Page 14 of Hunted By the Masked BRATVA
It means betraying everything I've built my life around for the last decade.
But as I look down at the woman sleeping in my arms, this fierce, broken, beautiful survivor, I realize I don't care.
I'm choosing something for myself.
And if it burns my entire world down?
At least I'll burn for something that matters.
Emilia
I wake to sunlight streaming through floor-to-ceiling windows and the unfamiliar warmth of another body beside mine.
For three seconds, panic claws through my chest. Then memory floods back. The masquerade. The poison. The Hunt. Konstantin.
I turn my head carefully, not wanting to wake him.
He's sprawled on his stomach, one arm thrown across my waist, his face turned toward me. Without the mask, without the careful control he wears like armor, he looks younger. More human.
The tattoos covering his back are intricate, beautiful in a violent sort of way. Orthodox crosses. Cyrillic script. Stars and skulls and symbols I recognize from my father's world.
Each one tells a story. Each one marks a choice, a kill, a moment when Konstantin Grinevsky became more weapon than man. My fingers itch to trace them, to learn what each mark means. Instead, I carefully extract myself from his hold and slip out of bed.
My dress is a crumpled pile of midnight blue silk on the living room floor. My shoes are somewhere in the ballroom. My mask is gone. I'm standing naked in a stranger's suite with no clothes and no clear plan for what comes next.
I find one of Konstantin's shirts draped over a chair, black, expensive, and smelling like him, and pull it on. It falls to mid-thigh, turning me into a cliché from some romance novel. I should hate it, but I kind of love it.
Tension tightens my chest as I breathe in his scent. I was so certain that killing Troskoy was the answer. Six years of planning, preparing, building toward that single moment when I'd slip poison into his glass and watch my family's murderer die.
And Konstantin stopped me. No. Konstantin showed me there was a better way.
I move to the window, looking out over the hotel grounds. In daylight, it's less intimidating. Just gardens and forest and expensive architecture.
My reflection stares back at me from the glass. Messy hair. Kiss-bruised lips. Konstantin's shirt swallowing my frame.
I look thoroughly debauched.
I look alive.
"You're up early."
I turn to find Konstantin leaning against the bedroom doorframe, wearing nothing but low-slung pants. The morning light catches every plane and angle of his body, turning him into something carved from marble and violence.
"Couldn't sleep," I say.
"Regrets?" He moves toward me, all predatory grace.
"About last night?" I consider the question seriously. "No. You?"
"No." He stops in front of me, close enough that I have to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. "But we should talk about what happens next."
"You meant what you said. About helping me destroy Troskoy."
"Every word." His hand comes up, tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. "But you need to understand what that means."
"It means betraying the Reznikov’s."
"It means potentially burning my entire life down." He says it calmly, like he's discussing the weather. "The Reznikovs don't forgive disloyalty. If they find out I helped you, they'll kill me. Slowly."
