I needed to be a realist.
I needed, above all, to keep my shit together.
I had managed this far; I wasn’t going to lose it now.
“Right,” I agreed, taking a deep breath. “I needed that,” I admitted, looking over at him, giving him a nod, the closest thing I could get to a thanks.
“Figured. Come on. I’ll walk you out.”
And then he did.
I drove away from the building with Mackey scratching at my backseat, and a pit nestled in my stomach, something poisonous and seeping, making my whole stomach and abdomen feel acidic and sour.
But, I reminded myself, this was simply how it had to be.
He had his life.
I had mine.
That was just the cold, ugly truth.
I would learn to live with it.
Along with everything else.
TWELVE
Quin
I would die a happy man if I never had to step foot in Russia again.
Forget the careful power dynamic between the law and the criminals. Forget the fact that my Russian was shoddy at best. Forget, even, that when you dealt with these kind of men from this country, you were dealing with the most cold-blooded, ruthless human beings on the planet.
I just never wanted to know this kind of fucking cold again. It seeped into your bones. It made you think you would never be able to get warm again.
Wheels had been down for just under eight hours. It felt longer. It felt like a lifetime that I had been sitting in this goddamn hotel room, waiting for Miller and Kai to get back, waiting for word from Smith that everything was okay. Something. Anything.
The plane ride itself had been torture. Nine hours with nothing to do but think. My team wasn’t a chatty bunch when they were about to head into a job. They needed to get their minds right, going over shit. Especially Miller and Kai who would be on the frontline with wildly dangerous men.
We all were stuck with our thoughts.
And mine, well, they were focused on a gorgeous face with some scrapes and bruises, big, deep blue eyes that went heavy when I was inside her. Even just that thought made my cock try to stir to life right there on the plane.
I didn’t mean for it to go there.
I told myself after the kiss that I had to keep it together, keep it professional. Not because I didn’t want it, but because it was wrong. Her life was upside down and turned around. I was the compass pointing due north. That was it. A woman like her in her right mind would never have chosen to sleep with me.
But it happened.
And I wouldn’t lie.
It was the best I’d ever had.
Her whimpers and moans, her sweet taste, the way she rode me like it was the only thing that mattered in the world, the way she cuddled into me and fell asleep.
It was good.
Every last second of it.
I wanted a repeat.
I wanted several repeats.
That being said, that was all I was good for. Repeats. Not commitment. Not settling down. My life had no roots. Women like Aven needed them to grow and thrive.
I hadn’t been thinking.
I had been living in the fantasy.
And then my real life came banging on the door.
I planned to go back up, to find some words to say, no matter how bad I was at such things, to explain, to, I don’t know… just not fly off to Russia with no explanation.
But when I went upstairs to see her, I found Gunner in her room, stripping the bed.
“Where is she?” I asked, voice a little accusing.
“I advised her to pack up and move on with her life.”
“You said what?” I growled, sure I misheard him. Gunner was an ass at times, but he wasn’t usually intentionally hurtful. And that, well, yeah, that would have hurt Aven.
“Are you in love with her? Is she the game-changer?” he asked, lifting his chin a little. I hesitated, thrown off. These were not the type of words you expected to come from Gunner. “Exactly. So if you don’t love her, and she is not the game-changer, then you need to leave her the fuck alone. She’s been through enough.” With that, he grabbed the linens and moved past me. “Don’t worry; I’ll keep an eye on her.”
He’s lucky he was gone when I turned, or I might have said fuck it to professionalism, hauled off, and hit him.
“He’ll keep an eye on her,” I grumbled under my breath, making Lincoln look over from the document he was studying.
“What was that?”
“Nothing,” I lied, turning away, watching the fur-covered heads move around on the street below me, a fresh coating of snow having fallen right before we arrived. As if the foot or so on the ground already wasn’t enough.
I was hoping this meeting would go well.
I didn’t want to be here any longer than necessary.