Page 26 of Claimed in Sin
"What crawled up your ass and died?" he asks, and I can hear the humor in his voice. He's not going to let me out of this without spilling everything, but I'm not the sort to overshare. It's none of his business. I'm gonna do my job and I'm gonna do it well. I just don't know how to do it without hurting her, which suddenly is my concern when before, I couldn't have cared less.
Kazimir climbs into the ring with me, rubbing his hands together, and I throw first. A jab that he slips, followed by a cross that he catches on his forearm. He counters with a short hook to my ribs that I feel through my core. I circle left but he mirrors me lazily. He's sloppy and I'm too tense to bark out how he's too loose or slow.
"Heard the delivery teams ran clean last week," he says, throwing a jab that I parry.
"Yeah." I fire a combination—jab, jab, cross—and the cross lands on his shoulder. He absorbs it and steps in with a body shot that makes me exhale hard. "Ro was happy about it."
"Yeah, I heard he wants to double the shipment frequency by next month." Kazimir's feet slide on the mat instead of bouncing. He's either tired or trying to throw me off. I just stay focused on his chest, watching the periphery for any movement.
I throw a hook that he blocks with his elbow before he fires back with a straight right that I slip by an inch. The air from it brushes my cheek. He's gonna have me in stitches if I don't get on my game. But physical pain helps distract me from the anger. Maybe it wouldn’t be all that bad.
"What about the alliance?" he asks, starting to be a bit lighter on his toes.
I reset my stance and circle away from the ropes, annoyed he can't just keep his nose in his own business. "We can talk about it later, Kaz."
He reads the tone immediately, and his hands drop a little—not enough to leave himself open but enough to signal he's listening. "What's going on?" he asks.
I throw a lazy jab that he bats away. We're still moving, still circling, but the pace has dropped. The sparring has shifted from training to trading angry blows. I know better than anyone that when it gets to this point, there's no use in trying to hide it. Kaz and I have been close for years, since we were kids, and he's gonna find out. I may as well just be open and tell him.
I throw a cross that he slips. "I asked her to marry me."
Kazimir stops circling and scoffs, lowering his hands. "You asked Sergei Belova's daughter to marry you." He processes it for about two seconds before he throws a jab that catches me on the chin because I'm not paying attention. The impact snaps my head and brings me back to my body and out of my thoughts where I get stuck thinking of her.
"Focus," he says, but I'm in no state to be in this ring. I'm beginning to think the bar would’ve been a better choice.
"She said no, okay?" I reset and shake my head, raising my fists to cover my face, but we're circling again. He's not pressing me too hard, but I can see by the look on his face that he thinks I’m stupid.
He throws a combination that I block and counter, then slips my counter and comes back with a hook to my ribs that I eat because I'm a half-second late getting my elbow down. It forces the air up from my lungs and I double over, grunting. I deserved that. I'm being lazy, watching his eyes to see what he's thinking instead of his chest to make sure I catch every movement.
"I don't get what the play is here. I thought you were supposed to end that alliance, not make a new one." Kazimir has a point. My job is to stop Orlov and Belova from aligning. That doesn't require me to sleep with her or fall in love, but I've done both. My original plan to soil her and show Orlov would've worked if I hadn't let her get in my head so easily.
"I had a plan and it would’ve worked."
Kazimir catches my next jab and ties me up, pulling me into a clinch. We grapple for a second, his forearm against my neck, my hand on his shoulder until he pushes me off and we reset.
"What happened?" he asks, turning to the side to spit.
"She won't do it, okay? She's too loyal to her family, even though I can give her everything Orlov can and more. I just don't think she'll even go to her father to ask him." We may not have access to the same trade routes, but together the Radins, Kuzins, and Belovas would dominate the entire region.
Kazimir throws a straight right that I block and we exchange body shots in close. His fist connects with my floating rib and I answer with a hook to his kidney that makes him grunt. I'm finally getting my head into this and he knows it.
"There's a simpler way to do this," he says, panting. Sweat darkens the collar of his shirt. "Kill Orlov."
I stop circling and narrow my eyes at him. "What?"
"Kill him—stage it as a smuggling deal gone wrong. If you do it right, no one's the wiser and the alliance is off. Poof—" He opens his fingers in front of my face like fireworks and grins. He just doesn't get it. It's not that easy. It could start a war.
He throws a light jab to keep me honest and I parry it without thinking. Now my reflexes are kicking in, and if he's not careful, I'll hand him his own ass. "Roman won't go for it," I say.
"Why not?"
"Because killing Orlov in cold blood isn't how Roman operates. He doesn't start wars on purpose. And if the Orlov family traces it back to us—even a suspicion—we're fighting on two fronts before the gun operation is fully running. We don't have the infrastructure for that yet."
Kazimir shrugs and throws a combination that I block on reflex. "Just stage the hit during one of his border runs, make it look territorial, and nobody looks twice at us. Why get Ro involved?"
I don’t like it. Kazimir is like this—secretive and a bit sneaky at times. It's why he kept Zora a secret from us for so long. We all learned a hard lesson from that. I know better than to go behind Roman's back. I just don't know how to tell him what I want without him denying me. It's tempting, but I can't do it.
"No," I say. "Maybe at some point, it will become necessary, but I have to do this my way."
