Page 82 of Baby for My Ex’s Dad

I gently open one door. Inside, the room is dark, with curtains blocking out the daylight. The air feels quiet and close, filled with the smell of him, cigars, and cologne. Against the far wall, on the massive bed, there’s a shape—a person-shaped lump under the heavy covers, still and breathing calmly.

Sleeping like a baby.

The man who barged into my house, threatened the woman I love with a gun, shot my son, and tortured my oldest friend. He sleeps like a man who believes he has already won.

My gun rises, finger on trigger. It would be easy and fast—three rounds through the blanket—to end what ruined my night, my son, and my oldest friend. But I stop myself.

Fast is not what I drove here for. Fast is a mercy. Alexei Sokolov will receive no mercy from me. Not ever.

I need him awake. I want to see the fear in his eyes, the moment he realizes all his men are dead, and that the bait was useless. I want him to see that the man he should have buried first has walked through his entire house unscathed to stand at the foot of his bed.

I want him to realize I didn’t kill him in his sleep for a reason. I’ve earned his terror across this ruinous night, paid for it in blood not mine to spend. I will have it before anything else.

My footsteps remain silent in the dark room. Thick carpet helps. With my gun leveled steady at the shape in the bed, I take the edge of the heavy covers, and I fling them back, hard, to wake him into his own death and let him see my face while it arrives.

Perfume wafts through the air, and in the dark, my eyes make out the wrong shape.

Anya Sokolov, in a pale silk nightgown, propped on the pillows, wide awake, and not startled in the least. Pistol already up, aimed at the center of my chest. Smiling.

“Maxim,” she purrs. “I always knew I’d get you in my bed.”

35

THEA

“You two.” I’m already moving for the doors, while the twins Maxim left behind straighten up as if a string pulling them together has been tugged. “Come with me. Now.”

“Thea.” Galina catches my sleeve. “Where are you going?”

“To save him from himself.”

I hear how insane it sounds, but I keep going anyway, because this is my plan, and my plans go according to schedule, and God only knows how much trouble Maxim has gotten himself into by now.

Galina stops in front of me. “You cannot mean this.”

“He went to Sokolov’s alone, Galina. He went tonight, wrecked and not caring whether he returns. You saw his eyes. You know what he’s thinking, same as I do. It’s not a plan—it’s a man rushing to his own doom. I refuse to sit in a shitty chair and wait for the father of my child to die of a broken heart. Not while I can do something.”

Galina’s stitched mouth opens and closes, showing something in her expression that isn’t quite refusal anymore—more like recognition. She doesn’t tell me to sit down again but looks at me a bit longer. Finally, she nods and releases me. “I’ll stay here.”

“Good. Thank you.”

The short-haired twin says, “Miss. Our orders are specific. We keep you here, in the hospital, until the boss comes back. That’s the order.”

“I know it is. He gave it in front of me.” I pick my coat up off the chair. “And that order was designed to keep me safe, yes? That’s the entire point of it. Keeping me safe, right?”

“Well, yes, but⁠—”

I shrug the coat on. “If he dies today because nobody moved, how safe do you think I’m going to be?”

They frown at each other, and he points out, “You’re safest in the hospital.”

“And tomorrow, after Max is dead? Where am I safest? Where won’t his enemies find me? Do you have orders to take me there?” I wait for them to catch up.

“No, but⁠—”

“The order and I want the same thing, boys. We just disagree about the method, and when Max gave it, he didn’t think this through because he was grieving.”

The long-haired twin looks sad to say the words, “We can’t let you walk out. Please don’t make us hold you here.”