Page 141 of Filthy Promises

I slide into the passenger seat, texting Arkady:Follow, but stay back. Track my phone.

“Where are we going?” Daniel asks.

“Just drive. Head toward the park.”

He obeys, pulling into traffic. His knuckles are white on the steering wheel.

“How long have you known?” he finally asks.

“About you and Anastasia? Or about who you really are?”

“Both.”

“I’ve known about you and Anastasia for weeks. Your true identity? About an hour.”

He swallows visibly. “She doesn’t know.”

That surprises me. “About us talking now?”

“About who I really am.” His voice cracks. “She thinks I’m just Daniel Spencer. Trauma surgeon. No connections. No family history.”

“You’ve been lying to her.”

“To protect her.” He takes a turn toward the park. “And to protect myself. My father would kill me if he knew I was in love with Andrei Akopov’s future daughter-in-law. Some things are too twisted and fucked-up to be useful, you know?”

I study him carefully. There’s no deceit in his expression, just resignation. And something else. Something I recognize all too well.

Desperation.The kind that comes from loving someone you shouldn’t.

“Pull over there,” I direct him toward a secluded spot near the park entrance.

He parks and turns off the engine, then faces me, shoulders squared like a man ready to meet his fate.

I can’t help but admire his bravery.

“I won’t apologize,” he begins. “Not for loving her. You can kill me if you want, but it won’t change how I feel.”

I almost laugh at the absurdity of it. This man—this Petrov—ready to die for a woman. Our families have been at each other’s throats on and off for generations.

Yet here we are.

“Did your father send you to seduce her? Is this some elaborate plot to infiltrate our family?”

He looks genuinely offended. “No. I met her by chance. I didn’t even know who she was at first.”

“And when you found out?”

He looks away. “I should have ended it then. But I couldn’t. She’s…” He trails off, searching for words.

“She’s what?”

“Everything,” he says simply. “She’s everything.”

The word hits me hard, ripping open the wound Rowan left earlier today. Because isn’t that the truth? When you find the right person, they become everything.

Your compass. Your reason. The center of a universe you never even knew existed before them.

That’s what Rowan has become to me, though I’ve been too much of a fucking coward to admit it.

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