Page 61 of Santa Daddy
He huffed a sound that might’ve been a laugh and rolled to his side, propping his head on his hand to study me.
The look in his eyes made my skin feel too small. Softer. But still edged with that unshakable possession.
“That I can’t hate you anymore,” I admitted, the truth slipping out before I could catch it. “And that terrifies me.”
Surprise flickered across his face, then something like recognition. His hand came up, cupping my cheek again, thumb rubbing the edge of my mouth.
“You should be terrified,” he said quietly. “This thing between us? It’s going to get us both killed.”
Probably.
But lying there, wrapped in his warmth and the faint glow of Christmas lights reflecting off the glass, I couldn’t make myself care.
“Then we’d better make it worth it,” I whispered.
He stared at me like he was trying to memorize every part, like he was afraid of forgetting and more afraid of remembering.
For a second, I saw fear.
Not mine. His.
Not of enemies or bullets or losing power.
Fear of this. Of me. Of whatever we were building in this glass cage while the rest of the world slept under fairy lights.
“What happens now?” I asked. The question had been eating at me since the first time he’d put his hands on me.
“Now?” His thumb traced my bottom lip again, slower. “Now we survive whatever comes next.”
Like it was simple. Like we were on the same side.
The thought sent a thrill through me I didn’t have the courage to unpack.
Outside, the city hummed—horns, distant sirens, people stumbling out of bars, living lives that didn’t involve Bratva politics or blood on snow. Somewhere, someone was wrappinglast-minute Christmas presents. Somewhere, a kid was leaving out cookies for a man who didn’t exist.
Forty floors up, I was falling asleep in the arms of a very different kind of myth.
I couldn’t hate him anymore.
That terrified me.
So did the fact that I loved how his arm tightened around me as sleep pulled at my edges, like he wasn’t letting go even in dreams.
If loving Konstantin Zverev got me killed, so be it.
I was his now.
He was mine.
And whatever came next—wedding bells, war bells, or death knells—we’d face it together.
For the first time since the tree lot, I fell asleep without plotting an exit.
Tomorrow everything would change.
Tonight, under a Christmas city and a monster’s blanket, was just us.
And somehow, that was enough.
