Page 47 of The Russian's Innocent Prey
Everything seemed to be setting me on edge lately. Tiny inconveniences that I would normally brush off—loud voices in the hallway, wrong stitching on sample garments, missing buttons on prototype pieces—made my skin prickle with annoyance. Even the sound of traffic outside my office window felt like nails on a chalkboard.
I tried to focus on the sketches spread across my desk, designs for cocktail dresses that would hopefully capture the attention of buyers at next month’s fashion week. But the lines seemed to swim before my eyes, and my hand shook as I tried to add details to a sleeve design.
Setting down my pencil with more force than necessary, I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes. Maybe what I needed was food. I’d been surviving on coffee and the occasional protein bar for most of the week, too distracted by work and worry to maintain proper eating habits.
Or maybe what I needed was my husband to remember that he had a wife who worried about him when he disappeared for eighteen hours at a time.
The rational part of my mind understood that Lev was dealing with threats that could get us all killed if not handled properly. I understood that tracking down trained assassins required a level of focus and dedication that didn’t leave room for romantic dinners and pillow talk.
But the emotional part of me—the part that had finally admitted to loving him and had expected that confession to change something fundamental between us—felt abandoned. Forgotten. Like I was just another responsibility on his ever-growing list of things to protect rather than the woman he claimed to care about.
I picked up my phone again, thumb hovering over Lev’s contact information. I could call him, demand to know where he was and when he planned to come home. I could insist that hetake five minutes out of his manhunt to assure his wife that their marriage meant more to him than just a convenient way to keep me safe.
But I didn’t.
Because deep down, I was afraid of what his answer might be. Afraid that the man who’d held me like I was precious just weeks ago was already slipping back into the cold, emotionally distant stranger who’d dropped me off at my mansion after our first night together and walked away without looking back.
The fashion sketches blurred again as tears I refused to acknowledge threatened to spill over. I blinked them away and reached for my tea, ignoring the way my hand shook as I lifted the cup to my lips.
Everything was fine. Lev was fine. We were fine.
I just needed to be patient while he dealt with the ghosts from his family’s past. Once Petro Kozak was no longer a threat, once the immediate danger had passed, things would go back to normal. We could have lazy Saturday mornings and dinner conversations and all the ordinary intimacies that I’d never realized I wanted until I’d gotten a taste of them.
My phone buzzed again, and this time I didn’t even feel the flutter of hope. Just weary resignation as I glanced at another message that wasn’t from my husband.
Eleanor, asking if I wanted to have lunch tomorrow.
I typed back a quick agreement, already looking forward to spending time with someone who wouldn’t disappear for hours without explanation or make me question whether I’d imagined the depth of feeling in our most intimate moments.
At least some relationships in my life were reliable.
Chapter 15 – Lev
I was zipping up my duffel bag when Anya stepped into the bedroom, her silhouette framed in the early evening light filtering through the windows. She stood there for a moment, watching me pack with an expression I couldn’t quite read—part resignation, part fury, all exhaustion.
“Again?” Her voice carried more weight than volume, the single word loaded with weeks of accumulated frustration.
I nodded slowly, not trusting myself to look at her directly. “Two days. I’ll be back before you know it.”
“You said the same thing last week. And the week before that.” Her voice was steady, controlled, but I could hear the fractures underneath. “I don’t even remember what it feels like to have a husband anymore.”
The words hit me like physical blows, each one finding its mark with surgical precision. I forced myself to keep packing, to maintain the cold professionalism that had kept me alive for thirty-seven years.
“I’m tracking a man who’s already put blood on our doorstep, Anya. This isn’t some game—”
“What’s the point of being safe if we’re falling apart in the process?” she interrupted, and this time I could hear the crack in her voice, the desperation bleeding through her careful composure.
Something inside me snapped. All the pressure, all the sleepless nights, all the weight of protecting everyone I cared about while hunting a ghost who could be anywhere, could strike at any time.
“I’m trying to stop a fucking assassin before she burns our entire life to the ground,” I snarled, finally turning to face her. “I’m trying to keep you alive, Anya. I’m trying to keep all of us alive.”
Her hazel eyes flashed with pain and anger. “I don’t want safety if it means losing you in the process. I miss you, Lev. I miss us.”
The raw honesty in her voice broke something inside my chest. Here I was, running myself into the ground trying to protect her, and all she wanted was me. Just me, present and whole and hers.
I reached for her without thinking, my hands finding her waist and pulling her against me. She crashed into me with weeks of suppressed longing and frustration, her lips finding mine with a desperation that matched my own.
We didn’t make love. We took it. Claimed it. Demanded it from each other with the kind of raw hunger that came from too many nights sleeping in separate worlds, even when we shared the same bed.
