7. Hunter

SEVEN

HUNTER

I learned long ago that the one person who can bring me to the edge of sanity and keep me teetered there is Winter Leigh Vaughan.

I’ve grown as a human over the course of our relationship. I don’t want to keep her out of the loop. But I’m still struggling with the unknown, and if I bring her into this more, how much more danger will that put her in? We’re in this shit now, and the thing that’s fucking with me the most is that I can’t guarantee her safety. No matter how fucking much I want to.

So when Winter challenges me with those six shitty words, I want to shatter right here. Because in the way she most needs, I’m unsure.

But there’s one thing I am sure about.

Can you take care of me?

“Yeah, baby. I’ll take care of you.” I run my nose up the side of her neck, and I’m mesmerized by the movement of her throat as she swallows.

“Stop distracting me. You’re shutting me out,” she says, her breaths coming quicker.

“No. I’m taking the opportunity to remind both of us that we’re alive.” I nip at her earlobe, and a visible tremor runs through her body.

“Why won’t you tell me what’s going on?” she asks. I pinpoint the moment when she gives herself a stern talking-to, divorcing her body from the lust that’s so palpable between us.

“Okay, Sunbeam. Keep asking me questions and I’ll answer them,” I say, following the words with a kiss to her collarbone. Her breathy sigh straddles the edge of turning into a moan.

“What is The Legion, specifically?” She grasps my jaw with one hand, pulling me around to face her. Her eyes flit to my lips, and I bite my bottom one.

She silences a squeak.

“The tl;dr answer is that The Legion is a group of elitist fucks who have a plan to perpetrate a mass genocide to create their version of utopia.”

Her head jerks back a fraction, and I run my finger along her collarbone. It’s a feather-light touch.

“Okay,” she says lightly. “Who makes up The Legion?”

I trace my hand from her collarbone to the back of her neck, squeezing the tense muscles more gently than I usually would because of her injury.

“A bunch of people do. There are people who are connected to this organization all throughout the world. Some are higher up than others.”

“You’ve only answered part of my question—oh, God!” She groans when I ghost my lips down her chest and between her breasts, crouching so that I’m level with the right spot.

I smile against her flesh. “Be more specific, then,” I whisper.

Her hand plunges into my hair, gripping the strands at the roots. “What if August walks in? Or anybody, for that matter?” she whispers, a slight edge of tension weaving through her voice.

I nod and pull away, taking a moment to analyze the control panel on the wall near the entrance before pressing a button I’m sure will close off the room. Turning my back to the whirring mechanics of the sliding opaque pocket doors, I stalk back to Winter, returning to my position.

“Now, where were we?” I murmur, planting my face back into her chest.

She laughs, and it’s a light sound. “August? Have you seen him?”

I breathe deeply. I’ve seen him, but he was so sedated that all he could do was sleep.

“Yes,” I say, working my way up to the sweet spot where her neck and shoulder meet. I sigh against her. “He’ll need help working through this.”

I feel Winter’s head move in a nod.

“And we’ll be there for him,” she says, resolved.

I kiss her skin.

“Your father. Blair. Do these people have anything to do with The Legion?” After a long moment of silence, she sighs and pulls my head back so that I look up at her.

“Yes. In fact, my father and Morris Winthrope are sort of in charge. Well, were sort of in charge,” I say. I keep my eyes open and trained on her face. Because if I close them, if I blink, I’ll see the melted remains of my father again. “The ultimate head of The Legion is a figure called The Architect. No one knows who that person is, but the idea is that if The Resistance can get rid of that person, they can end The Legion for good.”

“Who is in charge of The Resistance?”

“Misha is,” I tell her.

“What do they need from you?”

“I don’t know,” I say. What I don’t say is, “And that scares the fuck out of me.”

“What they’re really after is information. Locations. Things that I might have known or seen in my time with my father. Knowledge that might lead Misha and the team to the very top of The Legion so they can cut them off at the neck. They think I might know where that information is.”

I don’t know. Well, I don’t think I know.

“Well, tell them what you know so that we can get this all done and go back home,” she says, her voice turning pleading.

“It’s not that simple, baby.”

She pushes me away and I have to catch myself before I fall.

I straighten in one smooth movement.

“It’s never that simple for you, is it, Hunter? You know what, I’ll get the answers for myself.” With that, she rises and picks up her bowl, heading for the sink. I press behind her when she pours the rest of her uneaten soup down the drain and turns on the faucet.

Putting my hand over her womb, over our child, I press her back into my body. Her head drops to her chest as the water flows down the pipes.

“I’m answering your questions,” I whisper in her ear.

She shivers.

“But it seems you still want to fight.”

She shakes her head, lifting it to stare straight ahead. “No, I don’t want to fight you, Hunter. I want to live in peace. To be happy. Safe.”

“And to the best of my ability, while you are here, you are those things.”

She drops her head back against my shoulder.

“Hunter, I…” When her voice breaks and a choked sob exits her lips, I spin her around and crash her mouth into mine.

She wraps her arms around my torso, but I pull back at her pained, sharp intake of air.

“Easy, Sunbeam,” I say, putting her injured arm back to her side.

“I want to feel you, H.” She brings her lips to mine.

I chuckle.

“Nah, because you’re unsure if I can take care of you, right?”

She pulls back and blinks at me, her mouth gaping open and closed as she struggles to find her words.

“But let me remind you, baby,” I whisper, leaning close to her. “How many have I made bleed for you?”

I pull back as she trembles in response, but her gaze doesn’t waver from mine.

“How many did I make beg for mercy for harming you?”

“Hunter,” she says, her voice whisper soft.

“Have I not promised you safety? Comfort?” I kiss the side of her mouth. “Revenge?”

She nods. “Yes, you have.”

“So what makes you think that I wouldn’t give my last breath to make sure you’re taken care of?”

One. Two. Three.

Winter jumps and wraps her arm around my neck, bringing me into a fierce kiss. I bite at her lip as her mouth attacks mine, and I spin to sit her on the island counter.

“Don’t you remember you’re precious to me?” I grit out, moving to unbutton her loose linen shirt.

“H, please make it better,” she groans. When she’s bared to me, I pull her sensitive nipple into my mouth.

“Hunter!” she gasps. I’m mesmerized by the flush running down her chest, turning her skin into a hypnotizing rose gold.

“What are we to each other?” I demand, pulling her straight up by the back of her neck. To gentle the movement, I trace lazy circles around her nipple with my tongue.

“We’re lovers,” she pants. I kiss between her breasts, moving my finger down to the waistband of her stretchy leggings.

“What else?” I say, my voice low, rumbling.

“We’re friends,” she says, her words choked as I slide my palm down to cup her mound. Her sex is hot, drenching my fingers.

“What else, Sunbeam?” I circle her clit in slow movements, and her hips rise up from the counter.

“We’re—we’re soulmates, ” she says. Her voice breaks, and I cover her mouth with mine to swallow her scream as my finger plunges in and out of her hot channel, and the heel of my hand presses firm against her button.

“God!” she nearly shouts on an exhale.

“So you do remember now?”

She nods her head with vigor.

I grab the back of her head, restricting her movements.

Control yourself.

“Good fucking girl,” I whisper. She clenches on my fingers and hisses when her injured arm jerks on reflex.

Breaking away, I say, “Don’t tense up, Winter. You’ll hurt yourself.”

“H-how?” she stutters.

“Let me get you there, baby. You deserve it because you remembered who you belong to.”

At the words, she goes boneless; her spine and neck release tension and she would have cracked her head on the marble if I hadn’t kept her upright with my arm around her back.

“See, I’ve got you, baby. Let go,” I say. I’m so, so hard that the rough denim of my jeans abrades my cock, even with the protection of my boxers between my skin and the fabric.

But watching her break apart, watching her trust me and let go….

“Come,” I command. “Come for me, baby.”

And she does.

Instead of clenching her body to chase her release, she lets me control her climax. All tension in her body centers on her pulsating cunt around my fingers.

“That’s it. Such a good girl for me, Winter,” I rasp, and I bite my lip so hard I draw blood to prevent myself from exploding right alongside her.

“Hunter, what are you doing to me?” she mumbles as I allow her to rest back on the counter. With a firm circle to the roof of her pussy, I feel something loosen in my chest when another gentle wave crashes over her.

“Baby, I’m doing what I plan to do for the rest of my life.” I lean down and kiss her right over her navel. “I’m loving you with everything I have.”

“There’s more you aren’t telling me, isn’t there?” Winter’s words are low in the darkness, and I pull her closer into my body when she whispers them.

The moonlight makes all the shadows in our bedroom a hazy gray-blue as it blends with the dimmed light of the forgotten television.

Winter craved comfort after she broke in my arms in Misha’s kitchen, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t give her. There’s no part of me she doesn’t already have.

So when she curled into me and cried as she sat on the hard marble, all her pain and terror and sadness spilling out of her as she wept, I did one of the only things I could do. I carried her to bed and cuddled with her as we watched a movie.

Yes. Hunter Brigham. Cuddling.

Even though we’re both covered from head to toe—Winter in pajamas, me in joggers and a T-shirt—I try not to make a big deal out of it.

The fact that this is the first time we’ve shared a bed in more than two days isn’t lost on me. Before the raid, things were tense. Winter had kicked me out of our room.

I don’t blame her. I can freely admit now that I was an ass to her.

Mean Girls blended into Legally Blonde before she dozed off. Somewhere around the time when Elle Woods went off to Harvard Law, I’d given her another dose of her pain pill. And even though she went to sleep, I stayed awake. Now the television brand logo bounces around the dim screen.

I pull her close as I contemplate her words.

“What else aren’t you telling me, Hunter? You’re troubled, that’s why you’re still awake.”

She’s right. I wanted to fall into a deep sleep alongside her because if I need anything besides Winter alive and whole next to me, I need sleep.

I kiss her forehead in response before sitting up against the headboard.

“Okay, Sunbeam. We’re a team, right?”

She sits up to face me, her back to the TV. “Yes, of course. That’s why I’m so desperate for you to let me in. Let me help, Hunter.” She moves to sit on her folded legs.

“Hunter, do you remember what you vowed to me in our gazebo? We’d made love that morning, and everything was so perfect.”

She sniffs as tears begin to clog her throat. I do remember that moment.

“You promised that we’d both get revenge and that we’d take the people who hurt me down. You promised that we’d do it together. I know you’re planning something. Something with Misha. Because I know you, Hunter Brigham, and I know you won’t let what they did yesterday go without retribution.”

She raises her good hand and places it on my cheek.

“You love me and August too much to let something like that go,” she says, her voice soft.

I turn my face to kiss her palm. She’s so, so right.

“But when you set me aside and don’t let me be an equal member in your planning, it’s not only heavy-handed, it’s hurtful.”

Pain hits me in the chest where her words land.

“I love you, Hunter Brigham,” she rasps, her tone heavy.

Control.

“I’m sorry, Sunbeam.” I say the words as I stare directly into her eyes. “I’m sorry for this. I’m sorry for before the raid. I’m just…I’m sorry.”

But would I have done things any differently?

The position of her body against the screen causes her face to lay in shadows, but I don’t miss it when she bites her lip. I reach over, pulling it from between her teeth and caressing her cheek.

“Stop distracting me, baby. We have work to do.” I feel the contraction of her facial muscles against my palm when she smiles.

Readying myself, I say, “I got a call from Morris Winthrope while you were getting medical help.”

She puts a palm up to stop me before jumping out of the bed. “Wait, I need to take notes.”

She hops around the room, pulling on drawer handles until she finds a pad of paper and a pen, taking a detour to turn on the desk lamp in the far corner to give us more light.

“You know I’m an external processor,” she says, settling over the comforter with the notepad in her lap. “I’ll ask a kajillion questions and prevent you from getting through what you want to tell me if I don’t write them down.”

She pulls the soft throw blanket from beneath her hip and places it over her feet. “Okay, go,” she says.

It takes me a moment to catch my breath from my amusement and awe, because even in the middle of this incredible shitstorm, she manages to make me smile.

She lifts her eyebrow in expectation before spinning her hand in front of her, signaling for me to get on with it.

“I heard from Morris Winthrope. It was a very short call, but I was in the room with Leo, Misha, Luna, and the rest of them when the call came through.”

“Was Amelia there?” she adds with her gaze focused on her writing.

I grunt. “Yes,” I clip out.

She noticeably bristles, pausing as she writes, but after a moment, she returns to her note-taking.

“The critical thing is he wants Ella, and he wants her by,” I turn my head to read the digital clock across the room, “a little under two hours from now.”

Winter’s eyebrows go up toward her hairline. “Well, obviously, he can get fucked,” she says.

“That’s what I said,” I reply. “Misha, however, was of a different opinion.”

Her eyebrows slam down. “Come again?” Darkness coats her voice.

“Basically, he wants to send Ella over as bait but then pull her out before she ever changes hands. He swore up and down that he could keep her safe, but I don’t trust it.”

“Understandable, H,” she says. “What does Ella have to say about it?”

I pause, and the silence is damning.

“You have spoken with Ella about this, right? Seeing as it pertains to her.”

I try to go for a meditative, deep breath, but it comes out in a rush instead.

“Hunter James Brigham, this is what I’m talking about!” She throws her pen and paper on the bed and stands.

“You cannot unilaterally make decisions for other people.” She enunciates each word as if I were a child.

“I don’t need to consult Ella because it’s a stupid idea,” I say.

Winter scoffs. “Yes, however, don’t you think Ella should make that decision for Ella? As a full-grown adult, I think she has enough brainpower to determine if something is for her or not.”

I sit up more on the bed.

“It’s a moot point, Sunbeam.”

She throws up one arm, clearly angry. “Is it really?”

I release another short breath. “You want to brainstorm, yes? How about we talk about how to get out of this mess because I see only one way out that gives us the best chance of survival.”

“Which is?” she asks.

I sit on the edge of the bed, and she takes a step back to give me space.

“We go underground.”

She blinks at me for several moments before humming in response. I prepare myself for her arguments, standing to steel myself against them.

“It would be easy for us all to get new identities. We can start over. I think we get a Cessna—one from someone we’re not very connected to. Then we can fly to Mexico before setting up a decoy and going the opposite way. We can stop in Paris for a while, then go over to London and Japan. You said you wanted to go to Tokyo, right?”

She remains silent while I speak, and an emotion that feels a lot like terror wells up in my chest as I keep talking. “We could do Indonesia and then Fiji. Have you been to Fiji, baby? It’s beautiful. Then Australia, New Zealand, we can go where they shot The Hobbit ?—”

“Stop, Hunter.” Her words are soft, but they stop my monologue because of the gravity in them.

I stand to cradle her face. “I want us far away from this, Sunbeam. I know that you want to fight, and I love that about you, baby. You’re my warrior, and I love the fuck out of you for it.”

She rubs her cheek against my palm.

“But I’m so sorry, Sunbeam. Because the thought of something happening to our family makes me want to die on the spot.”

She kisses my hand in response. “Hunter, I think you know as well as I do that running won’t work.” She gazes directly into my eyes, into my soul.

“It will work, Winter?—”

“No, it won’t, Hunter. And what’s more is, we shouldn’t run. We need to face this.”

I step away from her, dropping my arm. I try to keep control of my body.

“What are you saying, Winter? That we should just all be martyrs to the cause?” I run a hand through my hair, pushing it away from my face and channeling my agitation.

She sighs, but it’s patient. “No, I’m not saying that. I very much want to live.”

“Then what the hell are you thinking?” My voice rises to a near shout, and her lips press into a firm line before releasing.

“I know that running will only get us so far. I know that there’s no way we can live—really live—if we’re looking over our shoulders. We are trapped in this now, Hunter. We were trapped even before the raid happened. You were trapped as soon as you got off that plane and took responsibility for August, and I was trapped when I laid eyes on you.”

Her words…her words make me want to throw myself from a tall building because while I’ve always known that I’ve been on borrowed time and my father and his influence will always be there in the background, the fact that she knows that being with me means death and destruction makes me want to rip my heart from my chest.

“Sunbeam,” I start, but no other words come out.

“Hunter, I wouldn’t change any of it. I wouldn’t trade any of it if it meant that I could have you and August. If it meant that I could have our family. And so…I want to live. I want to live fully. And the only way to do so is to face this head-on, fight, and win.”

She brings herself close to me, molding her body into my chest. The contact is the thing I need most desperately right now.

“The only way we’ll do that is if we do it together. And not just me and you, but all of us.”

Misha and Luna. Leo and Ella. Veronica and Summer.

And Amelia too?

I draw in a shuddering breath and kiss the top of her head.

“Okay,” I say.

Her shoulders relax. “Okay,” she echoes.

After a few long minutes in each other’s arms, she looks up at me, blinking sleepily.

“What are you thinking, H?” she asks.

“I’m thinking that even though this is one of the worst days of my life, I’m still the luckiest bastard breathing.”

Her eyes focus on mine.

“What makes you say that?” she whispers.

“Because you’re here. You’re alive. We’re all alive, even though we shouldn’t be.”

I lean down to give her a hard kiss on the lips. It’s possessive and demanding, and I pour all my fears and hopes and dreams into the press of our mouths together.

“I am so fucking grateful, Sunbeam,” I whisper against her lips.

She shudders a breath. “Why do I feel there’s a ‘but’ in there?” she asks, whispering with her face pressed to mine.

“There isn’t a ‘but.’ Just an ‘and.’ And I’m terrified my luck will run out. And I can’t face that.”

She closes her eyes, and I feel the fan of her eyelashes against mine.

“Well, I guess we’ll have to do our best to keep the streak going and leave the rest to fate,” she tells me.

“Yeah,” I say.

With a final kiss to her head, I usher her beneath the covers, and she wastes no time curling onto her good side.

“Let’s talk more later, baby. But everything is going to work out for us. I’m putting it out into the Universe, so you know it’ll happen,” she says. “I’m a powerful manifestor if you didn’t know.” She releases a sleepy chuckle that turns into a yawn.

“I have no doubts in you, Sunbeam,” I say, kissing her on the lips as she slips into unconsciousness. Everything within me wants to slide under the blankets with her, but I know I don’t have that luxury. I leave the room, headed for the garden to work through my memories in the darkness. I might know something.

Maybe.

Winter’s words spin between my ears, and the more I focus on them, the more I want to believe them. The more I want to believe they’re right.

Winthrope gave me twenty-four hours to hand over Ella.

I pull out my phone, glancing at the time. There’s under an hour left on his countdown.

“Finally, I get you alone.”

I bite back a groan and roll my eyes to the heavens as Misha Hroshko’s voice stops me in the hallway. I’m a few feet from the door that leads to the garden and the peace I so desperately want to access.

The garden reminds me of Amelia Manor. Even though I try to divorce my thoughts of my home from my mother, I struggle to do so.

“Misha,” I bite out. Turning to him, I say, “What do you want?”

Misha’s dressed casually in dark gray joggers and a loose cotton T-shirt. His wavy brunette hair looks mussed, and no one could miss the hickey on his neck.

Jesus Christ.

“I want to actually have a conversation with you,” he says, his voice tight. When I raise my eyebrow and just stare at him, he cracks his neck from side to side before taking a short breath.

“Luna…suggested that perhaps I’ve been a little too heavy-handed with my approach toward you.” He shrugs, placing his hands in his pockets. “So I figured we could simply talk. There’s much to discuss, and I’m sure you have many questions.”

I hate that he’s right—I do have so many fucking questions, but the more questions I ask, the more confusing everything gets.

“All right,” I mutter, “let’s talk.”

Misha doesn’t respond to my statement. He turns on his heel and heads in the direction of the kitchen. The kitchen I just defiled with my…Winter.

I smile, even though there’s a part of me that struggles to file away the fact that I am also confused as fuck about Winter. Well, not about Winter. I’m all in on my feelings about Winter and the future we’re going to have together. That is, if we stay alive long enough to even have a semblance of a future. But more, I’m confused about where we go from here.

Misha makes an immediate move for the refrigerator, and after half a minute of rummaging around, he turns around with two white plates covered in Saran Wrap. On the small plates are individual slices of chocolate-on-chocolate cake.

“The chef knows that this is my favorite,” Misha says, not looking at me.

I silence the words that demand to be spoken: That chocolate cake is my favorite too.

I’m turning into a goddamn sap, and I fucking hate it.

“Fine,” I say, my response not making any sense. He pulls out two sterling silver forks and slides a plate and silverware across the counter to me.

He doesn’t wait for me before he slides onto a stool and starts eating.

I sit on the opposite seat, and when I lift the fork to my mouth, I’m almost angry at how good this cake tastes.

“You wanted to talk, so talk,” I grumble around another bite of cake.

Misha puts his fork down, and a quick glance at his plate shows that it’s empty. Wordlessly, he goes to the bar on the opposite side of the kitchen and keeps his back to me as he prepares coffee. I’d expect a man like Misha to have a state-of-the-art coffee maker, but he surprises me when he pulls a can of Folgers from the cabinet and starts a cheap brew.

“Coffee at night?” I say, unable to resist my desire to be an ass to him.

Misha tilts his body so I can see his face, his eyebrow quirked. “I have a long night ahead.”

I grunt in response.

After a few minutes, Misha turns around with two mugs of coffee. Without speaking, he slides one of the cups in front of me.

While he pours creamer into his mug, he says, “I know you haven’t known about me, but I have known about you for quite some time.”

The words aren’t comforting.

“Luna told me about your father and Amelia,” I say. Eyeing the creamer, I pour a dollop into my mug.

My head hurts.

“What do you call her?” I ask.

He lifts an eyebrow. “Who?”

“The woman who birthed you,” I say, my jaw clenching.

He takes another sip of his coffee. “Why don’t you ask what you really want to know,” he offers back.

I feel the muscles tense in my face.

“Was it just us she hated, or was she a mother to you?” The words that come out aren’t the ones I’d planned on saying. I wanted to know more about how he and Amelia work together. I wanted to know when she reconnected with him and why.

But instead, I stare at him, showing my scars. Many of them, but not nearly all of them.

“She never hated you or Ella, Hunter,” Misha says.

“Right,” I reply. “You haven’t answered my question.”

Misha sighs and puts his mug on the counter. “She left me with my father when I was eight. I was uncertain of many things at that time. My father was Mafiya, as I’m sure you know.”

I nod, my hand firmly on the handle of my coffee cup.

“I was told that my mother went away. I was a little older when my father confessed that he’d traded her for access to a pipeline in the Balkans.” Misha shrugs, and even though the movement is casual, his discomfort is plain on his face.

“She went to your father. When I got older, I followed my father all over—to America, all over Europe, China—and Benjamin Brigham was always somewhere around.”

At the mention, a flash of a memory crops up of a dark, hazy club with round tables scattered throughout. A gambling hall. Father was there, laughing and surrounded by women. He didn’t even try to shield himself from me as a woman went down on him.

Twelve. Twelve. That was the first time he gave me a woman. There, in a dark corner, I lost my virginity.

I shake my head to get out of the memory.

“When I turned eighteen, I celebrated at the top of the Parus Centre in Kyiv, and after I was toasted to, I murdered my father. That same day, I became the Pakhan of the Ukrainian Mafiya.”

Misha killing his father doesn’t surprise me. He seems like the type of person who would do such a thing, but then, am I one to talk? There’s so much blood on my hands that it’s a wonder anyone can see my flesh.

“When I was made into the pakhan, she contacted me. It was by chance. We were both in London, staying at the same hotel. She saw me at one of the events Benjamin brought her to. She said when she saw me, she knew it was me. She had been told I was dead too.”

“I’m glad you had a pleasant family reunion,” I snap. Why am I getting so angry? Misha isn’t doing anything wrong—at least, not right now.

I take another sip of my coffee, and as the caffeine buzzes through my body, I admit that I am jealous of Misha Hroshko, at least in this regard.

I’m angry and jealous that he got time with our mother when I did not. I’m angry that she sought him out but left me in the dark for decades.

I don’t notice that I’ve clapped my mug back onto the island until the warm liquid spills over the back of my hand.

“She wanted my help to get out. To get all of you out. Ella was barely a toddler, and she’d discovered some shit that scared her to death.”

“What did she find?” I ask. I’m not sure I really want to know.

Misha pauses as if weighing his words. “They were stealing people and using them as test subjects. So many of the people they stole died. Luna, as you know, was one of them, except she survived.”

Misha taps his finger on the handle of his coffee cup.

I try to pick up the mug, but my hands shake too badly.

“This is fucked,” I say.

“That’s the least fucked part about it,” Misha says. “The Architect, for whatever reason, really values your bloodline.” The way he says this, he almost sounds amused, but then there’s an edge of something else.

“What the actual fuck,” I say, sitting back in the chair, stunned.

“Indeed,” Misha says.

“I don’t know who The Architect is,” I offer.

Misha takes another sip of his coffee.

“That’s the thing. We don’t know either. There are clues and theories because we’re not the only people talking about The Legion. There are all kinds of inroads on the dark web. That’s actually how Max came to be with us.”

Hm. Makes sense.

“Amelia wanted to stop Benjamin and Morris and all those other fuckers who played on Isla Cara. She wanted to save Ella from all of it—as well as all the other innocent people who were trapped in The Legion’s web.”

“And me?” I ask, the words bursting from my lips. “Did she want to save me?”

Misha’s gaze turns sad. “I think she wanted to save you most of all. She wanted to save you from becoming like your father.”

We both go quiet, but when he shifts to look at his watch, I track his attitude change. Where he was empathetic…human even, moments ago, now the Pakhan of the Ukrainian Mafiya is back.

“Hunter, a lot of people are going to die if we don’t stop them. The best way for us to do that at this point is to use Ella to draw them out.”

That phrase. Use Ella . Is that very much different from how others wanted to use her existence from the very start of her life? Even before she took her first breath?

“No.” The word is sharp and final as it bursts from my lips.

Misha sighs. “Hunter, if you can’t get out of the way, I will go around you.”

The look on his face is unreadable but dark. The promise that whatever “going around me” means won’t be pleasant.

“If we don’t go to Winthrope, Winthrope will come to us,” I say.

Misha chuckles, but it’s humorless. “You think that logic holds up? You’ve been around these people your whole life, and yet you know nothing about how they operate.”

I don’t know, and that’s by choice. I don’t want to know them or their ways. Why would I?

“If you push him, he will act, Hunter. And the result will be more bloody than either one of us could tolerate,” he says.

“My number one priority is my family and keeping them safe.”

Misha blinks at me for a long beat.

“Understood,” he says and looks at his watch again. “I just hope you can live with the blood on your hands because time is up.”