Bound to the Beast: Russian Hitman Romance by Ada Stone Page A

would need for the baby.
     
    He couldn’t know, but then why was he here?
     
    I sucked in a quick breath, then let it out, trying to stay calm. Forcing myself to keep walking to the door, I refused to make eye contact with him, unlocking the door casually. “What are you doing here?” I asked, opening the door.
     
    Without any prompting from me, he strode inside first, looking around my dingy little apartment. Instantly, I felt embarrassed. I remembered still what his luxurious apartment had looked like and he must be utterly disgusted by the way I lived. At the very least, it was neat and picked up, so he wouldn’t think I was just a total slob.
     
    “When was the last time you saw your brother, Susanna?” he asked, completely ignoring my question.
     
    I blinked at him. My brother? “What?”
     
    He rounded on me and I was startled by the intensity of his eyes. Quickly I looked away before I got caught in their spell. “Your brother. Christopher. When was the last time you saw him?”
     
    How does he know Chris? Oh, god, did I sleep with one of my brother’s friends? I didn’t think so, but I couldn’t come up with any other reason for why Alexei would know Christopher. “Um, a while. He’s out of state right now.”
     
    Alexei frowned at me, his thick brows pulling together, creating a crease between them that was troubling and still sexy at the same time. I tried not to think about the strange craving I had for him, just as strong as the first time we’d ever met.
     
    “Out of state,” Alexei repeated flatly. “He hasn’t been here?”
     
    I shook my head. “No, I mean, not for a while anyway. He had to leave town for a job or something.” I shrugged my shoulders. My brother was a carpenter, sort of. Mostly, he was a jack of all trades. He’d do a little bit of anything for some extra cash, which meant he was never really good at any one thing. But, he could half-ass just about anything. I guessed that was something.
     
    “A job.”
     
    “Why do you keep repeating everything I say? What are you doing here?”
     
    Finally, Alexei seemed to focus. He was troubled still, serious in a way he most definitely wasn’t the first night we met, but he seemed to have decided something for himself as he locked gazes with me. “Your brother isn’t out of state doing a job,” he told me, his voice low and deep and laced with that accent that I loved so much. “He’s running.”
     
    My mouth dropped open a little. “Running? From what?”
     
    “From who. And the who is important only because it is a very powerful man who will do very bad things to anyone who crosses him.”
     
    I almost felt like laughing. A powerful man? What, like a mob boss or something? Was this man some sort of gangster, Capone style? That was ridiculous! My brother was kind of a screw up sometimes, but he was family and I knew he had a good heart. He would never get involved with some sort of dangerous mobster. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. My brother is a carpenter —”
     
    “A carpenter who was hired by this powerful man to do a job. He failed in that job and then he stole a lot of money. This man wants his money back.”
     
    At this, I did laugh. It was a short bark that wasn’t wholly sincere, but it was all just too much. It sounded like a bad plot to some B-grade heist movie! My brother wasn’t capable of pulling anything like that off. But then I saw that Alexei’s expression hadn’t changed. He looked just as serious—no, grave—as he had a moment ago.
     
    He was being serious.
     
    A shiver ran through me, all of the laughter instantly sucked out of me. I felt cold and worried and suddenly I knew that Chris was in a lot of trouble. Bad trouble.
     
    But I wasn’t ready to accept it. Not from this man who had used me and left me and then haunted my dreams and desires. No, not from him. My brother was fine . This was all some huge misunderstanding. “Get out.”
     
    Alexei’s