LOGINNico's PovA year.I know it's been a year because Lucy calls every anniversary of everything, and she calls this morning to say happy anniversary and I answer from bed and Sasha, who is already up because he is always already up, hears me talking and brings coffee without being asked, which he has done every morning for three hundred and sixty-five mornings and which I have not yet stopped noticing."Tell her the coffee is good," he says."He says the coffee is good," I tell Lucy."That's the most romantic thing he's ever said," she says."I'll tell him.""Don't, he'll stop doing it." She pauses. "How is it. Really."I look at him reading at the other end of the kitchen table. The pen behind his ear. The briefing he's annotating. The untouched cup, second one, always the second one he forgets about."Good," I say. "Really good.""Good," she says, and I can hear that she means it.We walk in the afternoon.That's the thing we do now, when the work allows and the day is mild enough, we
Sasha's Pov The man's name is Renato Amari.He's fifty-one years old, a former parishioner from the priest's original parish in Salerno, and the letter writer, which confirms the name Nico gave me. He isn't a ghost. He's a man with a grievance and a calculated plan and the very specific confidence of someone who believes that proximity to a secret gives him power over the people in it.I find this out in a room off the main corridor, away from the music and the candlelight, with Dima and one of his men present and Renato in a chair that he chose to sit in himself, which tells me he's been planning this moment.He expected Nico.He got me.That seems to recalibrate him slightly."You're the Russian," he says."I am," I say."Where is he.""With people who care about him." I sit across from him. "Which is not a description that currently applies to you, so."He looks at me. He's not frightened yet, which means he still thinks the letter is leverage."The information I have—" he starts.
Nico's Pov I don't tell him everything that night.Not because I'm hiding it. Because I need to carry it alone for a few hours first, to see what it weighs, to understand what it asks of me before I bring it to him. That's what she's been helping me learn the difference between isolation and processing. I'm not shutting him out. I'm just sitting with my own fear first so it doesn't come out sideways.The letter burns in my pocket like fire, but I push it down. Tonight I need Sasha more than I need air. We are in our bed the night before the pre-wedding event. The lights are low. Sasha lies on his back, watching me with dark, patient eyes.I climb on top of him slowly. “Tonight I want to take care of you,” I whisper. “Let me.”He nods once. For the first time in our healing, he lets me lead.I kiss him deep and slow, tongues sliding together while my hands roam over his chest. I feel his heart beating fast under my palm. I reach down and stroke his cock until it is hard and leaking. S
Sasha's PovFederico Vescari is twenty-six years old and has been running a quiet parallel operation inside his own family for fourteen months. That's what the full picture looks like when Dima lays it out on the table Thursday morning. Someone taught him how to build it, which means Federico is not the origin, he's a channel.We already know the origin.Papadis."He's been feeding route intelligence to the Greek faction since before the Karalis proposal," Dima says. "The proposal was partly built on what Federico gave them. They knew the Vescari logistics well enough to design terms your side couldn't absorb without destabilising the Bratva northern agreements."Nico is sitting across the table from me. He's been still since Dima started talking, the particular stillness that isn't calm, that's something held in place."He was at the engagement announcement dinner," Nico says."Yes," Dima says."He toasted us." His voice is completely flat. "He stood up and toasted us."Nobody says
Nico's Pov We find him in two days.A safehouse in the Belyayevo district, registered to a shell company that took Dima's analyst twelve hours to trace. Ground floor, back exit onto a service lane, two men outside who are not particularly good at looking like they're not outside a safehouse.Sasha pulls the car to a stop half a block down."East entrance," he says. "You take it. I'll go through the front when you're in position.""How long.""Three minutes."I check the time. "Three minutes," I say.I get out.The service lane is dark and narrow and smells like wet concrete and somewhere behind me a cat does something in a bin. I move along the wall to the back door and I wait. The two minutes feel longer than two minutes, which they always do when you're standing in a lane by yourself about to go through a door.My phone vibrates once. Sasha's signal.I go through the door.The man is at a table in the main room. Mikhail Petrov, twenty-nine, Bratva auxiliary intelligence, recruited
Sasha's Pov My therapist sends a follow-up note, which she doesn't usually do. Three lines, the gist of it is that what Nico said in the room was the right thing at the right time and that I should let it land rather than filing it and moving past it, which is what I would normally do, which she apparently knows, which means she's been paying attention.I read it standing at the kitchen counter. I put the phone down. I stand there for a moment.Then I let it land.It takes about thirty seconds. It feels like something settling in the foundation. Nothing dramatic. Just a weight redistributing itself into a position it was always supposed to occupy and didn't.Nico comes in, sees my face, says nothing, pours his coffee, and sits down.That's it. That's all.I sit too."Wednesday session or Thursday," he says, meaning which day to book the next one."Thursday," I say. "I have the port authority follow-up Wednesday morning.""Thursday then." He opens his laptop. "Lucy sent forty-seven p
Chapter 61Let's not talk about last night Nico's POV Morning creeps in through the blinds. There is a very delicious ache all over my body. I feel ravaged and kind of happy. But the warmth from hours ago is gone.I snap my eyes open and look around the room.Sasha is not here.When did I even fa
Chapter 60Mark me again Nico's POV The kiss doesn't soften. It detonates.Sasha's mouth crashes against mine like he's trying to punish me for every second we've been apart—teeth scraping, tongue demanding, a low growl rumbling from his chest that vibrates straight through me. My back is still p
Nico's POV The parking lot is still very quiet, except for the low, distant hum of music coming from the party.Sasha is still holding the folder in his hand, almost like he’s still contemplating whether to believe me or not.I don’t blame him. I wouldn’t believe me either. In fact, I wouldn’t giv
58: Don't Get Excited Sasha's POV The parking lot still smells like oil and night air. Nico doesn't move closer, and I don't know why it unsettles me.He stands where he is, one step back, his hands visible, shoulders tense like a man bracing for impact. He doesn't seem concerned. It's more like







