I stand in the doorway, watching Rowan sleep.
She didn’t even make it under the covers. Just collapsed on top of the bed, still wearing my shirt, her body finally surrendering to exhaustion after everything she’s been through.
Everything I put her through.
Her face is peaceful now. The cut on her cheek has stopped bleeding, but the angry red line remains—a permanent reminder of how close we came to something much worse.
I should leave. Give her privacy. There are a dozen calls I need to make, arrangements that won’t wait.
Instead, I find myself moving closer.
Her hair fans across the pillow, tangled and still spotted with debris from the crash. One hand curls near her face, fingers bent like she’s reaching for something even in sleep.
I’ve seen countless women in my bed over the years. Beautiful women. Powerful women. Women who knew exactly what they were getting into with a man like me.
None of them have affected me like her.
None of them have made me question everything I’ve spent my life building.
It’s fucking infuriating.
I reach down, brushing a strand of hair from her forehead. She doesn’t stir. Her breathing remains deep and even.
“What am I going to do with you?” I murmur, though I know she can’t hear me.
The cut on her cheek makes my stomach clench with a rage I’m not accustomed to controlling.
I’ve felt anger before. This is different. This is white-hot and chaotic. This makes me want to burn the whole fucking world down for daring to harm her.
I pull the throw blanket from the foot of the bed and carefully drape it over her. She sighs in her sleep, turning toward the warmth.
Quietly, I leave the room, closing the door behind me.
In my office, I pick up the secure phone and dial.
“It’s me,” I say when Arkady answers. “I need a security detail at Rowan’s apartment building. Four men minimum. Around the clock surveillance.”
“Already in place,” Arkady replies. “Sent them the moment we dropped you off.”
I nod, even though he can’t see me. “Good. And the hospital?”
“Two men outside her mother’s room. Another two patrolling the floor. The staff thinks they’re private security hired by the family.”
“They are now,” I say. “Make sure they know to be discreet. The mother doesn’t need to be alarmed.”
“Understood. What about you? How’s our little witness holding up?”
I move to the window, looking out at the city stretching below. “She’s sleeping.”
“And when she wakes up? You think she’ll run straight to the cops?”
“No.” The answer comes without hesitation. I’m not sure when I became so certain of her loyalty, but I am. “She won’t talk.”
“How can you be sure?”
Because she looked at me with those green eyes, even after watching me kill a man, and said she wasn’t afraid of me.
Because she could have run a dozen times and didn’t.
“I just am,” I say instead.
Arkady sighs. “This is a complication we don’t need right now, Vin. Between your father’s ultimatum and the Solovyov situation—”
“I’m handling it,” I cut him off.
“Are you? Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you’re getting—”
“Don’t say it.”
“—attached,” he finishes anyway.
“She’s an asset,” I reply, too quickly. “Nothing more.”
“Bullshit.”
I close my eyes, fighting for control. “What’s your point?”
“My point is, your father already thinks she’s a distraction. After tonight, he’s going to see her as a liability. A weak point in your armor.”
“She’s under my protection now. That’s non-negotiable.”
“And if your father objects?”
My hand tightens around the phone. “Then he’ll have to go through me.”
Arkady whistles low. “You really are in deep.”
“I’m not—” I stop. What’s the use in denying it? “Just make sure the security details know their orders. No one touches her. No one approaches her without my direct authorization.”
“Understood, pakhan.”
The title is only half-joking.
I hang up and move to the bar, pouring myself a generous measure of vodka. The familiar burn does nothing to quiet the storm inside me.
I pull up the security feed on my phone, checking the cameras outside my penthouse, in the elevator, in the lobby. All clear. No suspicious activity.
Next, I access the feed from Rowan’s apartment building. My men are in place—one in the lobby, one across the street, two more in a parked car with a clear view of all entrances.
I tap another icon, bringing up the hospital feed. Her mother’s room is secure, the hallway empty except for the occasional nurse.
It’s not enough.
It will never be enough.
I down the rest of my drink and step to the window, staring out at the city without really seeing it. My reflection stares back at me—disheveled, bloodstained, eyes darker than usual. I almost don’t recognize myself.
That’s the effect she has on me. Turning me inside out. Making me reckless. Making me weak.
I should send her away as soon as she wakes up. Put her on a plane to somewhere far from New York.
Far from the Bratva.
Far from me.
It would be the smart move. The safe move.
But the thought of her gone—of never seeing those green eyes flash with defiance or watching her teeth worry at her lower lip when she’s nervous—makes something in my chest constrict painfully.
I’ve taken lives without hesitation. I’ve ordered executions with a nod. I’ve walked away from burning buildings without looking back.
Yet somehow, the thought of walking away from her is un-fucking-thinkable.
