Page 66 of The Russian's Kidnapped Bride
I can’t slow down, and I can’t wait for anyone.
Lily seems to pick up on my mood immediately before I even have the chance to speak.
“You’re later than usual,” she comments, closing her book while marking her page with a thumb. “Everything alright?”
Pulling in a breath, I try to keep the brunt of it away from her. “Not really.”
Her brows pinch together, looking worried.
That should be a comfort, knowing she’s concerned, but that’s just another thing for me to dance around. Another thing for me to try and explain away.
“Is it the Nikolaevs again?”
Holding her gaze, I hesitate to answer.
She’s been around long enough now to pick up on names and the occasional pattern. Her even using that name makes me squirm a bit on the inside.
It’s not that I want her shying away from the intricacies of my world—especially not when I pushed so hard for her to get comfortable around these things—but her knowing too much is still dangerous.
She’s worried, and I know she’s just trying to understand and engage. Still, I want enough of a divide between her and the dark things to keep my peace of mind.
Not wanting to lie to her, well aware that the trust between us is still delicate, I nod. “Yeah…Maxim’s making more than noise now. He’s doing too much for someone who’s supposed to be laying low.”
“Is anyone hurt?”
I nod. “Some of ours, but they’ll live.”
Her expression remains unreadable as she processes the information. “How long does this last?”
“What do you mean?”
“This fight. The back and forth. Does it ever end?” She asks, sounding tense about it all still. “Or is this how life will always be?”
I should’ve anticipated the slight edge in her voice, but after the day I had, I didn’t like hearing it tonight.
I sigh to myself. “Lily…”
“I’m asking a serious question,” she returns, stopping me before I can dismiss her. “It’s been weeks since you reassured me that everything will be fine. But you keep coming home like this more and more. It’s weighing on you…it’s aging you. And now it seems like things are only getting worse.”
Taking a small step closer, I put a hand against her arm. “I was born into this…there’s always something.”
“I wasn’t,” she snaps, clipped and direct. “And I’m not prepared to lose more to street warfare.”
I pause, watching as something else moves through her eyes. Something else lingering beneath the surface. My brows furrow. “More?”
As if realizing her slip-up, Lily takes a deep breath and moves to set her mug down before crossing her arms over her chest.
“I never told you because I didn’t know how, but…” she trails off, hesitating while seemingly trying to get her voice to work. “My brother Wyatt was my guardian after our parents died in a car accident when I was in high school. To make ends meet, he started doing legwork for one of the gangs here before joining it. He was struggling to provide for me, and he thought that was the only way he could make enough money. But he died in a shootout just a few years ago.”
That stops me entirely, and I blink back at her, unable to find something worth saying.
“After it happened, the case went cold, and the police slapped some pointless verdict on the whole thing, but it felt like a cover-up to me. So, I tried digging for myself, and in doing so, I saw your name. Your family’s. Of course, it still went nowhere, and the cops didn’t take me seriously,” she explains, looking vaguely uncomfortable while sharing. “I had every reason to believe he was in a group working against your family, and it cost his life.”
It takes me another moment to even get my words in order as that information hits my chest directly. “Lily, I didn’t know—”
“I’m not blaming you personally. It was his choice to get himself involved in something he never should’ve touched,” she says, voice quiet before holding my gaze again. “But I need you to understand that this world you live in…it already tooksomething from me before I even met you. I swore I’d never have anything to do with your name or anything gang-related.”
Her words land like a quiet kind of blow, and it lodges deep.
