Savage Hearts (Queens & Monsters #3)(78)

And I can’t stop looking out the windows. Moscow at night is a glittering fairy tale of lights, people, and movement. It seems larger than San Francisco by a factor of ten.

Mal takes my hand and squeezes it. “What are you thinking?”

“There’s no snow.”

“We’re not in the mountains anymore.” After a beat, he says, “What else?”

How well he can read me. When I look down at my hands, he wraps an arm around my shoulders and pulls me against his side, lowering his head to murmur, “What else, malyutka?”

I lean my head against his shoulder and close my eyes. “Everything else.”

He kisses my forehead gently. I’m glad when he doesn’t say more.

The drive to his home from the airport lasts under thirty minutes, but by the time we get there, I’m a nervous wreck. Even the incredibly beautiful views of the city passing by the windows can’t distract from my panic.

I feel frazzled and strung out, like I’ve had way too much caffeine. After the tranquility of the woods, everything is too loud, too close, too bright. My heart is palpitating.

We pull into the parking garage of a glass tower and stop in front of a bank of elevators. Four hulking men in black suits step forward. One of them opens my door, another one rounds the back of the car and opens Mal’s.

He doesn’t need to instruct me to stay put. My intuition tells me there are rules here, new rules I’m not aware of. The primary one being follow his lead.

Mal exits the Phantom, walks around to my side, and holds out his hand.

The men in suits step back to form a line in front of the elevators. Hands clasped behind their backs, faces impassive, they look off into the distance.

I take Mal’s hand and step out, feeling shaky. He curls his big hand around mine to steady me.

One of the men in black presses a call button for the elevator, then goes back to pretending to be a statue.

When the doors slide open and Mal and I walk past the men, all of them bow in unison.

I wait until the doors slide shut and the elevator starts moving before I say, “What the heck was that?”

He says simply, “Respect.”

“Are those your bodyguards?”

“I don’t have bodyguards.”

“Why not?”

He slants me a look.

“Oh. Right. You’re the guy other people need bodyguards for.”

He looks at me for a moment, his eyes half-lidded, then takes me by the arm and pulls me against his chest. He cradles my head in his hands and kisses me.

It’s a firm kiss, but not a passionate one.

It’s a kiss that tells me to calm down. That he’s in control, and I have nothing to worry about.

That he won’t let anything bad happen to me.

I drop my forehead to his chest and heave a sigh. “Thank you.”

“You needed that.”

“Yes.”

“I know.”

Despite my jangling nerves, I smile. “So what happens now?”

“Now we get you settled, then I go to work.”

Work. So much violence contained in so few letters.

The elevator slows to a stop. The doors slide open. Mal takes my hands and leads me into the foyer of a dark apartment. The view of the city through the floor-to-ceiling windows lights up the space in a ghostly glow.

“Holy shit.”

“You like it?”

I don’t know if I like it exactly, but it is beautiful, so I stick to the positive. “It’s incredible.”

He leads me through a living room, empty except for a giant black sectional sitting in front of a big-screen TV on the wall. We pass an open space that seems like it’s supposed to be a dining room, but it’s also empty. Then we’re in a kitchen, a vast echoing space of white marble and glass, as sterile as an operating room.

Mal flicks on a light, illuminating the kitchen. It’s so bright, my eyes water. He walks to the stainless steel fridge and opens the freezer door. Inside, dozens of identical boxes of frozen dinners nest side by side. He removes two and tosses them onto the counter.

“Are you hungry?”

Without waiting for an answer, he tears open a box, removes the plastic tray from inside, turns to the microwave above the sink, and pops it open. He sets the timer and closes the door.

When he turns back to me and sees me standing there, looking lost, he abandons the other box he was about to open and comes to me.

Murmuring something in Russian, he wraps his strong arms around me and squeezes.

I whisper, “I’m okay.”

“You’re not.”

“I will be.”

“What do you need?”

“I don’t know.”

“Think about it.”

I do, for several long minutes while he holds me, stroking a hand over my hair, his lips pressed to my temple.

I exhale and close my eyes. With my cheek resting against his chest, I say, “It’s just…weird.”

“Keep going.”

“This place. Those frozen dinners. It’s beautiful, but everything is very cold here.”

“I’ll keep you warm.”

He takes my jaw in his hand, tilts my head up, and kisses me.

This is a different kiss than in the elevator. It’s deeper, more emotional, and ten times as hot. I cling to him, trembling, as his tongue sweeps against mine and his mouth turns my body to liquid fire.