Page 243 of Gilded Cage (Kovalyov Bratva 1)

I wish I had a camera. Esme would have loved to see him.

That thought is so normal, so mundane, that it actually shocks me into stillness for a second.

Because itisnormal. All this is normal.

Hunting in the mountains.

Coming home to a wife to tell her about an eagle in the sky, a deer in the bushes, a goat on a distant cliff.

The problem is—that isn’t my life.

It can’t be.

I’m living someone else’s reality. Like I’m borrowing it or stealing it for a little while.

But it doesn’t fit me. It never will.

This world is not where Artem Kovalyov belongs.

I hear movement a few feet away. I go still, trying to catch a glimpse of the deer that I’ve been chasing for about a mile now.

I’d seen it flash through the underbrush about twenty minutes ago. Nothing since, but the animal’s scent still clings to the air.

I leave the steep path I’m on and move a little higher, to more stable ground.

The path I find is broader, but it winds towards the cliff’s edge. The river in the ravine thunders from below.

Up here, the scent of dried bark and crunchy leaves weaves into that pungent deer smell.

But there’s something else, too. An unfamiliar scent on the edge of my perception.

Something that doesn’t belong here.

More precisely—someone.

I stand up a little straighter, on full alert as my eyes comb the surrounding area. The trees are thick in these parts, but whoever it is that’s tailing me is clumsy and obviously inexperienced in the art of stealth stalking.

Definitely not an animal—the mountain creatures are far smarter and more subtle. I creep further along the rocky trail. I take care to step only on hardened stone so I don’t leave any tracks.

The mysterious strangers weren’t as careful. I see their boot prints in the soil. Only one set of tracks so far.

I have a bad feeling I will soon find more.

Two steps later, my worst fears are confirmed.

A muddle of tracks in the dirt. Half a dozen men, maybe more. They clustered here and then spread out.

I curse silently.

Have Budimir’s men found us?

And if so, how the fuck did they manage to do it?

I think of Esme, sitting at alone in the cabin. I’d left her sitting contentedly by the fireplace, a tell-tale sign she was composing music in her head. She’s unprotected in there. No way can she fend off a group of attackers, armed or otherwise.

She needs me. I have to go back. I hope to fucking God I’m not too late already.

I turn around, ready to make my way back to the cabin as fast as I can.

---