Page 12 of Lobanov Bratva Obsession
Damian no longer saw me as disposable.
The change was subtle but unmistakable. In retrospect, it should have been evident from the times he'd discussed my demands instead of dismissing them outright. Or, maybe he was doing that because he wasn’t sure if I was bluffing or not. But now, the shift in the dynamics between us was clear. Power has redistributed itself between us, and we both knew it.
The knowledge both empowered and terrified me. It felt great that he was now understanding that I was more valuable to them than he thought. But it was also terrifying to think of how much he might be expecting from me in return for my safety, how deep into all this I already was. What I felt was something closer to vertigo—the dizzying awareness of standing at a precipice without knowing whether the ground ahead was solid or void.
I pulled my knees to my chest, an undignified position I wouldn’t have allowed if anyone could see me—besides, there might not be cameras here, after all. I let myself think about the cost of becoming what I was. The black sheep. The brilliant lawyer who’d turned her knowledge into a weapon aimed at her own blood.
My family hadn’t disowned me. That would have been too public, too messy, too likely to raise questions among theold guard who still remembered my father, the brother Sergei never mentioned, the man who’d died when I was twelve in a car accident that was never quite explained to my satisfaction.
They’d done something more efficient: they’d erased me quietly.
Well, I’d survived. I had made myself indispensable elsewhere—to corporate clients who needed someone who understood how criminals thought, to white-collar defense attorneys who wanted the best, to federal prosecutors who occasionally needed a consultant who could decode financial structures designed to be indecipherable. I’d survived by being useful. By being untouchable in ways that had nothing to do with violence and everything to do with expertise.
Filing the lawsuit had never been about revenge, though I wouldn’t deny the satisfaction of watching Sergei’s world crack under legal pressure. It had been about ending a cycle. A cycle that had been moving so independently for so many years that it seemed impossible to end.
So, even though I hadn’t spilled the whole tea to Damian, I wasn't bothered about him misunderstanding my intentions for filing the lawsuit.
What I was bothered about, however, was the growing pull I felt towards him. I could acknowledge the danger of it, the inevitability of it, to myself at least.
I hated it. Hated that my body responded to him—to his restraint, to the violence he held back like a predator tolerating proximity to prey, to the way he looked at me like I was an equation he couldn’t solve.
He felt it, too. And he was probably on the same page as I was, which would explain his abrupt holding back from touching me earlier.
Desire felt like another cage, prettier than the room but still designed to contain me. I didn’t want such a cage—not now, not ever.
I can’t allow it.
*****
I must have dozed despite myself, because the sound of the door opening jerked me awake with my pulse already racing. My hand pulled the covers close to my chest as I sat up against the headboard.
Damian stood in the doorway, backlit by hallway light that turned him into pure silhouette. He had traded the tailored suit for dark jeans and a black jacket that did absolutely nothing to make him less intimidating. If anything, the casual clothes made him more dangerous—less businessman, more predator.
“Easy,” he said, his voice carrying that particular flatness that meant he’d catalogued my defensive posture and found it simultaneously concerning and pointless. “Just checking security.”
“Well, it’s nearly midnight,” I defended.
He moved into the room with that liquid grace that shouldn’t be possible for someone his size. “We received intel about rival movement. No part of the building should be a weak spot.”
The realization that things like these were normal for someone like him reminded me of where I’d gotten myself into.
Damian’s gaze swept the room, cataloguing details with professional efficiency. When his eyes landed on me, they narrowed fractionally. “You’re shivering.”
I hadn’t noticed, but now that he mentioned it, I could feel the tremor running through my shoulders. The brownstone’s heating system was erratic at best, and the temperature had dropped with nightfall. I’d been too lost in thought to care.
“I’m fine.”
He shrugged out of his dark leather jacket, revealing his black Henley. He held it out to me without ceremony.
It was at the tip of my tongue to say I was okay. But I just didn’t.
The gesture was small. Intimate.
I stared at the offered garment like it might be a trap for a second before extending my hand. My fingers brushed his rough yet warm ones as I took the thick jacket from him. The contact lingered, making heat spike through my veins. Then he abruptly withdrew his hand like he’d been burned.
Feeling more self-conscious than I would have wanted to, my eyes moved downwards to the bed as I put the jacket on. The scent of soap and a not-so-strong cologne enveloped me as I pulled the zipper up.
Looking back up to meet his gaze, I said the first thing that came to mind.
