Satin Princess(77)

“At one time,” she admits. Then she frowns. “That’s strange.”

“What?”

“Can you see that window up there? The small square one?” she asks, pointing up to the building. “I keep it open all the time. It leads into the bathroom, and I’ve never closed it. But it’s closed now.”

A weird sense of dread spreads through me. Jessa shrugs and moves towards the entrance.

“No,” I growl, grabbing her arm and pulling her back.

“What?”

“Don’t go in.”

“What do you mean?” she asks. “We came all this way to get my stuff.”

“If you didn’t close that window, someone else did.”

She freezes. “You think Marina—”

Her words are drowned out by an impossibly loud bang.

Jessa screams as I engulf her with my body and twist her away from the explosion.

The heat beats down on my back and smoke and debris fill the air. Still huddling over her, I sprint with Jessa across the street.

My ears are ringing, but I start to make out other sounds. Screams, cries, panic.

Then in the distance the sound of approaching sirens.

“Are you okay?” I ask Jessa.

But her gaze is fixed on her building. There’s smoke billowing from a single set of windows.

I don’t have to look to confirm my suspicions: Jessa’s apartment was the only target.





26





JESSA





Everything hurts.

Smoke stings my eyes, my head throbs, and my skin feels hot and prickly. It feels like there is fiberglass in my lungs.

“Oh my God,” I whisper over and over again. “Did that really just happen?”

I feel someone pulling me along, and I look up and see his gray eyes. They seem emotionless on the surface, but I’ve known him long enough to know that he’s furious. Seething, in fact.

“Anton?”

“Are you okay?” he asks, twisting me around so that my back is to the building. So I can’t see my burning apartment.

I can hear sirens in the distance closing in. Then I feel moisture on my cheek. For a second, I think it’s raining. Then I realize it’s a tear.

“Anton,” I say again, even though I have no idea what I’m trying to get out.

“Jessa. Breathe,” he tells me.

He pushes something into my hand. I look down dumbly to see it’s a bottle of water. Where did he even get that from?

“Drink,” he tells me.

I just stand there, too stunned to move. “My apartment…”

“Your apartment is gone now.”

“What about the others?” I ask as the enormity of what has happened sinks in. “My neighbors. Oh my god, Mrs. Harrison. And there’s a couple on the second floor. They have a baby.”

“Look at the building, Jessa,” Anton says, twisting me around again. There’s smoke surrounding the building, pouring into the sky. But it all seems to be coming from one apartment. “Your apartment is the only one that exploded. The others are intact. This was an assassination attempt.”

“Marina,” I whisper.

“Fucking Marina.”

Realization dawns, and I grab Anton’s arm. “If you hadn’t pulled over when I felt nauseous… we’d have been in there when the explosion went off.”

“The timing…” he says under his breath. “She’s watching us. Even now.”

What little sense of calm I managed to find on the drive is completely shattered, along with my hope that this is going to end soon.

We’ve all underestimated Marina and her violent ambitions.

“Let’s go.”

“Let’s go?” I repeat stupidly. “I’m not leaving my apart—”

“Jessa, there’s nothing you can do here. There’s nothing either of us can do. We need to go.”

“Your wife is trying to kill your child,” I whisper as my thoughts turn morbid. “One of these days, she’s going to succeed.”

Suddenly, Anton wraps his arm around my waist and whisks me away from the road towards a row of hedges nearby. He grabs my chin and forces my eyes up to his.

“Listen to me,” he says fiercely. “I know you’re in shock. I know you’re panicking now. But believe me when I tell you that she will not fucking succeed. I will kill that bitch before she ever hurts you.”

“She’s dangerous, Anton.”

“So am I.”

I blink and a tear falls. It feels cool against my hot cheek. “We need to go to the cops.”

“No.”

“Anton—”

“We don’t involve the cops in Bratva business. I will resolve this all soon enough.”

I can see it in his eyes: the promise of murder. Maybe I’ll see him kill her, maybe I won’t. But I get the feeling that I’ll sense it when it happens. One nasty, twisted soul snuffed out of existence.

Can I handle that? It feels like too many shocks to the system in too short a span of time. My hand lands on my belly.

“Is something wrong? Are you having pain?” Anton asks urgently.

I shake my head. “The baby is fine.”