Page 110 of Captive Souls

“I’m not going to poison you,” Lukyan said over his shoulder, misinterpreting my silence. “If I planned on killing you, you’d already be dead.”

“Consider yourself that talented, do you?” I asked, not moving, not blinking.

“You’re on my property,” he reminded me. “Where my wife sleeps.”

That said everything. His wife was his greatest treasure. And when it came to her, he was indomitable.

I understood that.

I took the drink he offered, sitting at the other side of his desk in the chair he nodded at. I was being deferential through gritted teeth. Lukyan saw that, and I knew it surprised and delighted him.

We weren’t exactly adversaries, but we both waded in the underworld with reputations for our vacant souls, our kill counts. We had always operated under the assumption that one day we might be ordered to take out the other.

It had been a foregone conclusion. Until Lukyan went rogue and decimated everyone who had previously employed him, unraveling the entire Russian mob.

For his wife.

Which was why I was there. He’d managed to do the unthinkable with no allies.

He didn’t speak when he sat. He waited, watching me, the low murmur from his wife and the slightly higher pitch from Piper the only sounds in the room.

“A woman has made the ogre human, I see.” When he finally spoke, amusement danced in his tone.

“Not quite,” I answered, sipping my drink. I reveled in the rich fire traveling down my throat.

His fingers thrummed on his tumbler. “Enough to have you sitting here. Asking for help, I assume.”

“No.” The insinuation that I neededhelpkeeping my woman safe damaged an ego I wasn’t sure I possessed until that moment.

Weakness.

That’s what I was showing.

Something deadly in my life.

Yet I didn’t hesitate when it would keep Piper safe. I had no ego when it came to her.

“I don’t need help with my task,” I stated evenly. “But I cannot take Piper with me.”

The thought of being without Piper after everything that had happened to her sent my blood boiling, but I had no other choice. I would not risk another mark on her skin, any more harm coming to her. She needed to be as far away from this, from me, as possible.

Lukyan was not a man prone to surprise, but I knew I’d shocked him with my unspoken request.

Though he’d only met her a few minutes ago, I knew that Lukyan was smart enough to deduce that Piper wasmygreatest treasure.

“You trust me to keep her here? Unharmed?” Intrigued, his eyes narrowed on me as if I were a fucking insect under a microscope.

My fingers curled into fists as I nodded once, violently.

“You are going to punish those who marked her, I assume?” he asked instead of offering any inkling of whether he would keep her there or not. He was going to torture me with that. It was his way. He could not provide kindness without cruelty. Though it infuriated me, I understood it. If he had come to me with the same situation, I never would’ve let him through the door.

Before Piper, at least. She wouldn’t have allowed me to keep someone on the doorstep with a bruised woman, even if that someone was the most dangerous hitman in the country.

“I’m going to take down Stone and everyone who is loyal to him.” It was folly, telling him my plan. Lukyan held no loyalties, but I knew he collected favors. It would be a big one he’d collect indeed if he were to inform Stone of my plan and whereabouts.

“No small feat.” He sipped his drink.

I didn’t respond to that.

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