9. Radimir

9

RADIMIR

I sat low in the big Mercedes, scowling at the world as I swept through the darkened streets.

In the week since I’d walked out of her store, I’d taken to driving myself home from work. It meant I didn’t have to explain to Valentin why I was taking a diversion to drive down one particular street.

I’d never go back in. Never contact her again. I’d come too close to something dangerous. But I allowed myself this one indulgence, speeding past the little glowing storefront every night so I could glimpse her. I knew it wasn’t healthy, but I couldn’t stop.

The line of stores before hers had grown familiar. A closed-down jewelers, a grocery store, the coffee shop and then?—

Control yourself, you idiot. I inhaled and gripped the steering wheel as I approached. I wouldn’t look. I’d keep my eyes on the road and that would be the end of it.

But as we passed, that pull I felt to her was too much. My eyes flicked to the side, just for an instant.

That glimpse of long red hair, as expected. But there were two people who shouldn’t be there. I recognized the brown leather coat and the bleached blond hair instantly. Doyle and Yoz.

And Doyle had his hand around Bronwyn’s throat.

I buried the brake pedal in the carpet. The wheels locked up and painted thick black lines of rubber along the street and I came to a screeching stop. A taxi that had been behind me had to slam on its brakes too and stopped an inch from my rear bumper.

I threw open the door and stalked toward the bookstore. The taxi driver leapt out to yell at me, then got a look at my face and backed away.

Something had taken hold of me. It had me in its grip and it was squeezing tighter and tighter. I reached the bookstore and kicked the door so hard it flew back on its hinges and cracked its glass.

Doyle looked over his shoulder, annoyed. Then he recognized me, and all the blood drained from his face.

I marched towards the counter. Books were scattered everywhere, some of them burned and ruined, and the floor was soaked. This place that had felt so alien and strange a month ago had become special to me because it was hers. And they’d destroyed it.

The anger was part of me, now, heating my skin, pouring through my veins, making my muscles swell. I was dimly aware of Yoz running towards me, but my eyes were on Doyle. He still had Bronwyn by the throat.

Yoz punched me hard in the face and my head snapped to the side, but I didn’t feel any pain. I looked at him dumbly and he got in two hits on my ribs before I finally focused on him.

When he punched me again, I grabbed his wrist and twisted, pulling his arm up behind him until I heard a bone snap. Then I grabbed a handful of his hair and rammed his head into the edge of a table.

As he fell, I started moving towards Bronwyn again. Now I could see that the front of her jeans were open, and the anger changed, becoming a crimson drumbeat that shook my entire body.

He was dead now. They both were.

Doyle must have seen the possessive fury in my eyes because his gaze suddenly went to Bronwyn, and he released her throat like it had burned him. I saw his legs go rubbery as he realized the scale of his mistake. “I didn’t?—”

I punched him in the jaw with the full force of my anger, sending him flying backwards. He crashed to the floor and I was on him before he could move, driving my fists into his face, left then right. Again. And again. And again. I only stopped because I didn’t want him to die. I needed him to suffer.

I wiped my hands on his shirt and stood up, then walked back to Bronwyn. She’d fastened her jeans and was leaning against the counter for support. Her chest was heaving, her body trying to cry but her mind still too panicked to allow it. “Jen. Jen is in the back room,” she told me between breaths. “They wouldn’t leave. I said I’d pay. They didn’t stop?—”

I knew what to do because I’d seen American men do it in movies. I held out my arms and beckoned her in. She collapsed against me; I folded my arms around her and for the second time in a week I was hugging a woman. And after a few seconds, the tears started, big heaving sobs against my chest.

It was nothing like when she’d thrown her arms around me in the back room. That had been thank you and relief and happiness, and she’d been carefully made up and half naked. This was her clutching at me for support, teary and red-eyed and trusting me to take care of her when she was at her most vulnerable. It made me clutch her so tight that it felt like we were one: each sob hurt my chest. And the pain seeped inward and made something shift and open, deep inside me, something I’d managed to keep locked up for years. I’d never had anyone trust me like that.

Behind me, I could hear Yoz grabbing his friend and dragging him to the door. It didn’t matter. This was my city and there was no place they could hide where I wouldn’t find them. However much I wanted to kill them right now, holding her was more important.

I waited while Bronwyn comforted Jen and called her a cab. “Shouldn’t we call the cops?” asked Jen.

Bronwyn looked at me, then turned to her friend. “They’ll never come here again,” she said firmly.

When the cab arrived and they were saying their goodbyes outside, I called Gennadiy. As his phone rang, fear and guilt twisted like snakes in my guts: I nearly didn’t look. I’d been trying so hard to stay in control, to not feel, that I almost drove right past.

Gennadiy finally answered. “Doyle and Yoz,” I said. “They do protection shake-downs on the west side.”

“I know of them.” Gennadiy sounded confused. “They’re strictly small time.”

“Find them. Do whatever you have to, but I want them found by dawn.”

I could hear Gennadiy sitting up, the tone of my voice sending him into attack mode. “It’ll be done. What do you want doing with them?”

I looked at Bronwyn through the glass as she walked back towards the store. “Take them to the warehouse. Break their arms and legs. Then leave them for me. And Gennadiy? Bring pruning shears.”

I ended the call as Bronwyn pushed the door open. “I think she’ll be okay,” she said, looking back over her shoulder at Jen’s cab. “I’ll call her tomorrow.” Then she looked up at me and?—

Something happened.

The rage that had sent me marching in here was dying away. But it had melted the chains that had kept things in check. I looked down into those big green eyes and I was just... overcome by her. She’d been through hell, and she was still worried about other people. She was honest and good, and I nearly lost her ? —

She blinked up at me. “Radimir?”

I took her cheeks in my hands, leaned down and kissed her.