Page 52 of Diamond Devil

I narrow my eyes. “Screw you.”

He turns the corner hard the moment the light turns red. “You want to know why I’m not falling to pieces,tigrionok? Because I can’t afford to.” A vein in his jaw ticks as he takes a moment to chew on whatever thoughts are rolling through his mind. “I am thepakhan. Everyone—and I meaneveryone—relies on me. If I don’t keep myself together, it all falls apart. If you see me unraveling, that’s when you should start panicking. Because that means it’s over.”

“Are you trying to scare me?”

“I’m not trying to do anything,” he murmurs. “But if you are scared, then maybe you’re smarter than I realized after all.”

I turn my face away from him and gaze out my window. “It’s not about being smart,” I tell him quietly. “It’s about the fact that I’ve seen scarier.”

That gets his attention.

“The first time Mom was diagnosed with cancer, that was the first time I experienced pure, unadulterated fear. The kind that sinks into your soul so deep that you have nightmares every night until you’ve processed it. Cancer scared me. Losing my family—that scares me, too. Everything else? I can deal with.”

“Cancer can be fought,” he suggests quietly.

I snort. If he was a different person, I might have thought he was trying to comfort me. I know better, though.

Comfort.He doesn’t know the meaning of the word.

“Cancer fights, but it doesn’t fight fair.Youcan fight, and make decisions, and decide to show mercy or not. You know who to aim at and who to avoid. Cancer doesn’t know or care whether the victims are young or old or rich or poor. It doesn’t even care if you’re Bratva.”

Ilarion’s lips are pursed. He doesn’t glance my way, but somehow, I just know he’s looking at me. “That doesn’t mean you give up. That doesn’t mean you stop fighting.”

I shake my head. “At what cost? My mother has been fighting her cancer for years now. It’s ripped at her from every side, taking bites out of her until what’s left of her is unrecognizable. I worry sometimes we won’t even have a body to bury.”

His nod is slow. Now, he does glance at me. “Worse than a bullet to the head.”

I hear the hint of sympathy in his voice. I’m not sure I’m ready to receive it. Not right now. Not while we’re driving to see my mother who is now dealing with both cancer and bullets.

“We were all different people B.C. And now… Well, this is the part they don’t tell you about. It’s not easy looking after someone who’s sick. It takes its toll on you, too, no matter how much you love them.”

“What did it take from you?” he asks gently.

“It took my mom. It took my dad, too, in a way. It took my adolescence and my innocence all at once.” I replay my answer back in my head and cringe. “I sound like a selfish bitch, don’t I?”

“You sound like someone who refuses to lie to themselves. That’s admirable.”

I glance at him from the corner of my eyes. I’m over here pouring my heart and soul out on the dashboard, and yet there’s not one crack in that steely armor of his. “My mother’s dying, Ilarion.” I sigh heavily. “And I find myself getting resentful because I can’t live a normal life. Because I have to miss parties to take her to chemo.Parties.Fucking stupid, meaningless parties. If that’s not selfish, I don’t know what is.”

“You’re human,” he says. “You’re allowed.”

“I’m a human second. I’m my mother’s daughter first.”

The ghost of a smile dances along the corners of his lips. It brings back a vivid memory from the night we met. Those full, sure lips traversing the plane of my shoulder…down to my breasts…the scrape of his beard against my thighs…

Stop!

“Is that it, then?” Ilarion asks. “Your entire identity revolves around other people?”

“Doesn’t everyone’s?”

“No,” he says softly. “Not everyone’s.” His eyes are darker now, and I wonder if he’s thinking about things he’d rather forget, just like I am. “Not everyone has people in their life worth sacrificing so much for. You’re lucky in that regard.”

I raise my brow. “Who are you talking about?” The air has the charged feeling it gets when someone is holding a memory in their head that still hurts them. When fresh air reaches somewhere it hasn’t reached in a long, long time.

Then his eyes flicker to me, and that steel armor clanks right back into place. “What makes you think that I’m talking about anyone?”

I sigh. I should’ve expected him to retreat.

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