27. Alek

27

ALEK

S eeing Mila caught in the grip of Sergei Kastava's top soldier's hands sent me spiraling and sinking into a deep rage unlike anything else I'd ever felt. My arms and legs vibrated with the urgent need to inflict pain, and I let the wrath coat me like a shield.

I exhaled hard through my nostrils for a moment, letting this image etch into my brain. Because this would be the last time. This would be the very last time any man ever dared to touch my woman.

"Let go of my wife," I ordered in a lethal tone that promised no mercy.

"Fuck you," Lev sneered, shoving her to the side with no care for her slipping and falling into a puddle. Hearing her cry out at the rough handling stoked the fire and anger within. I fumed, overwhelmed with the immediate urge to end his life.

"You touch my wife and die," I vowed. I'd slaughter him and slay every other motherfucker who dared to harm a hair on her head.

Mila was mine, and I would burn the goddamn world down for her if I had to.

He lifted his gun to aim it at me, but I wasn't that stupid. I wouldn't rise to his bait. We were right next to the station. Police officers and detectives would be swarming the area. Using guns would ensure that all the cops—including Murphy—would come running and intervene.

Sergei had already worked out some kind of a deal with the law enforcement to set the Valkov Bratva up. They would side with Lev here, not me, and I didn't need to risk any more obstacles to getting Mila back in my arms and to safety.

I charged at Lev instead, knocking his gun to the ground. He hadn't kept a good enough hold on it, and the firearm smacked to the pavement, loosening the silencer he'd attached to it. Instead, he retaliated with his hands and feet, attacking me and wrestling to beat me down, man to man.

He wouldn't win. There was no way I would slip and let him get on me like this. Seeing him being rough with Mila ensured that he would receive every ounce of my anger, and I vented it all with every punch, jab, and kick I rained down on his body and face. This was rage, no holds barred. I unleashed a steady stream of violence until he panted and shook, struggling to rise to both knees. He couldn't keep going, worn from the battery of my fists.

A dark mist of violence had claimed my mind, and I wouldn't stop until he'd lost his last breath.

"You touch her, you die," I reminded him as I grabbed his head and twisted hard.

A final, sickening crack followed the gesture. His body went limp, sagging in my hands before I released him with a shove. Over and down, he folded and sank to the puddles in the alley.

I stood there catching my breath from the bloody and brutal fight to the death, staring down at his corpse as I waited for my heart to return to a normal, steadier pace. I wouldn't be calm for another year, it seemed. My heart still charged fast, riled up from seeing Mila targeted and captured to be returned to her father.

Still, I'd heard her beg to be released. Flashbacks of her cries replayed in my mind, when she'd demanded that Lev release her. Her warnings that I'd be out looking for her and wanting her back.

She was right. And wrong.

Dmitri and I had been coming here to corner Murphy and spy on him for the sake of changing the details of tomorrow's big shipment coming in to the Colver dock.

As soon as he'd parked nearby, I got a call reporting the deaths of three guards at the building, all shot dead by none other than Geoff Federov. Cameras had caught him breaking in and trying to rape my wife in our home.

The second I heard her crying out in the alley, I'd run back here, ensuring Dmitri could leave to deal with the chaos at the building.

It's done. He's dead. He can't hurt her. I heaved out one more deep breath and turned to see her where she'd snuck back to hide alongside a dumpster. Soaking wet, she looked drenched and miserable. I saw her shaking from the cold as I stalked over to her. Her hair was plastered to her head, and as I neared her, she stared up at me with wide-open, trusting but fearful eyes. Unsteadily, she rose to her feet, but she didn't take her hands from her ears. She'd no doubt covered them at the awful sound of Lev's neck snapping.

"Come here." I didn't order it harshly despite the rage still simmering in my blood. I offered her my hand, trying to coax her closer.

She came. She stepped carefully toward me, lowering her hands to take the one I held out to her.

The moment she placed her delicate fingers, so icy cold and wet, in my hand, I grabbed her close and wrapped my arms around her.

She sobbed, shivering, shuddering, and sniffling against me. I felt every tremor of her body shaking in the cold and fear, and I didn't waste a second to scoop her into my arms and carry her further from the man who'd tried to return her to her father against her wishes.

"I… I…"

I pressed a kiss to her temple as she tucked her face to me, burrowing close.

"I didn't run."

I barked out a single laugh. Nothing about this was humorous, but still. "You did."

"I ran to hide." She cried harder, then cleared her throat harshly, as though she scolded herself to stay strong. "I ran to get away from him and I didn't… I didn't know where you were."

That's the last time we'll ever make that mistake. "I know."

"I'm sorry. Alek, I didn't… I didn't run."

I kissed her again, clutching her closer as I brought her to the car.

Dmitri had already come back. I saw his car pulling up at the end of the alley, and he didn't utter a word as he got out and opened the back door for us. I climbed in, not releasing my grip on her once as I adjusted her on my lap.

My brother knew better than to speak as he drove. When I met his gaze in the reflection of the rearview mirror, he nodded once.

I interpreted that as the all-clear. He'd handled Geoff's corpse at the apartment. He'd seen to the removal of all the bodies and blood.

I nodded back, knowing he would understand and receive my thanks in that silent gesture.

Words weren't necessary now. All that mattered was making sure Mila was warm and clean, safe and dry. And with me, where she belonged.

I hated that I'd let my doubts get the better of me this morning. As she trembled and cried softly in my lap, I vowed to never doubt her again. I'd suspected that she was a rare gift, a unique and unlikely gift that I wasn't sure I deserved. I had a hunch deep down inside that she was worthy of my trust, and I despised that it had taken me so long to get my head out of my ass and realize it.

Dmitri drove us home, still without a word, and I carried Mila up to our apartment. A quick glance showed me that the cleaners had done their jobs with excellence. Nothing looked out of place, and not a speck of blood remained in the halls or the apartment. Sometimes, waterproof backing and liners for carpet was all the world needed to be restored to normal with speed.

I lowered her to her feet in the bathroom. As she sensed me getting ready to release her, she curled her fingers tighter in my shirt, not wanting to let me go.

"Where… How…" She swallowed, wincing at the motion. "What happened to the… men?"

"They've been disposed of."

She blinked, nodding as I began to strip her clothes from her trembling, icy-to-touch body.

"Geoff broke in." She swallowed again, staring at me with such a vacant look that I doubted she was focusing on me at all but looking through me. That blank void she wore suggested she was reliving the horrors she'd survived without my help, and I would never forgive myself for her suffering without me there to save her.

"He…" She shook harder as I turned the shower on. "He broke in and tried to rape me. He said even though I was damaged goods, he still wanted to have me. All my life, he's tried to rape me, to take what wasn't his. He was obsessed, and I refused to live in fear of him for another moment."

She spoke faster, gaining confidence or anger as she rambled, unaware that I was stripping her to warm her in the shower.

"He wanted the papers that Maxim gave you at the wedding. I'd forgotten about them. I was so stunned that I'd killed someone. That I'd killed your cousin. An heir. I was so stuck in the shock that I didn't realize at first that your brother had copies of emails from Kastava sources. My father used to request that I transfer them. In the office, I was supposed to forward all those coded things and pass them along to different addresses." She licked her lips, nodding as she rambled, almost with a panicked rush.

"He ordered me to report to him after I married Andrey," she rushed to add as I guided her backward into the shower.

Her skin bore the marks of a struggle, but she wasn't wounded too badly despite her scuffles with Geoff, then Lev and the cops. She winced at the first hit of hot water on her flesh, but I knew it had to be the shock of heat on her chilled skin. Her smooth flesh would return to normal. I wasn't worried about hypothermia, but rather, shock.

I held her hands, ensuring she didn't trip in the trancelike fugue she moved with as she stepped under the water, still facing me through the open door.

"He wanted me to still answer to him," she added, gazing at me with such open sincerity that I knew she needed me calm.

I nodded, letting her know I listened as I removed my wet clothes.

"He said I was to serve him and never hesitate to answer to him, but I didn't. I wouldn't. He wants me dead, and I never want to return to him."

I entered the shower, joining her under the pelting water. She clung to me, wrapping her arms around me and tucking her face to my chest as her emotions got to her once more.

Holding her tightly, I tried to warm her up and calm her from this frantic spill of her fears and worries.

"Geoff wanted me to give him papers so they would have intel about that big shipment, but I didn't know where they were. Even if I did, I wouldn't have ever helped him, Alek. I am your wife, your partner, and I will choose you."

I cupped her face and tipped it up to kiss her lips. Desire warred with my need to comfort her, but I didn't plunder her mouth and demand a taste. I kept it simple, bushing my lips over hers with as much tender gentleness as I could manage as I held her tightly.

"I understand." And I did. I understood that now. Mila wouldn't betray me. Not like my uncle had, not like any enemy might want to.

"I was so scared, so worried when Geoff entered. Not only because he wanted to rape me, but because I thought you would assume I'd called him here, that I asked him to find me. And Lev. I didn't know he was nearby, potentially waiting to bring me to my father."

"I saw it on the video," I said calmly, stroking her long, brown locks back from her face as she blinked up at me.

"You did?"

I shook my head. I personally hadn't watched the footage yet. My men had reported it all back to me. I wasn't sure whether I could stomach watching the live-action evidence of when my wife was almost captured, raped, and taken from me. We'd only just found each other. We'd only just married and made our commitment to a future together, and it was far too soon to imagine losing her.

A lifetime with her wouldn't be enough.

I wanted forever.

"They told me."

"He came in and shot a guard," she added, furrowing her brows. Her words left her lips slower now, calmer, as though the rambling rush had soothed her enough to think and take her time speaking.

"Not just one. Three. Geoff killed my men all the way to get to you."

"So they would have protected me?"

I narrowed my eyes. "What do you mean?"

"I worried that maybe since you struggled to trust me and know that I stand by you, your men would fail to follow orders to keep me safe as well."

I shook my head. "They heed my orders. You are my wife." I kissed her harder. "My queen. And they will protect you when I can't."

"I'm sorry." She lowered her gaze but didn't stay cowardly for long. She tipped her chin up and faced me again. "I'm sorry they were killed. I ran out and saw the man dead at the door, and I ran because I didn't know where I would be safe. In here, on the streets, anywhere."

And I'll never leave you without a means of reaching me ever again. This was all new to me. I'd had lovers before, but not a partner, an equal, a wife. I had to consider not only my own safety and survival, but that she'd rely on it too.

"Those cops found me, and it clicked. Those codes in those emails, in those copies that Maxim handed you, they made sense. That day that you and Nik came to the office asking about a Doc, I realized that the Valkovs were included on that shipment correspondence. But I didn't know what anything meant, what would happen. But that cop?—"

I grabbed her hand and kissed her fingertips. "I know. The Doc. Stephen Murphy. It's an old, coded nickname that I should have realized sooner."

"He's setting up the bratva," she exclaimed, licking her lips and eager to share all she had learned. "You need to know that he's planning to help somehow. Or something. I don't know, but he's dirty, and my father is working with him!"

I stared into her expressive blue eyes, so open and eager to persuade me to believe her. It wouldn't take much. She spoke of things I had already figured out, and with the fact that she was spilling it all so freely with the intention of helping me and looking out for me and my bratva, I knew she was my woman in every way I needed her to be. Not only my wife, but also my support to lead and take care of the bratva, of the Family.

It was this freely given admission that made me realize once and for all that she was in this with me. She was all in.

"I'll never be a pawn for any man ever again, Alek, but I swear on my life, I will be an agent in seeing to your success, to our future."

I clutched her close and kissed her hard, reveling in every sweep of her tongue alongside mine and each breathy moan of need she uttered as she warmed under my touch.

"I trust you, Mila."

I wanted to, and I knew without a doubt that she would never let me regret it.