Page 67 of Guarded Rebellion

“As if that can matter right now.” She let me lean on her as we walked. “You’re hurt. I think that’s priority.”

Better that I’m hurt. And not you.

I let her words replay in my mind and soothe my soul.

That’s priority.She’d stated thatIwas priority. Hers.

The depth of her remark knocked me off my axis. This woman, my assignment, cared about me not just to tell me that I mattered. She showed me the intensity of her thoughts and comments by stitching me up. By wiping off the blood. In helping me clean up from the gore of the fight. It wasn’t the worst I’d ever faced, but that man was a big, mean fucker who’d taken the wind out of me more than I cared to admit.

Under her tender care, though, proving how unafraid and accepting she was of the violence that ruled in our world, shedemonstrated how good of a team we made. How wecouldwork together despite our first tendency to butt heads.

This afternoon, I realized once she sat with me on the couch and pressed ice to the swelling bruise forming on my cheek, was when I fell in love.

With her.

28

EVA

For most of the day after that ill-fated trip to Kelly’s dorm room, Lev did damage control. His body did damage control, too. Between the cuts I stitched up or bandaged and the ice I applied to his wounds, his body was recovering with the slight rest.

But he was made for this. He was a killer. A trained fighter. One fight, no matter how challenging it seemed, wouldn’t set him back for long.

It was with a bizarre yet natural confidence that I’d been able to shut my mouth, not scream, and stay out of the way while Lev killed that man.

Violence was an element to the Mafia life, but what happened in that dorm room was the first time I’d experienced a first-row seat to it.

“Yes, gather her papers and whatever looks necessary,” Lev told Marcus on the phone.

He was still seated on the couch, busy on the phone as Marcus and the cleanup crew reported in to him and also while he checked in with my uncle.

Glancing at me, he raised a brow. “Will she need any biology books?” he asked, running interference.

I cringed and shook my head. “No. I think she studies with the online material.”

Honestly, thinking about any of my classes—or Kelly’s—wasn’t something I had the time or energy for. School wasn’t on my mind right now. This danger was.

Another push notification came through on my phone, and I looked at it.Reminder to submit.I sighed and swiped to dismiss it. If I didn’t turn this paper in on time, whatever. I’d catch up. Or take the hit on my grade.

In this moment, I felt like I was lying to myself. To the world. Iwasn’tjust another college student. With this episode of violence, of a man waiting to attack in the dorm room I was supposed to be living in, myreallife was creeping in. I couldn’t change the fact that I was a Baranov. I couldn’t run from who I was. And with a heart-wrenching sense of defeat, I hated to think I was wasting my time trying to experience a so-called normal life for as long as I have here.

Before I lowered my phone, a text popped up.

Kelly:Is this for real? I’m moving in with you?

Eva:Yes. Rurik is bringing you over as soon as you are discharged from the clinic.

Now, that, I could smile about. After Lev’s protests about having Kelly as a friend, never letting her visit, he changed his tune to insist that she stay here. I wanted to believe he was extending that invite—or making that demand—because he knew I’d feel better about having her close and seeing that she was safe and well. But I bet it was more because she could be a clue to why there was any danger on campus at all. Because he assumed her drugging incident was a decoy or attempt at getting to me.

“Are you all right?” Lev asked.

I blinked up at him, nodding. “Yeah. Why?”

“You’re pensive.”

“Well, you did say I seemed to be an intellectual woman.”

He didn’t take the bait to my sly smile. “Kelly will be protected here.”

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