Page 40 of The Bratva's Sextuplets
His grip tightens. “I doubt they would have taken you alive.”
The certainty in his voice shocks me. “How can you be so sure?”
“Keeping you alive would require negotiations, exchanges, and prolonged contact with our organization. Dead wives send cleaner messages than kidnapped ones.” He pauses, and when he continues, his voice is more somber than I’ve ever heard. “They would’ve killed you in that car, Zita.”
The revelation should terrify me. Instead, it brings an odd sort of relief. Death I can understand. It’s the alternative possibilities, such as torture, rape, or prolonged suffering designed to break Tigran’s resolve that have been feeding my nightmares. “You sound like you have experience with these calculations.”
“I do.” No elaboration, no justification. Just acknowledgment of realities that shaped his understanding of the world long before I entered it.
“Have you ever ordered someone’s wife killed?” The question slips out before I can stop it, raw and honest in a way that surprises us both.
Tigran goes very still, not answering for a moment. “No.”
I believe him, but his hesitation makes me ask, “Would you if circumstances required it?”
“Yes.” There’s no hesitation this time. “To protect you or those in the family, I’d eliminate them without hesitation.”
The honesty is brutal and necessary. I’m married to a man capable of ordering murders, someone whose protection sometimes comes at the cost of other people’s lives. The woman I was before we got engaged would’ve been horrified by this knowledge. Tonight, it brings only a complicated sort of comfort.
“Does that frighten you?” he asks.
I consider the question carefully, examining my emotional response to his confession. “It should, but it doesn’t.”
“Why not?”
“I understand your violence isn’t random. It serves a purpose and protects something specific.” I turn my hand palm up beneath his, interlacing our fingers. “In this world, the alternative to your protection isn’t safety—it’s being defenseless against people who’d hurt me for sport.”
His expression transforms from cold authority to something more human. “You’re adapting to this life faster than I expected.”
“I’m adapting to you faster than I expected.”
The admission hangs between us, but I can’t take the words back, and I find I don’t want to.
“Zita…” He starts to say something, then stops, as if he’s fighting some internal battle about how much truth he can afford to share.
“What?”
“When Viktor called and told me what happened, I felt something I haven’t experienced since I was nine years old.” His voice drops to barely above a whisper. “Pure, helpless terror at the thought of losing someone who matters to me.”
The confession breaks some barrier I’ve been maintaining against the growing connection between us. “I matter to you?”
“More than you should. More than is safe for either of us.”
His honesty deserves my own. “I felt the same terror. Not just of dying, but of never seeing you again or never getting to figure out what this thing between us actually is.”
“What do you think it is?”
I study his face in the dim light, noting the way exhaustion has carved lines around his eyes, and his usually perfect composure has cracked to reveal something vulnerable beneath.
“I think it’s dangerous,” I say finally. “It complicates everything we’re trying to build together. I think it makes us both targets in ways we weren’t before…”
“But?”
“I want you anyway.”
The words slip out jaggedly, carrying all the confusion and desire I’ve been fighting to suppress. Tigran goes very still, searching my face as if he’s trying to determine whether I mean what I just said.
“Wanting me could get you killed,” he warns.
