Rough Exile

I unlocked the door again and fled after him, getting the twists and turns right this time, but even my frightened run was no match for Ilya’s angry strides. At one turn, I saw him bump into a maid who almost went sprawling, but he caught her arm and patted her.

“So sorry.”

The woman gave him a frightened smile, and she shrank back as he turned away and kept walking. It was only then that she saw the axe in his hand and she squeaked and ran past me the other way.

“Ilya!” I almost stage-whispered, but he didn’t slow down. Had he not heard me? Maybe I’d said it too quietly, or maybe he was too angry to hear me.

When he got to the office, the door was closed. Ilya tried the knob and when it wouldn’t turn, he backed a few steps and kicked it open.

Vas rose from the visitor chair nearest the door. He stood and turned, still clutching where I’d kneed him. Rage burned in his eyes.

“Don’t even think about trying to save that little bitch from me—”

A chill slid across my skin, and my belly churned. Vas really was going to kill me. Threatening him would put Ilya’s life in danger.

I was three steps away from the door when Ilya brought the axe up and smashed it into Vas’s head.

There was a sound—a scream? Was it me or Vas?

My limbs wouldn’t move.

The second blow came before the man even hit the floor.

Ilya hit him again once he was down, then stopped, chest heaving.

Oh god. Was he alive?

He couldn’t be. His head wasn’t anything close to head-shaped anymore. It was open. Oozing. Blood and chunks of pulpy flesh had splattered Ilya, the carpet, the walls. Bits of it were dripping to the floor from the axe’s lethal edge.

Bile burned the back of my throat, but I swallowed it down.

My husband stood with his back to me.

“Ilya?” I whispered. It seemed loud in the silence.

I reached out to touch him, but hesitated inches away.

He blew out a breath, then turned to look at me, hair wild, gore dripping from his handsome face.

He looked unhinged. Ferocious.

He shook the axe with a quick twitch, shaking off the worst of the gore.

“Why?” I whispered.

“No one hurts my wife.”

He looked like a marauding Viking from a movie, covered in blood, with an axe in his hand. The stench of death filled my nostrils.

“You were supposed to stay in our room.”

“I was afraid he’d kill you.”

He grunted and stalked past me. “Follow me.”

I stayed close, watching behind us, ready to warn him if a guard or one of his brothers showed up.

I did my best not to step in the blood that still dripped from him. He was leaving a noticeable trail.

“Where are we going?”

“To speak to my brothers.”

“Ilya, no. They’re going to call the police. We need to leave.”

“I’m not going to run. You have another husband to keep you warm while I’m in jail.”

God, my heart couldn’t take any more of this. “Stop and think, Ilya.”

He turned to face me. I should have cringed from him, but I didn’t.

“I’ve thought all I need to.” He kept walking. We were in the family wing now, going through the hall outside the family suites. “Family meeting! Now!” He pounded on the doors as he passed them. He shouted in Russian as he kept going, then walked down the stairs, his bare feet silent against the marble.

“Are you going to kill them, too?” I whispered, eyeing the axe in his hand.

He turned an incredulous look my way. “Why would I kill them?”

“You’re still holding your axe.”

“The axe will be in my hand until I’m satisfied you’re out of danger.”

Confused family members wandered into the dining room, freezing as soon as they saw the condition Ilya was in, and the weapon in his hand.

I was still holding the throw tightly around me, but even so, I felt naked, knowing the state my dress was in.

“What did you do?” Alexander demanded.