Page 23 of Bratva Prisoner
“No.” She cuts me off with a raised hand. “I appreciate all the help, Maksim, but I’m not your charity case.”
“That’s not what I was going to suggest.”
“Okay, enlighten me. What were you going to suggest?”
The question is loaded with implications I’m not sure I’m ready to say aloud. What I mean is that I’m already thinking about her future in terms of our future, which is insane considering I’ve only known her for a few weeks.
“I mean, you’re smart, capable, and clearly good at taking care of yourself when circumstances allow it. Once you’re free from Troy’s harassment, you’ll have options.”
“Maybe.”
She doesn’t sound convinced, and I can’t blame her. From her perspective, she’s broke and hiding from a stalker. Not exactly the ideal launching pad for a new life.
“Tell me about your dreams,” I suggest, because I want to keep her talking so I can learn everything about the woman who’s somehow become the center of my universe.
“Dreams are expensive,” she replies, but there’s a wistful quality to her voice that tells me she has them anyway.
“Humor me.”
She leans against the kitchen counter with a coffee cup cradled between her palms. “I used to want to photograph remote places—the kind of locations most people never see. Underwater caves, mountain peaks, and desert landscapes that exist unchanged for centuries.”
“What changed?”
“Reality. Dreams don’t pay student loans or rent.”
“But you still want those things.”
“Wanting and having are different animals.”
The resignation in her voice makes me want to promise her the world and hand her a camera and a plane ticket and tell her to chase every dream she’s ever shelved for the sake of practicality. The intensity of that desire should terrify me, but instead it feels right in a way I can’t explain.
My phone vibrates against the counter, and we both stare at it like it’s a venomous snake. The display shows Grigor’s emergency number, which means whatever we dealt with earlier wasn’t as resolved as we thought.
“You have to answer it,” Alyssa says, reading my conflict.
“I don’t want to.”
“But you have to.”
She’s right, and we both know it. Family comes first in the Barkov world, no matter what personal desires get trampled in the process.
I grab the phone, already mentally preparing myself for another night of damage control and crisis management. Whatever this is, it’s going to take me away from Alyssa again, away from the warm domesticity we’ve created in my kitchen.
“This better be important,” I answer.
“It is,” Grigor’s voice comes through tight with tension. “We’ve got a problem.”
Fuck. Here we go again.
Chapter 8 - Alyssa
Empty houses tell their own stories, and this one is whispering secrets I don’t want to hear.
I wake up to silence so complete it feels oppressive, and it stretches through every corner of Ravenshollow like a living thing. The grandfather clock in the hallway chimes seven times, marking another hour since I last checked for signs of Maksim’s return. My phone shows no missed calls, no texts, nothing to explain where he disappeared to or when he might come back.
The massive bed feels even larger without the possibility of him appearing in the doorway, and I find myself straining to hear footsteps on the marble floors below. Nothing but the occasional creak of an old house settling into the morning.
Harrison knocked on my door an hour ago to inform me that breakfast was ready whenever I wanted it, but when I asked about Maksim, all he said was that he still isn’t home, and nobody knows when he will be.
