Page 81 of Twisted Cage

“You know who she is?”

He nods yes again as my heart beats in time with the waves of agony on the man’s face. A sort of alignment between predator and prey. He rained bullets on my Kostya. I flex my fingers on the handle of my knife. He’s going to pay for it.

Konstantin clucks his tongue, draws his gun back, and waits for the man to look at him from his one exposed eye. “You know what else she is?”

I’m his.

I’ll never let the words slip from my lips. Not even after seeing him like this. Looming over the fucker who shot at us, the very embodiment of retribution. I can’t give him that power and still belong to myself. But finally seeing this side he’s always hidden from me, I know it’s true. I’ve always been his.

The man finally shakes his head, his dull gray eyes landing on Konstantin’s face before darting away.

“Mine.” Konstantin smiles then, but it’s a bone-chilling smile, the kind you’d see in nightmares. “And I protect what’s mine. You…” he says, adding more pressure on the man’s jaw until he’s groaning in misery. His eyes roll back in his head before coming to focus on Konstantin once again. “Are going to beg me to die long before your heart stops beating.”

He’s a one-man walking army and as magnificent as he is in battle… he’s standing between the life thrust upon me and the one I’m taking for myself.

Enough blood has spilled in my name. By men guarding me, keeping me pristine, perfect, and untouched. Now it will spill by my hand. “Beg me to die, Konstantin.”

His ruthless gaze snaps to mine and his jaw clenches, biting back his reply.

Raising my knife before me, I turn it over in the moonlight, satisfaction burning through me at the wary look in the man’s eye. “He came after me. I’ll be the one paying him back for it. For all of it.”

28

KONSTANTIN

I’m going to fucking kill her myself.

Popping into the fray like she’s watching the fucking opera and not bursting out into the open with bullets flying.

Like one didn’t just miss her by fucking inches.

She hovers over the fucker under my shoe, her blade glinting in the moonlight, not a single flicker of understanding on her livid face as to just how close she came to dying tonight.

My head pounds, the adrenaline beginning its retreat, leaving my muscles twitching and my hands shaking. Or maybe that’s the fury and the instinct to wrap my fingers around her slim little neck and shake the fuck out of her pulsing through me.

The minute I step back, the man at my feet loses consciousness. “Take them all to the den. Keep them alive. No one touches them. They’re mine.”

“And mine.” Her silky voice drips with cold malice.

If it were any other night, if the target had been anyone but her, it would be comical to see twin looks of shock on their faces as their gazes snap to hers.

But right now, none of this is funny. It’s stupid, reckless, absolute insolence and tonight she will fucking learn to listen.

I crouch, and with one swipe of my arm, she’s draped over my shoulder. “We’ll be back.”

“Put me down, asshole!” She pounds on my back, the hilt of her knife connecting with my kidney, earning her nothing more than a grunt for her effort.

Grigori shakes his head as I turn away. Marching through row after row of the dead, I delve deeper into the darkness, tearing up the cold damp grass as I stomp past endless gravestones. Most who likely died in old age, but not all, dammit. The young rest here too. Lives snuffed out far too soon. They’d gone to their graves with the barest taste of life on their tongues.

Tonight, she’d almost become one of them.

I smack her ass, putting every bit of force I can muster into my swing, knowing it still won’t be enough to make me feel one bit better.

“Shut the fuck up!” I bellow the words, the sound a deep combination of every emotion she brings out in me. Rage, helplessness, regret, longing, jealousy, obsession, pride, hurt, and love.

So much love I’m drowning in it. Making stupid fucking mistakes. Mistakes with the highest price tag—her life.

The sudden need to see her face, to reassure myself she’s okay, sweeps over me and before I know what I’m doing, I dump her on her feet in front of a tall cross. I raise her arms, settling her hands on each side of the granite. “Don’t move.”

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