooms by in a flurry of work and departure preparations. I continue operating the cafe, figuring the extra money can’t hurt, though I do stop ordering new food supplies and limit the menu as various products run out. The cafe keeps me busy, which is good because Lucas works nonstop, frequently putting in eighteen- and twenty-hour days. In a span of four weeks, he trains Diego to oversee the guards on the compound, sets up manufacturing facilities in Croatia, finds clients for the weapons that will be made at those facilities, and purchases a house on the Karpass Peninsula in Cyprus—a country we settled on as our home base due to its warm climate, strategic proximity to Europe and the Middle East, and relatively high percentage of population fluent in either English or Russian.
“The house is on a cliff overlooking a private beach,” Lucas says when he shows me photos of the new property. “It has only five bedrooms, but there’s an infinity pool, a balcony on the second floor, and a fully equipped gym in the basement. Oh, and I’m having them remodel the kitchen, so it’ll be done exactly to your specifications.”
“It’s beautiful,” I say, looking through each photo. Though “only” five bedrooms, the house is large and spacious, with an open floor plan and floor-to-ceiling windows facing the Mediterranean. And most importantly for Lucas, it’s set on ten acres of land that he intends to fence in and protect via bodyguards, guard dogs, and a variety of surveillance drones.
We will be living in a fortress—albeit a gorgeous, beachfront one.
It seems so surreal that I often feel the urge to pinch myself. The life Lucas is planning for us is like nothing I could’ve imagined when Esguerra’s men came to extract me from that Moscow prison. I’m still Lucas’s prisoner—the faint white marks where the trackers went in are a daily reminder of that—but the lack of freedom bothers me less nowadays. Maybe it’s the needy little girl within me, but Lucas’s fierce, unapologetic possessiveness reassures me almost as much as it frightens me.
I belong to him, and there’s a comforting stability in that.
Of course, even if I could leave Lucas, I wouldn’t. With every kiss, with every caring gesture big and small, my captor ties me to him a little tighter, makes me love him a little more. And though he doesn’t say the words back, I’m increasingly certain that he loves me too, as much as a man like him is capable of loving anyone. What we have together is not normal, but neither are we. My “normal” ended with my parents’ crash, and Lucas’s may never have existed in the first place. But as I’m fast discovering, I don’t need normal. My ruthless mercenary is giving me everything I’ve ever wanted, and when I stop to think about it, I’m seized by equal parts joy and fear.
Things are going so well I’m terrified something will happen to snatch it all away.
“Is everything okay?” Misha asks during dinner one day. Lucas is working late again, so it’s just the two of us for the third night in a row. “You look worried.”
“Do I?” Pushing my mushroom risotto away, I make a conscious effort to relax the tense muscles in my forehead. “I’m sorry, Mishen’ka. I’m just thinking, that’s all.”
Misha frowns over his quickly emptying plate. “What about?”
“This, that… the transition,” I say with a shrug. “Nothing in particular.” I don’t want to tell my teenage brother that the future, though bright and shiny, scares me to the point of nightmares every night, that a cold, hard fist seems to be permanently lodged inside my chest, squeezing my heart every time I think of how fragile and fleeting happiness can be. Pushing the dark thought aside, I smile at Misha and say, “What about you? Are you excited about going home?”
“Yes, of course.” Misha’s face brightens as he reaches for a second serving of the risotto. “Lucas let me speak to my parents yesterday. Mom was crying, but they were happy tears, you know? And Dad is already planning all the things we’re going to do together.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful.” The knowledge of my upcoming separation from my brother is like an acid burn on my heart, but the joy in his eyes makes it all worthwhile. “How are they?”
Lucas showed me the surveillance photos taken of Misha’s parents, and I can now picture them in my mind. Natalia Rudenko, Obenko’s sister and Misha’s adoptive mother, is a slim, stylish brunette who resembles her brother, while Misha’s father, Viktor, is plump and balding—a typical middle-aged engineer. He’s almost ten years older than his forty-something wife, and he looks it, but he has a kind face, and in many of the pictures I’ve seen, he gazes at his wife with a worshipful smile.
“They’re good,” Misha says. “Same, you know.” His expression turns somber as he adds, “Mom’s been grieving for Uncle Vasya, but Dad said she’s doing better now. They’ve always known that his job was dangerous, so what happened wasn’t a huge surprise. It helped that Lucas contacted them back then and told them I’m okay.”
“Right.” Lucas’s message explained that I, Misha’s long-lost sister, had come out of a long-term undercover assignment to take Misha someplace safe for a while. “So what did they say about that?”
“Well, they had a million questions, as you would expect, but for the most part, they were just relieved I’m returning home and”—he gives me a slightly bashful look—“going back to school.”
I smile, more than a little relieved myself. It seems that the recent events have cooled some of my brother’s enthusiasm for nontraditional career paths—at least for a while. “Will you have to take any extra classes to catch up?” I ask. It’s already October, so Misha has missed at least a few weeks of ninth grade.
“No, I don’t think so,” he says, chowing down on the risotto. “We covered most of the subjects taught in school during UUR training.”
“Oh, yes, that’s right.” I’d almost forgotten that the reason why I’d been able to start college at sixteen was because the curriculum for trainees had included math, science, history, and language studies at levels far beyond those taught to kids that age. “So you’re more than caught up.”