Page 81 of Forced Virgin Bride of the Bratva
I miss the version of myself I was when I was with him. Not the weapon. Not the spy. The girl who laughed at his dry jokes, who whispered in his ear in the dark, who almost believed she could belong to someone.
That girl is dead now. I killed her the moment I pulled the dagger on him. The moment I ran.
It had to be done but God, it burns.
I turn over and press my face into the pillow, swallowing a groan. The pain blooms fresh behind my ribs, sharp and insistent. I almost prefer it. It gives me something else to focus on. Anything but the memory of his hands on me. The way he said my name like it meant something.
I know what comes next. Tiago’s already planning for it. Relocation. Retaliation. Blood. The game is no longer cloak-and-dagger—it’s knives-out. No more quiet positioning. No more careful whispers. This will be loud. Public. And irreversible.
Maxim won’t stop. Not after this. He’ll hunt me. Not because of what I stole—but because of what I was. What we were, because he looked at me like a future once, and now I’ve burned that vision to the ground.
The worst part is, he won’t even need to kill me.
All he has to do is look at me again, like he did in the study. Like I’m filth. Like I was never anything more than a threat he was too stupid to see coming.
That look gutted me more than the fight did. I squeeze my eyes shut. No tears. Not now. Not for him.
I left that version of myself behind in New York, along with my wedding ring and every lie I ever told him.
There’s no place for softness in what comes next.
There’s no place for him, but my body betrays me still—muscle memory, instinct, longing. I crave the warmth of him, the safety he gave without knowing. I crave the silence that felt like peace when we lay tangled in bed, not strategy. Not calculation.
The war has started, and still I want him.
It makes me sick.
Tomorrow we leave for São Paulo. That’s what Tiago said. Our base. Our fortress. The last line. I’ll wake up and put on the armor again. I’ll reload the gun. I’ll memorize names and schedules and routes. I’ll be the woman he trained me to be.
Tonight—tonight I mourn. I mourn the version of me that let herself believe in something other than revenge. I mourn the touch of a man I now have to kill.
I let the ache settle in my chest. Let it remind me that this was never going to end clean. That this was always going to cost me something.
I also promise myself something else.
Maxim Sharov may have seen through my lies. He may have caught me. Hurt me. Branded me with that gaze of his, but he will never break me.
I won’t let him.
Chapter Twenty-Six - Maxim
The smell of gunpowder still lingers in the air by the time we breach the final door. The walls of the safe house are thick, reinforced in places, old blood embedded in the tile grout like permanent ghosts. My boots echo off the floor as I step inside, weapon drawn, chest tight with the promise of violence. I already know what I’m going to find.
Nothing. The silence confirms it.
Empty rooms. Abandoned gear. Half-packed bags. A glass of water still sweating on the windowsill like someone left it there only moments ago.
They’re gone.
I feel the tension in the men around me—the crackling disappointment, the wasted adrenaline. Platon moves through the space with quick efficiency, barking orders, signaling our sweep teams to check every room, every exit, every footprint in the dirt. We tear through it all, like wolves denied a kill.
She’s not here.
They knew we were coming, which means someone warned them.
I walk through what looks like the main living room, where blueprints are still taped to the wall, red string pulled taut between marked locations. The names are familiar: mid-tier cartel families, Bratva defectors, logistical weak spots. It’s all laid out like a spiderweb. They’re building something—or they were. Now they’re gone, and all that’s left is the echo of what they almost did.
I run my hand down one of the strings and rip it from the tack, letting the red line fall limp between my fingers. I want to destroy the whole thing. Burn the fucking house to the ground.
