Moving Target (Target #3)(35)

“Don’t make me or you pay for his mistakes,” I add, everything going out of me. “Please. Don’t leave me again.”

He starts to say something, but then shakes his head, muttering in Russian as he leaves my room.

Pausing at the door, he turns to look at me. “This is not easy for me. Make no mistake. I’ve killed for you, lied for you, and defied all logic to keep you safe. Do not put me in the same category as your father, except when it comes to protecting the ones we… value the most.”

“You can’t even say it?” But neither can I. I grow silent while he continues to stare at me, his emerald eyes emotionless.

“There is nothing else to say. Goodbye, Chloe.” He steps out into the hallway. “Find happiness.”

I throw a crystal vase at the door as soon as it closes, but he doesn’t come rushing back in.

Furious, I leap out of bed and get dressed, then head to Konstantin’s office or sitting room, or wherever the hell he is. It’s time we had a real heart to heart.



“Why?” I shout at him “Why would you send him away like that? Why would you use his loyalty to you against him?”

“It’s for the best,” my father says calmly. “It’s the reason why I could never give your mother what she deserved. I don’t want that for you. You don’t understand how it worked, the things that were demanded of me. I wanted to be true to your mother, but my job demanded that my only love be this country. They threatened to kill her, which I thought I could handle, but then you came along, and there was no place I could hide her and an infant, not with my notoriety. I wasn’t thinking straight. I suppose, looking back, I could have faked all of our deaths and started over, but I was desperate. Desperate men are terrible decision makers. So… I did what was best for you and your mother. I loved the two of you more than myself, so I made myself disappear by faking my death and coming back home, where I belonged.”

“I’m sure that made my mother feel sooo much better,” I spit at him.

“She knew.”

I blink at him, my mouth falling open. “What?”

“She knew. She knew all my secrets.”

“And she let you leave?”

Konstantin’s smile is sad. “We loved you more. You had no choice in your parentage. To live a life constantly looking over our shoulders was unacceptable.” He exhales. “But like I said, I was a desperate man at the time. Irrational when it came to death threats against my wife and child. I saw what they’d done to others. I heard the screams and—let’s just say that they would torture the two of you to punish me.”

“I didn’t know that,” I whisper. “That sounds like something out of a movie.”

“Truth is stranger than fiction.” Suddenly, he looks old and weary. Resigned. Defeated. I don’t think he’d let anyone but me—or my mother—see him like this. So vulnerable.

So much like Dima did when he let his guard down with me.

Maybe that was how he showed me his love. Maybe leaving me was the only way he knew as well.

Just like my father. No choice for either of them.

My heart goes out to him, but my anger with his interference at my second chance at love prevents me from feeling too much pity for him.

“I’m not an infant or a toddler anymore. You don’t get to decide what’s best for me. You barely know me at all.” I turn on my heel, intent on marching back to my room. “Because if you did you’d—”

The door opens with a bang… and Dima bursts inside. I think my heart almost bursts open in shock.

“I’m not leaving you.”

“I don’t want you to leave,” I blurt, internally berating myself because I’m angry with him too. “But that’s because you used to live here, and I don’t think you should have to leave because of me.” There. That sounds much better.

And ridiculous.

Dima smirks a little, like he knows what I’m really thinking.

“I’m not leaving.” He turns to Konstantin. “I sat in the drive for thirty minutes, unable to move, and I know it’s because of her. I want to be with Chloe and I refuse to let my loyalty to you stand in the way. My loyalty should be the reason why you approve of us.”

A glimmer of a smile creeps up on Konstantin’s face. “That’s what I wanted to hear. In my day, unless the government was threatening to torture and kill your family, you fought for them.”

At that moment, I feel sorry for Konstantin and what he lost by giving up his family so we could live in peace. “Maybe one day, you will get a chance to see my mom again. I’m sure she’d love it.”

“I don’t know. She might not want to see me. We parted on bad terms, even though she claimed to understand.”

“You never know unless you ask. Just don’t kidnap her. Write her a letter or something,” I caution.

Dima continues to stare at me, his face hard and his eyes determined.

“I’ll leave the two of you alone to work things out,” my father says as he walks out of the room, closing the door behind him.





19





Dmitry

As soon as the door shuts, I stalk Chloe across the room. She finally bumps into a table and grips it with her hands behind her.