All Chapters of A Prey For My Enemy: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

163 Chapters

The Gift

— Tatiana —Julian rushed toward me the moment the guards gave us space on the terrace. His arms opened like he meant to pull me into him and never let go.“Tatiana, I’m not leaving you here with him. Not one more day.”I stepped back before he could reach me, heart pounding. The wind off the cliffs whipped my hair across my face. “Julian, stop. There is no point in you being here. It was foolish of you to even come.”His expression crumpled. “How can you say that? I came for you.”I glanced toward the shadows near the stone wall, then back at him. “Don’t you care for your life at all? You can help me more from outside. Find out who put the bounty on me. Dig into my father’s enemies. Work your contacts. Kain is far more likely to kill you here than he is to kill me. Just go. Please.”He shook his head, stepping closer again. “I’m not abandoning you. I can’t.”I felt my temper rising. “I don’t want your death on my neck!” I screamed, the words tearing out of me louder than I intended. T

Reverse Bargain

— Tatiana —I stormed into Kain’s office without knocking, chest tight with fury and desperation. The room was dimly lit, monitors casting a cold blue glow across his sharp features. He sat like a king on his throne of shadows, reviewing security feeds, but the moment I entered, every line of his powerful body went rigid.“Let Julian stay,” I demanded, stopping right in front of his desk. “A proper suite. Not some temporary cage you can toss him out of whenever you feel like it.”Kain slowly lifted his gaze. Those pale grey eyes pinned me in place with unnerving intensity. “No.”The single word landed like a gunshot. I slammed my hands on his desk and leaned forward. “He risked everything coming here for me. If you throw him out now, he will try to come back, and we both know you will kill him.”Kain rose to his full, imposing height and rounded the desk with predatory grace. He stopped so close I had to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. The heat rolling off his body made my skin pr

Julian's Questions

— Tatiana—The cold October wind cut straight through my cardigan, turning my cheeks numb and my breaths into pale little clouds that disappeared too fast.Julian’s hand rested against the small of my back, safe and normal.Exactly what I should have wanted after weeks trapped inside Kain’s orbit like some idiot moth with a death wish.I leaned into Julian anyway. I was committed to pretending my brain still worked correctly.“How far does this place actually go?” he asked, glancing toward the massive stone wall disappearing behind the trees.“I honestly don’t know.” I shoved my freezing hands deeper into my sleeves. “Kain only lets me walk as far as the western tree line. There’s a private road past it and he got very intense about me staying away from it.”Julian looked down at me, listening in that focused way he always did. At one point in my life that alone would have made me fall harder for him.His thumb brushed slowly over my knuckles.This was Julian. The boy who smuggled hims

The Almost Confession

— Tatiana —The rain came down so hard it sounded violent. Not rain against glass. Fists. A hundred fists. The cliffs below the mansion disappeared every few seconds beneath silver sheets and then reappeared again like the sea was reconsidering whether it wanted us tonight.I couldn’t sleep.Julian’s question during the day triggered a nightmare. Every time I closed my eyes I saw blood sliding across white plates. My mother’s hand hanging limp beside her chair. My father staring at Kain like he finally understood something too late to matter.So I wandered because apparently that was my new coping mechanism. Trauma and insomnia. The common room was dark except for the storm throwing light through the windows in flashes. Kain stood near the glass in black sweats and a dark shirt, motionless enough to pass for part of the room if you didn’t know better.Turn around. Go back upstairs. He is literally the reason you can’t sleep.Instead I crossed to the sofa and folded myself into the co

Lingerie Counterattack

— Tatiana —The note was in his handwriting.I recognized it immediately from the bookmarks he kept slipping into library books like some deeply repressed Victorian widower. Same mechanical pencil. Same precise pressure. Every letter looked measured before it touched the paper.Wear what you want. It changes nothing.I stood there reading eight words for an amount of time that suggested I had either lost my mind or acquired a fresh mental illness specifically tailored to one emotionally constipated Russian man.He had picked up the lingerie I’d abandoned across the common room like breadcrumbs leading directly to sin. He had gone into my room.He could have shoved into a drawer or thrown it onto the bed. He folded it. Folded it.And then he’d written me a note.It changes nothing.I read the sentence again.I am a reader. A serious one. I understand subtext and unreliable narrators. It changes nothing was, at best, a partial lie.Either Kain Morozov genuinely believed he was immune to

Diamond Earrings

— Tatiana —I had barely finished changing back into soft leggings and an oversized cardigan when a familiar knock sounded at my door. Julian. He came to ask me out on a walk. The earrings were diamonds.Julian handed them to me in the garden, standing beneath the stone arch tangled with dying ivy, his scarf loose around his throat, his expression already arranged into tenderness before I’d even opened the box.“One year,” he said softly. “I couldn’t let it pass without giving you something worthy of you.”The velvet box clicked open between us.The diamonds were elegant in an almost aggressive way, each stone cut so sharply it threw white fire across my skin when I tilted them in my palm. Platinum hooks. Expensive craftsmanship. The sort of earrings that belonged to women in perfume advertisements who had their lives together and definitely never developed emotional fixations on emotionally unavailable Russian men.“They’re beautiful,” I said honestly. Because they were.Julian smil

Fault Lines

— Tatiana —Across the table, Julian let out a soft laugh, the sound easy and polished, but I felt the subtle tightening of his hand where it rested beside his wineglass.Kain’s expression did not change. Candlelight moved across the hard planes of his face, catching briefly on the scar through his brow before disappearing again. He sat back slightly in his chair, one arm draped over the armrest with infuriating calm, like a man discussing weather instead of detonating my dinner.“I am minding my business,” he said evenly. “You are living in my house.”Julian smiled again. Beautifully this time. Almost amused. “Kain, I really don’t think this is an appropriate dinner conversation. Surely I’m allowed to buy my girlfriend a gift without submitting financial records for approval.”“Girlfriend?” Kain repeated.Julian’s jaw flexed once before smoothing out again. “Yes. That’s generally the term for a woman you’ve been with for a year.”Someone, kill me now please. Preferably dissolve me d

Diamond Lies

— Tatiana —Julian held Kain’s gaze for one taut second longer, waiting perhaps for a response that never came.Kain simply sat there, fingers resting loosely beside his untouched wineglass, expression carved from something colder than indifference. The candles flickered between them, soft gold light catching the silver at his temples and the scar near his brow, but none of it warmed him.God, he was impossible.Julian exhaled another quiet laugh, though there was no humor in it now. “Right,” he murmured. “Good talk.”Julian reached for his coat draped over the back of the chair and started toward the door.I shoved my chair back so quickly it nearly tipped. “Julian, wait.”I rounded the table fast, fury climbing so high in my chest it felt difficult to breathe properly.“What the hell is wrong with you?” I snapped at Kain. “Seriously. What is actually wrong with you?”Nothing. No reaction.“You are unbelievable. You don’t even know him!”Grey eyes lifted lazily to mine. “I know enough

Bare Knuckles and Bad Decisions

— Tatiana —I woke up angry. I still wanted to make Kain pay.Julian was the only person who still treated me like I had a voice worth hearing. I haven’t seen him since that night, I could swear he was avoiding me. Can say I blame him. He has taken in so much disrespect for my sake. And now the man responsible for all of it expected me to train with him as if nothing had happened. I just hate him so much.By the time I reached the training room, I had fully decided I wanted to injure him, possibly physically if the opportunity presented itself.Kain stood near the center of the training room. His black compression shirt clung to every carved line of his torso, molding itself to his broad shoulders and the slope of muscle that tapered down to narrow hips. Loose training pants hung low on his waist, the fabric whispering against his thighs with the smallest shift of weight. His feet were bare against the dark mats, toes planted with confidence that made my stomach tighten traitorousl

Chokehold

— Tatiana—“Are we training or are you planning to torment me again first?”“Well,” he said calmly. “Are you planning to follow instructions today?”Our eyes locked in a staring match.God, talking to this man was exhausting. Every conversation felt like accidentally wandering into a hostage negotiation.I pulled my shirt over my head and the fitted tank top I had worn underneath came to light. Kain waited patiently beside the mats.“Today, you learn how to break a chokehold.” He said.“Useful. In case another emotionally repressed billionaire kidnaps me?”His expression did not change. “One arm around your throat from behind,” he continued, stepping closer. “Most attackers pull backward. Panic is what kills people.”How comforting to know.“You panic, you lose oxygen. You lose oxygen, you lose judgment.”“And then?”“Then you die.”A shiver ran through me at his tone. This is exactly why everyone avoids you.Kain stepped behind me. Without notice, our bodies fused together like tw

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