Page 38 of The Russian's Innocent Prey
It was Anya.
She stood there like an avenging angel, face pale as porcelain, hazel eyes wide with an emotion I couldn’t name. Her chestnut hair was windblown, cheeks flushed from running, and everything about her radiated barely contained panic.
The world narrowed to just her face, just the way she was looking at me like she’d expected to find my corpse instead of my voice.
Silence crashed between us like thunder.
In that suspended moment, I realized several things at once. Eleanor had overheard about the attack while I’d briefed Drew and called her—likely thought I’d been the one who had been shot.
And instead of staying safe in her office or her mansion, instead of letting Drew handle whatever danger might be waiting, she’d come here.
To a Bratva hospital. To check on me. To make sure I was alive.
The woman who claimed to hate everything about my world had armed herself and walked straight into the heart of it because she thought I might need her.
My chest tightened with something that felt dangerously close to hope.
“You’re not dead,” she said, and her voice was smaller than I’d ever heard it. Vulnerable. Relieved. Angry.
“Not yet,” I replied, unable to look away from her face.
She took a step into the room, and I caught a glimpse of something metallic tucked beneath her wrist. A blade. She’d come armed, ready for war, prepared to fight whoever had dared to hurt her husband.
The thought sent heat racing through my veins.
Behind me, I heard Hannah’s sharp intake of breath and Trev’s muttered curse. They were realizing what I was only just beginning to understand myself.
Anya Voronov—Anya Antonov—wasn’t just my temporary wife or my reluctant responsibility.
She was the woman who’d thrown away every principle she claimed to hold because she couldn’t bear the thought of losing me.
And God help us both, because that changed everything.
Chapter 12 – Anya
The moment I saw him standing there—whole, breathing, alive—something snapped inside me. All the careful walls I’d built, all the lies I’d told myself, all the reasons why this could never work crumbled to dust.
I ran to him without thinking, without caring who was watching or what it revealed about the state of my traitorous heart. My arms wrapped around his chest, clutching him tight enough that I could feel his heartbeat against my cheek, steady and strong and real.
“You’re okay,” I whispered against his shirt, breathing in the scent of him—leather and danger and something uniquely Lev that made my entire world feel stable again.
He froze at first, his body going rigid with surprise. But then his arms came around me just as tightly, pulling me closer until there was no space left between us. He buried his face in my hair, and I felt him tremble.
“What are you doing here?” His voice was rough, strained. “Alone? Anya….”
I lifted my head just enough to see his face, to drink in the sight of those steel-gray eyes that were very much alive and focused on me. Without thinking, without permission, I crashed my lips to his.
And Lev didn’t care who was watching. He kissed me back like he was breathing for the first time in days, like I was oxygen and he’d been drowning. The kiss was messy and trembling and so full of emotion that I felt tears sting my eyes.
When I finally pulled back, my chest was heaving. I reached beneath my blazer and withdrew the blade I’d tucked against my wrist, showing it to him with a steadiness that surprised us both.
“I know how to take care of myself,” I said, tucking it away again. “Eleanor called. She said you’d been attacked. I had to know if you were okay.”
His jaw clenched. “You came alone.”
“I came armed.”
Something shifted in his expression then, a heat that had nothing to do with anger and everything to do with the way he was looking at me like I’d just revealed something fundamental about who I was beneath all the polish and propriety.
