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I winced. “Is it fast?” I huffed a laugh to myself. “I can’t even tell… How long have I even been here?”

She laughed lightly with me. “Hey, it’s not a bad thing.” She cleared her throat, looking kind of sheepish. “I… When I met Lev⁠—”

“No, no.” I put my hand on hers. “You don’t need to share anything that’s difficult.” All I knew was that she was a slave, and he “bought” her when she was in the middle of a standoff. I was sure she struggled with the details of that time and I didn’t wish for her to relive anything traumatizing.

“No, it’s okay. I was just going to say that, well, um, it felt like it took me a while to adjust. To let him in. To know I was all right and that it wasn’t a weakness to love him. In hindsight, looking back, I can see how much time was wasted with that insecurity and fear. Because he was that good to me—all of them were—from the moment we crossed paths.”

“I know what you mean.” I meant that. “They are good.” I wasn’t waiting for lightning to strike me with that lie. “They are good to me and Brady. Nikolai saved me. He cares about my son without any obligation to do so. While I know they do bad things, they are… good to us.”

Later, while I took over making dinner since Paloma had a headache and was napping, I couldn’t stop thinking about what Mila had said and how she’d gotten me to open my eyes.

Nikolai was a godsend, but he was also the devil in disguise, only ever meeting me at all because he was supposed to have killed me.

But maybe it’s time to get over that.

He didn’t.

He found a reason not to—before he knew that I could actually have intel for him.

I swallowed and glanced at him as he sat at the dining room table.

Since he’d come home, he hadn’t made a single move on me. No little looks. No secret, sly smiles. That heat and spark had evaporated since he’d gotten me last night.

Okay, go easy on him.

He’s been gone a lot.

He’s clearly gotten into a fight. Or two. Or more.

Maybe he had to kill someone again.

It has to weigh on his conscience. I’m sure it does.

If he’s not being overly caring, then just deal with it.

I felt so silly to be nervous about how we would act around each other after last night, but now, through the almost stilted dinner that I’d made for us, I had to wonder if he’d lost his interest now. He got me. And now I was done. He’d gotten what he wanted and that was that.

Stop. Stop being so… Argh!

I went to the table to get the last dish, not minding the chore of cleaning up. It wasn’t like I had anything else to do since Brady had gone upstairs to play and read in his room.

Before I could take the last dish into the kitchen, though, Nikolai reached out and snagged my hand. He held it and didn’t let me pass. Lifting his gaze from his phone, that he’d paid attention to throughout dinner, he cleared his throat.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. Curious but also demanding. But not harsh.

“Um. Nothing.”

He tightened his grip on my wrist without harming me. “Louisa…”

I licked my lips, hesitant but wanting to take the dare to just tell him. Like Mila said, it might be such a waste of time to fight what could be so right and good.

“I feel like you’ve lost your interest in me. Since last night happened. You got what you wanted, and that was it.” I shrugged the arm that he wasn’t keeping in place with his hold on my wrist.

He smirked, curling me closer toward him until I landed on his thigh. “You would be very, very wrong about that, sweetheart.”

19

NIKOLAI