Page 25 of In Her Blood
Otto had the bedside light on and the draperies shut by the time she finished, a wordless indicator that he’d done his final sweep of the day. And as usual, he stood in the doorway to the adjoining sitting room, watching. He would leave as soon as she pulled the blanket up and said goodnight, and she would be alone for six hours where she was expected to stay put—to sleep.
It had been their routine for years, if not always in this exact room.
Evelina plugged her phone in and set it down as she always did. Then she hesitated. She stared at her bed, playing it out in her mind.
Otto would mumble goodnight before quietly taking his leave, locking the door to her suite behind him. There was one other way in and out of her room, but other than the times he made her practice emergency drills, it was never used. The ‘secret’ passage was so damn cliché she still rolled her eyes thinking about it. But late at night, when old nightmares inevitably woke her, knowing Otto was technically only on the other side of her oversized closet and would hear if she screamed brought her comfort.
It’s fine.The day had gone very sideways, and in the back of her mind, she knew she was on edge as much from the fact that all she’d heard from Pyotr was an insincere text expressing how glad he was that she had survived as from the shootout itself.
Pyotr was supposed to have met with his scumbag lawyer, but if he had, there wasn’t a single indicator of change in sight.
She still hadn’t gone over the contents of the drive.
She blew out a breath.Tomorrow.Something had to give, right? She was pretty sure she’d shot straight past ‘tired’ and into bone-deep exhaustion. The type that had the brain shutting down while the eyes were open and made it hard to move her body.
“Lina?”
She curled her fingers into her palms. “Sorry. You’d probably love it if I just went to bed already.” It wasn’t that she didn’t want to, even. It was what came with going to bed that she was suddenly desperate to avoid.
He didn’t immediately respond, but there was an odd weight in the air that had her thinking the silence was different from his usual non-responsiveness. Seconds passed before he quietly said, “What I’d love is if you would never do something so reckless again.”
Her head snapped up and she twisted to meet his unyielding stare. “Excuse me?”
He took a step forward, made a sound dangerously similar to an aggrieved sigh, and scrubbed a hand down his face. “You scared the fuck outta me out there. I don’t care how many times you say it, I’ll never understand why you put yourself in the line of fire like you did. You’re supposed to let me protect you, Lina. I am your shield. Use me. That’s my fuckingjob.”
She was all sorts of messed up if she somehow felt both elated and sick over the words pouring from his mouth. Her feet moved forward, bringing her close enough she could reach out and touch him if she chose. She held herself in check and settled for narrowing her eyes up at him. “I’m so very sorry I hindered your job today, Otto. Gosh, that was horrible of me. Would you like me to hide myself away like some whimpering damsel next time so you can bleed out for the both of us?” The words burned off her tongue, but she couldn’t stop them.
His jaw tightened. “I’d rather there notbea next time.”
“Well, I’m going to be pakhan, so there will be.” She licked her lips. “And maybe I don’t like seeing you bleed for me. Did you think about that? Did you consider how I felt when you straight-up offered to die for me out there?”
He leaned forward. “Bleeding for you—risking my life for yours—is my fucking job,” he said again, slower and harder than before. Like he was making a point.
She drew a shaky breath. The image of his broad back turned to her, taking up most of her line of sight while her ears rang with the cacophony of reverberating gunfire, ping-ponged around in her mind. Then the vision narrowed to the sight of blood seeping into his shirt from a fresh wound—a wound she’d later heard their doc say would have taken his whole arm if it had come from ‘those other bullets’.
She nearly opened her mouth to fire him just to make sure he never ended up in such a position again, but she was still cognizant enough to catch herself. She didn’t actually want to fire him, and letting him go would probably plummet him to a much worse position. So, she did the next best thing she could think of.
She curled her fingers in his clean shirt and pushed up on her toes, pressing her lips to his. She knew she’d have to lie through her teeth later to brush it off, but in the moment, she only hoped she was alert enough to retain the memory of his faintly chapped, warm lips against hers.
His hands flew to her hips, settling like heated anchors. His lips started to move, responding to the pressure of her kiss, then with a nearly inaudible groan he pulled back. He kept his hands at her hips, his grip almost too tight, holding her flat on the floor.
Evelina licked her lips as her mind spiraled. She was too exhausted to properly translate his conflicting responses. Probably it didn’t matter. So, she smoothed out a wrinkle she’dcaused in his shirt, suddenly unable to look him in the eye, and whispered, “I need you alive.”
Otto blew out a breath.
Evelina pushed away from him, more than a little disappointed when he allowed it. “That’s all.” That wasn’t all, but it was all she could put into words. Even if it wouldn’t have been wrong of her to try and seduce him given their social imbalance, there was no way a man who’d been saddled with her during her worst years would want her. He’d known her at her brattiest. He’d known her when her acne had been at its most consuming. He’d known her when her body hadn’t finished transitioning from child to young adult, and things were growing at inconsistent paces.
Her mother would have been horrified to ever learn of Evelina throwing herself, however briefly, at that man.Way to go, Lina.
Otto curled his fingers around her wrist in a gentle stilling motion. A single movement brought him up against her back, his body heat seeping into her, and he slid his touch up over her palm until he’d threaded his fingers with hers. His other hand tucked, softly this time, into the curve of her waist.
Evelina felt her breath hitch. He was holding her to him, her back to his front. She didn’t know why. But she did know that everything about it felt significantly more intimate than the way they usually touched.
Otto’s warm breath cascaded down the side of her neck and she realized he’d dipped his head forward to murmur into her ear, “That was your only freebie.” He pressed a lingering,unmistakably weighted kiss beneath the backside of her jaw and his fingers flexed against her. “Goodnight, Lina.”
Then he was gone, releasing her and stepping away so quickly Evelina was still catching her breath when she heard the soft click from the bedroom door.
“Word is you’ll be protecting the pakhan’s daughter when your training’s over,” Iouri said, pride gleaming in his eyes as he spoke.
