AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Luka’s hand curled into a fist at his side. A drop of blood fell onto the carpet below him.
Ivankov scowled back toward the dining room. “Perhaps I killed the boy too soon. Now I have nothing to quench this disappointment.” His gaze shifted back to Luka. “Nothing but you.”
Luka didn’t tremble. He felt nothing at all.
Perhaps the beating would change that.
Luka huddled in the alley across from the safe house. He didn’t understand why he’d gone back. What did it matter that Alina hadn’t left yet?
He settled in to wait. His body ached in a way that said he would be able to rest. New bruises peppered his face, and worse marks added a sharpness to his back. Others might have called it pain. The only true pain he felt was in being touched.
Ivankov had touched him plenty during his punishment. Nothing was as bad now that it was over. Heaviness filled Luka’s arms, weighing down his hands where they rested by his sides. Blood soaked into the black material of his undershirt. He missed the long-sleeved shirt he had worn, but now he could only picture it on her.
He’d looked at her too much the night before. Her image wouldn’t fade from his mind.
His thoughts blurred as he continued to wait. His eyes remained open, but it was as if he slept. The closest he would get to sleep that day, anyway.
The door of the safe house cracked open. Alina looked even more vulnerable with her hair rumpled from sleep and those drawstring shorts clinging to her waist. Or maybe it was the bandage around her bare foot.
He should have bought her shoes. The regret Luka felt at the thought was silly. Regret was meant for more important failures.
His body still felt heavy when he rose to follow her.
It was more difficult to remain unnoticed by others in the light of day. All the ink he flashed without his normal long sleeves didn’t help. Luka found what shadows he could, feeling less than nimble for the first time in forever.
At least Alina didn’t seem to notice his presence.
There was only one viable shop she could go to in the direction she had chosen. Luka waited until she went in before also slipping inside. She gathered the basics, and he noted the sizes she chose. Which was a ridiculous thing to commit to memory. She would disappear after she had what she needed.
Alina paused in an aisle he hadn’t expected. She stared in front of her for a long time. He’d had little money to leave her. She could only afford so much.
Still, she took whatever had caught her attention before moving on. Curiosity gnawed at Luka as he watched her approach the pharmacy in the back. Her discussion there took all her attention, so he eased into the aisle she had left.
A pack of pencils hung where she had been. He nudged the next one on the display, watching it sway, and remembered the face drawn in blood in the room where he had found her. The pencils in the pack were already sharpened, but that wouldn’t last long. His hand sought a sharpener she hadn’t chosen, slipping it into his pocket. He had no money to pay for it, but with all he had done in his life, what did theft matter?
His gaze was drawn to Alina again. She frowned down at her purchases as she clutched his money in her hand, and she slid the pencils out of the pile.
Luka’s hand went for the ones in front of him, and he exited the store before she finished being rung up.
Having the things he’d stolen in his pocket made him feel silly. He wasn’t going to interact with her again in order to give them to her.
He waited in a different alleyway for her to exit the store. To his surprise, she retraced her steps, now wearing the shoes she had bought. Dread filled him as she opened the door to the safe house that she hadn’t locked behind her when she left.
Ivankov had said she had nothing. Did that mean she had nowhere to return to?
Luka’s confusion over why she had followed him not once but twice the night before settled. Desperation prompted the worst decisions.
She’d be safe for now. He didn’t have time to warn Giovanni about the house’s use, but that could wait for another day. The next man he needed to kill would not. Ivankov had given him a deadline.
Luka felt his usual disconnect from the world around him. What was unusual was how warm he felt. It was the middle of winter, and he was in shirtsleeves. He should have been cold.
Telling himself none of that mattered, he left the safe house behind.
Chapter 6
Alina regretted not buying the pencils, but there had been nothing else she could put back when she didn’t have enough to pay for it all. The clothes and shoes and prescription had been necessary. Especially the prescription, even though it had taken most of the cash Luka had left her. She’d been surprised to find the money, but grateful.
Returning to the house where Luka had left her made her nervous. She knew she couldn’t stay there for the long term, but there was nowhere else for her to return to. When the Bratva had come for her, they’d burned down the small cabin she’d called home. It was fitting that Luka had burned down their home in return. The house in the woods where she had hidden away for the past ten years was small, but it had been hers.
