The engine purred deep beneath the hood, a low, steady sound, obsessively controlled, seeping into the bones and making the armored body of the Mercedes G-Class vibrate—black as sin and just as uncompromising. It was the kind of vehicle built for power, for dominance, for nights where weakness had no place—exactly like this night.
I was driving too fast. I knew it perfectly well. I felt the asphalt racing beneath the wheels and the tension tightening my muscles, but I didn't have the slightest urge to slow down.
Alla sat rigid in the passenger seat, her back stiff, her hands clenched in her lap as if that simple gesture were the only thing keeping her together. She was shaking—not from the cold; the air inside the car was warm, almost suffocating—but from shock, from raw, paralyzing fear, from having been torn without warning out of her life and thrown onto the seat of a man she didn't know, but whom instinct warned her to avoid.
A stranger.
The word scraped through my thoughts and I clenched my jaw, feeling the anger rise slowly, dangerously, along my spine.
I tried to calm myself, to put my thoughts in order, because I was not the villain in this story—no, however easy it would have been to step into that role. The real monster was the one who had exploited her mercilessly for years, the one who had broken her will and taught her to be afraid.
Asan.
I wanted to turn the car around just to make sure, personally, that he was no longer breathing.
Anger throbbed at my temples, intensifying the headache that had been tormenting me for hours. Lost cargo. My men shot on Russian territory. A compromised shipment. Ivar the Russian beside me in that filthy bar, calm and razor-sharp, explaining that Moscow does not forgive mistakes. I should have already been on my way to the airport.
And yet, none of that mattered now.
Because the girl beside me smelled of fear and cold sweat.
I shot her a brief glance. Too pale. Her lower lip slightly cracked. A scratch on her arm. My stomach tightened in a way that had nothing to do with business.
"Are you hurt?" I asked, my voice coming out harsher than I intended.
She flinched.
That hit me harder than any bullet.
I had sworn long ago that I would never be the kind of man women were afraid of. I had grown up surrounded by women who bowed to no one. My mother. My aunt. My grandmother. All tough. All upright. All with clear rules about what a real man meant.
Asan had broken every one of those rules.
I despised him.
And yes, I was a killer. I had no illusions about myself. But I had limits. Especially when it came to women who had never asked to be caught in our filth.
Alla wasn't afraid of me.
She was afraid of something much older.
I could tell by the way she breathed—short, controlled, as if she'd learned long ago that noise brings pain. By the way she avoided taking up space. By her eyes, too large for her drawn face.
Trauma. Deep.
Worse than it had first appeared.
I remembered her dance—the way her body moved naturally, almost hypnotically, as if the music flowed through her veins and not just through the speakers—and the way every man in the room watched her with shameless greed, desire hanging in their gazes like a filthy promise. I felt again how my attraction, from the very first moment, had mixed with something darker, harder to control—an instinctive, violent possessiveness that had nothing romantic about it and everything to do with danger.
The fact that she had been desired by others, watched, imagined in ways that did not belong to them, stirred brutal, primal impulses in me—instincts I didn't bother denying.
Mine.
I had paid two million dollars to take her out from under Asan's control, a sum that, for me, meant neither salvation nor mercy, but a calculated, cold move—an investment made with a clear head.
Not altruism.
And now the problem became simple and, at the same time, uncomfortably clear: what the hell was I going to do with her?
Because I had to leave for Russia. Urgently. Business didn't wait, the dead didn't bury themselves, and Moscow was not a city that tolerated delays. And the moment that thought crossed my mind, the truth settled into place—solid and inevitable.
Alla was coming with me.
Whether she wanted to or not was completely irrelevant.
"I live on… Street—" she said suddenly, her voice breaking halfway through the sentence, as if speaking the address itself were an anchor, the only thing she could cling to in order not to disappear completely.
I shot her a brief glance, then laughed—a short, dry sound, stripped of any trace of amusement, that filled the car more heavily than silence ever could.
"No, little love," I said calmly, almost gently. "You're never going back there."
She turned toward me abruptly, and in her eyes there was no longer just fear, but confusion too—distrust, a spark of rebellion only just beginning to take shape.
"What… what do you mean?"
I kept my eyes on the road, my hands steady on the wheel, as if we were talking about something trivial, without consequences.
"I mean that place stopped existing for you the moment you got into my car. The sooner you come to terms with it, the less it'll hurt. You're mine now. We're going to Russia tonight."
Her breath caught for a moment, then the fear slowly—almost painfully—turned into anger.
"You can't do this," she said through clenched teeth. "You don't have the right to decide for me. I'm not an object."
I smiled crookedly and let out a short laugh from my chest.
"Yes, I can. And yes, I do have that right. I paid dearly for it."
"You don't understand," she went on, her voice rising. "I need my documents. My clothes. My life is there."
"Your documents won't be of any use to you," I said without turning my head. "We're flying on my plane. You don't need a passport when you travel with me."
She fell silent for a second, then clasped her hands together in desperation.
"Then… then at least let me see Elena. She's my sister. I can't leave without knowing she's okay."
"No."
The word dropped between us—heavy, final.
"Please," she whispered, and that tone, loaded with fear and wounded pride, irritated me more than screaming ever could. "Just a few minutes."
"No," I repeated. "Not now. Not like this."
Her eyes filled with tears, but she didn't let them fall. She held them there, burning, refusing to give me the satisfaction of weakness.
A fighter. Exactly the kind of woman who survives, no matter how deep the pit you throw her into.
I exhaled slowly, reining in my nerves.
"Listen to me carefully, Alla. I'll take care of your sister. I'll send someone for her. She'll be moved somewhere safe. No one will touch her."
"And why should I believe you?"
For the first time, I looked directly at her.
"Because if I'd wanted to hurt you, you wouldn't still be here."
She studied me for a long moment, trying to read between the lines, to find the lie.
"I swear," I added, slowly, deliberately.
I wasn't the kind of man who swore often—and she sensed that.
I pressed the accelerator, and the city began to dissolve into the lights of the night.
If Alla didn't come to terms with her fate on her own, I would make her accept it.
One way or another.