Page 24 of Cruel Redemption

“Of course.” I leaned over to deposit dinner on the small table so I could wrap her in a full hug. “I wanted to be here sooner, but I had to pick up dinner at a restaurant not owned by the Petrovs.”

She nodded against my chest. “We need to find him. He’s not like us. He’s barely a business grad student.”

I held her at a short distance. “Where is this coming from?” There was a noticeable shift in her. I wondered what had happened in the two hours I was gone.

Her lashes fell over her eyes. “A stupid dream. But it felt real. And I don’t know that Enzo can survive long. He doesn’t have survival skills. He’s not that part of my team. He doesn’t even carry a weapon. He’s not Ciro.”

“He has a reason to survive and that’s what will get him through it.” I tried to assure her.

“Katya?” she whispered.

“Yes. He wants to get back to her.” It was the crumb of hope I was clinging to, to buy us time.

“God, he has to. How was she at dinner? How did it go?” Amara was frantic with questions. I couldn’t blame her as long as she had been here with no way to use her phone.

“I’ll tell you all about it. How is your hand?” I asked, leading her to a chair in the kitchenette.

She shrugged. “The same.” I saw how she cradled it to her chest.

I started to unpack dinner from the paper bags. “I got nothing at the dinner.”

“Really?” She frowned. “Nothing at all? I don’t understand. They have to know something,” she insisted.

“The Petrovs never flinched. There was nothing to play there.”

“How can you be so sure?”

I eyed her. “You know Inna and Vasha. I’m assuming you know them well. They have money. They have influence. They’ve never been master manipulators. They’re too focused on their grandchild. When’s the last time Vasha took out a hit on someone?”

She pulled out a chair and sat. “Never. That I know of,” she answered.

“Exactly. It’s not his style. He’d rather hike up interest rates or accumulate properties to trade for debt. I don’t think he would have gone after you and Enzo.”

“But Enzo said…” she stopped. “What I mean is, what if this is about Katya? What if they discovered the affair? It’s all personal to them. That changes things. The humiliation after the kind of fuss they’ve made about the baby. I got a shower invitation delivered by someone who was holding a live stork. They have lost their damn minds.”

“It would change everything if they knew, but they don’t. I read that room tonight. They are living in ignorant bliss. So is their son. Right now, that’s a blessing for Katya. And for me. It means she’s safe tonight.”

Amara opened one of the white cardboard boxes. “I’m starving. I could eat all of this.”

“Good.” I smiled, watching her twist her fork in the pasta. She lifted it toward her lips. “Did you say a live stork?”

She giggled. It was the first time I’d heard her laugh since our morning meeting in the office. There was suddenly warmth and light in the cabin. For a second, I thought everything was going to be okay and we weren’t at the epicenter of a dark and sinister world.

Fourteen

Amara

There was no way to tell what time it was. With the windows shuttered by boards and the cabin located in the part of the woods closest to the edge of the bayou, light didn’t find its way here. But Luka had. His arm wrapped around my waist and for a moment I tried to appreciate the rhythm of his chest rising and falling with deep solid breaths. I didn’t know how we slept that way all night. I couldn’t remember when my eyes finally closed. There was no measurement of time, there was no promise or threat of tomorrow. We found sanctuary in each other, eventually falling asleep our fingers wound together and our limbs in a pretzel.

Guilt slipped between my ribs when I remembered that Enzo was still missing, and we weren’t any closer to finding him. Luka exhaled against my neck. The warmth of him. The heat from his body lit something different inside me and I wanted to hold on to this for a little longer. To grasp and claw at the place we had found in the middle of this ugly darkness. We had to protect it. Fortify it. Or it would swallow us whole. I had come so close yesterday to shutting down. To shutting Luka out. But, he had pulled back from the edge of the cliff. It had taken one word at a time. One breath after another. One foot in front of the other to lead me away from a darker place than this one.

“You’re awake,” he growled against my ear.

“Mmhmm,” I answered, feeling my body respond to his. I wondered how long he had waited for me to awaken. Our bodies were covered by a thin quilt. We’d crawled into bed without much thought about clothing. Everything was dropped at the floor when we climbed under the covers.

His wide palms slid from my waist to my thigh. He took his time. I wiggled gently, leaning into the space that separated our bodies. His fingers dug into my skin, drawing deep lines with every touch as he worked to the inside of my thigh, igniting fire along my leg. How did he do that? How did he always do that to me?

My head pressed back against his shoulder. If I could have crawled beneath his skin I would have. To mold my body into his. For a little while, we could help each other forget that this cabin in the woods wasn’t a romantic getaway we had planned. For now, it was all we had.

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