Page 49 of Scarlet Secrets

And part of me wants to say they won’t know, but all it takes is one person seeing us at the wedding or back in Chicago and a little research into me and Sasha’s age…

Fuck, one look at a photo of Sasha and they’ll know. He looks so much like Demyan right now.

And this is why I ran, why I didn’t try to find him when Tom warned me, this crushing danger.

I wanted to protect Sasha from exactly this, and…

A sound escapes, and I stare at our ghostly reflections in the window.

“This isn’t your fault,” he says, words low. “It just is.”

No, I think it is. And it’s also Demyan’s.

The mansion is justas beautiful as before and there are more men on the grounds and this time, even though it’s Demyan behind the wheel, security shines a light into the car, on me, on the sleeping Sasha.

It might be beautiful, but to me it’s lost any charm it might have. The whole thing, the grounds, the guards, the mansion, they’re all somehow more oppressive than before.

Because this time, I don’t think there’s going to be a way out.

He slows to a normal pace, the kind one does when taking a longish road up to an expansive house that sits on even more expansive grounds. But to me, it’s excruciating in its slowness, like he’s some kind of sadist, exploring a new realm of his hobby… torturing me.

The fact the front is clear of most vegetation and the main gardens are in the back which is flanked by other properties, some with electric wires on the fences, makes me both shiver with wonder that I’d gotten away in the first place and the stone-cold knowledge I can’t do it again.

Not with Sasha.

I’m not risking him being shot.

If I’m to find a way out, I have to plan, plot, and play the waiting game. Sasha’s smart, but he’s only two. He gets being quiet but sometimes that’s a crapshoot with a toddler.

Shit. I risk a glance at the hard features of the man next to me, the set to his jaw I know a little too well, and not from memory. Sasha does that too. Usually when he’s digging his heels in.

But unlike a baby, I can’t bribe this man.

Hell, I’m finding it hard reconciling the fact he turned me to melted butter.

Though, if I strip the terror and fear, his touch still sings.

He—what am I thinking? That I can seduce him into letting us go? I probably could manage the first part if he was bored or looking for sex. But the letting go?

Never.

Sasha is his.

He won’t let his son go.

Another man might, but this one… I feel it in my bones. He won’t ever let my son go.

I’m going to have to be smart.

I suck in a breath as his gaze hits mine for a second.

“Whatever the fuck you’re thinking, Erin, don’t.” His tone is flat.

Demyan finally pulls up to the front of the mansion, sending gravel spitting. I open my mouth, twisting in the seat, but those cold ice-blue eyes shut me up. He gets out and closes the door with a decisive click and I can’t help it, I pull hard on the seat belt, the nylon cutting in and I look at the ignition, my hand already outstretched.

But, of course, the keys are missing and he says from the back, “I’m not a fucking idiot.”

He already has the door open and is working the straps holding the sleeping Sasha. He scoops him up and gets out, cradling him.

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