Page 69 of Disguised as Love

She stared at me as frozen as her mother before she shook herself out of it. She took the jacket and pulled it on over her black dress.

Malik and Ito-san joined us, breathless and wrathful.

Ito-san shoved her guns into her jacket and growled, “We can’t stop.”

“We need to split up!” I repeated. “Ilia will take Manya, I’ve got Raisa, and Ito-san will go with Malik.”

“I don’t need a fucking bodyguard. I need the fuck out of Russia,” Malik said.

“Woods is right, and we’re wasting time,” Ilia said. “We can’t lose them if we stay together.”

Ilia dashed across the aisle to the shoe department and returned with two pairs of tennis shoes. He tossed one pair at me for Raisa, and then he was bending to switch Manya’s heels for the cheap shoes. I bent, slipping her heels off and pushing her toes into the flats.

“We’ll meet at the boathouse.” It was Raisa who spoke. Her voice was surprisingly calm, although the hand she brought to her face as she tucked a stray hair behind her ear was shaking. “The boathouse at six.”

Everybody but me seemed to know what the hell she was talking about. Ilia’s eyes met mine over the top of the women’s heads. “Do not fail her,” he said, and then he was pulling Manya away, heading through the racks of clothes toward the back of the store.

I gave Ito-san a look. “You good?”

She glared at me and Malik and then gave a curt nod. I looked at Malik. “Listen to her, and she’ll make sure you get out of this alive. Don’t trust her, and you’ll end up dead.”

His friend had blown up half the Russian mafiya. Even if he hadn’t wanted it or approved it, they’d never believe him. He needed to go underground—and fast. I wasn’t sure Manya or Raisa would ever be safe. They’d always be seen as tools to get to Malik. It was enough to make me want to go back and pound the dead body of Isamu Yano into the ground. It was enough for me to want to shove Malik into a wall for trusting the man. It was enough for me to want to shove myself in front of a bus for losing focus yet again. For taking my eye off the ball.

At the entrance to the store, two men emerged in suits, scanning the interior. I ducked, trying to hide my height behind the racks. I was a goddamn blinking neon sign for Volkov’s men to follow. Raisa would have done better to go with Ilia, but my stomach sank at the idea of letting her out of my sight, of trusting her survival to someone else.

I pulled Raisa with me, and we found our way from the women’s department into the men’s. I snagged a dark-green jacket and a gray beanie, putting them on as we moved. I spotted a sign that said employees only and pushed through the door where a startled employee shouted at us.

We zig-zagged our way through the boxes and crates until we found a door that opened into a back parking lot. We hurried along the side of the building to rejoin the crowds that lined the embankment. The streets were filled with people, and the chaos from the avenue behind us was easily felt in the tension of the crowd, but people were no longer running. Instead, they were all turned, watching the smoke and fire jutting above the buildings as the news of the bombing spread.

I slowed us down, trying to mingle in with the crowd’s pace, trying to look like we were facing the same direction while actually moving away.

“Why are there so many people here? This wasn’t for the procession,” I asked Raisa.

“It’s for the Scarlet Sails,” she said, pointing to a banner swaying from a streetlight. It had a red sailing ship emblazoned on it as part of the White Night Festival. If nothing else, it helped that the crowds were larger because of it, making us more difficult to spot. There was more diversity amongst the tourists than there had been lining the streets for the funeral procession.

I looked down at Raisa, stopping to truly take her in. Her eyes were wide, her breath coming fast, chest heaving beneath the inexpensive blue coat I’d shoved at her. The sexy black dress she had on peeked out beneath the hem, standing out against the gray tennis shoes Ilia had gotten for her. She was dressed nothing like the model-like perfect woman I’d first met, and yet she still looked like her stunning self with her blonde hair glowing in the sunlight.

“Fuck,” I said and twirled around, eyeing the booths lining the shore. I dragged her toward one selling handcrafted hats and scarves.

I pulled out my wallet and handed some money to the woman behind the table. I grabbed a crocheted beanie and pulled it roughly over Raisa’s head. She grunted at me, pushing my hands away and adjusting it so she could actually see. I snagged a scarf for each of us, for the first time thankful of the cool temperatures that still surrounded St. Petersburg.

Then, we were moving again, still trying to blend in while I searched every face for the men I’d seen with Volkov or the other bratva leaders. I would have kept walking until we were blocks away, but Raisa pulled at me, pointing to where a boat was filling with tourists for a tour down the Neva.

“The tour ends out by the harbor,” she said.

I nodded and went to a booth to buy tickets. We did our best to stroll casually down the dock as if we didn’t have men chasing us as we boarded the boat. We picked a spot by the rail rather than seats inside. I slumped on the bench in an attempt to hide my height and pulled her so she was standing between my legs while I watched the shoreline in case we needed to jump from the ship at the last minute.

I saw the two men right as we started to pull away from the pier. They were eyeing the boat and the people on it. I didn’t think. I just pulled Raisa closer to me and kissed her, making sure our faces were hidden as much as possible. From the embankment, it would look exactly like what it was?a heated embrace. Because no matter how gentle and platonic I attempted to keep it, once my lips touched hers, flames flickered to life inside me.

For two seconds, she hesitated, and then it was her devouring me instead of the other way around, fingers digging into my scalp below the beanie, tongue pushing at my lips and seeking entrance. And I gave in, letting her control the intensity as she explored my mouth and bit at my lips. Desperation and dread and longing all tangled together.

We stayed that way, mouths searching for a release after the horror of the last few minutes, until a man came on over the speaker. His voice pulled us back to where we were—on a boat filled with tourists.

She tried to put distance between us, but I didn’t let her go. I held her to me while, for the first time in years, true fear filtered through me, littering my veins with a series of tremors, because Raisa Leskov had a target on her back a thousand times bigger than when we’d arrived. I felt my FBI career withering away as I realized the harsh truth with a painful leap of my heart: the only thing that mattered was keeping her safe.

Raisa

BATTLE SYMPHONY

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