Page 66 of The Russian's Innocent Prey
“Petro isn’t going to stop,” he said without preamble, settling heavily into the chair across from our couch. “Not until one of us is dead. I need to work without distraction, without worrying about your safety every second.”
The words landed exactly where he intended them to—right in the center of my chest, sharp and final.
“Are you sending me away?” I asked, though I already knew the answer.
“I’m sending you with Eleanor to a safe house.” His voice was steady, professional, like he was discussing business logistics instead of tearing our life apart. “You’ll stay there until I burn every trace of Petro Kozak out of this city.”
The rational part of my brain knew he was right. I was pregnant, relatively untrained in combat, and my presence would divide his attention when he needed to focus entirely on survival. But the part of me that had been shaped by months in his world, that had learned to see violence as sometimes necessary and protection as an act of love, rebelled against the idea of hiding while he faced this alone.
“I’ll cancel the fashion show,” I said, because some sacrifices were easier to voice than others. “The spring line can wait. But Lev, you have to promise me something.”
His gray eyes found mine, waiting.
“You have to come back to me. To us.” My hand moved instinctively to my stomach, to the life growing there that he had never seen on a sonogram, never felt kick, never had the chance to love properly.
The hardness in his face cracked just slightly, letting through a glimpse of the man who held me in the dark and whispered promises neither of us believed but both of us needed.
“You’re my reason now,” he said, leaning forward to frame my face with hands that had killed but touched me like I was made of glass. “I’ll survive hell for you, for our child. But I need you out of the fire while I do it.”
He kissed me then, and it tasted like goodbye. Desperate and thorough and full of all the words we didn’t have time to say. When he pulled back, his forehead rested against mine, and for just a moment, we existed in a bubble where the outside world couldn’t reach us.
“How long?” I whispered.
“As long as it takes.”
“And if something happens to you?”
His thumb traced along my cheekbone, wiping away tears I hadn’t realized were falling. “Then Maxim will make sure you and the baby are safe. That’s what family does.”
Family. The word encompassed so much more than blood now—chosen bonds forged in violence and tested in fire. People who’d die for each other without question, who’d kill for each other without hesitation.
“I love you,” I said, needing him to hear it one more time before the world tried to take him away from me.
“I love you too.” His voice broke slightly on the words. “Both of you.”
We spent the rest of the evening planning my disappearance. Eleanor would pick me up tomorrow morning, early enough to avoid most traffic, late enough that it looked routine. I’d pack light, take only essentials, leave behind anything that might suggest I wasn’t coming back.
The fashion show would be postponed indefinitely due to a “family emergency.” My assistant—my real assistant—was recovering from her ordeal and wouldn’t be available for scheduling. Everything that defined my normal life would go on hold while my husband waged war in the shadows.
As I packed a small bag with clothes that could accommodate a growing belly, I thought about the child who would either grow up with stories about their father’s courage or grow up without him entirely. The baby who had been shaped by stress hormones and fear, who was learning about the world through their mother’s elevated heart rate and sleepless nights.
What kind of mother brought a child into this? What kind of woman fell in love with a man whose enemies saw pregnancy as just another weapon to use against him?
But then I remembered Lev’s hands on my face, the wonder in his voice when he talked about our future, the way he looked at me like I was the answer to prayers he never thought to voice.
Maybe love wasn’t supposed to be safe. Maybe the best things in life came wrapped in danger, requiring courage to claim and strength to keep.
Maybe our child would inherit more than just the Antonov name and the violence that came with it. Maybe they’d inherit the kind of love that survived wars and the kind of family that rebuilt itself from ashes, stronger every time.
As I closed the suitcase and prepared for what might be weeks or months away from home, I made myself a promise. This baby would know their father. Would grow up hearing stories about the man who burned down half of Chicago to keep them safe.
Even if I had to drag Lev Antonov back from hell myself to make that happen.
Chapter 23 – Lev
The city burned in fragments, as if someone had taken Chicago and fed it to the flames one piece at a time. Orange light bloomed against the night sky from Bratva warehouses that had been burning for three hours straight. Smoke rose in black columns that twisted and writhed like the dying breaths of giants. Downtown traffic had become a war zone—Bratva cars flipped and smoking at intersections, with their occupants either dead or scattering like roaches when the lights turned on.
Sniper fire cracked over rooftops near the east docks, muzzle flashes lighting up the darkness in deadly Morse code. Each shot represented another chess piece removed from the board, another soldier who wouldn’t see morning.
