I stayed with my brother as Artem poured another glass, avoiding my eyes.
Where did this leave us? I wasn’t sure. He had shut me out again, not letting me know about his plans, and I had thought the absolute worst about him when I should have had more faith that he wouldn’t hurt me in that way.
I mean, he had pretended to shoot my brother and hadn’t bothered to tell me otherwise until now. What else was going to happen in the future that would have these same implications?
How could I ever trust Artem?
Chapter 15
Artem
I swirled my wine around in my glass as I listened to some bullshit story that my cousin was spouting to the rest of the room. Anytime he drank vodka, he liked to embellish his stories, and this wasn’t any different. Normally I called him out, but after the events of the day, it was exactly what we needed.
What else did I need? I needed my wife. I needed for her not to look at me like I was a fucking monster.
I needed to teach her how to throw a proper right hook. The way she kept flexing her hand throughout dinner told me it was sore as hell.
So was my cheek.
I didn’t know how to fix this between us. I had fucking screwed up, not anticipating that Declan would shoot at me regardless of his son and daughter being present. Because of his dumb ass, I had to show a side of myself to Emma that I never wanted her to see.
I hated my fucking self for what I put her through today, but I hoped it hadn’t hardened her heart against me. She was the very air I breathed, and without her, I was suffocating, trying not to show it, but yeah. I was a fucking mess.
“Well,” Irina yawned. “I’m beat.”
“Me too,” Harvey said, pushing back his chair. “I think I’m done for.”
“Lightweights,” Anatoly grumbled as the two said their good nights and headed to their respective bedrooms. He pushed back his chair, grabbing his jacket. “I’m going out.”
I waited until he was in the elevator before I pushed back my own chair. “Care to take this outside?”
Emma swallowed but grabbed her wineglass and followed me out onto the balcony, where the gas firepit was already blazing against the cool night. I gestured toward the chairs that were there and she sat in one, pulling her legs under her. I sat across from her, placing my wineglass on the ledge of the firepit. I didn’t know how to start this conversation with her, but I wasn’t going to leave until she heard me out. “The moment Declan called me and told me he had Irina, I knew that I would do anything to get her back.”
“You shut me out,” she said quietly, her tired eyes meeting mine. “You didn’t let me in, Artem.”
I blew out a breath. “I know. I couldn’t, Emma. There was too much at stake, and I couldn’t let you get hurt.”
“I was hurt,” she stated, looking away. “You acted like I didn’t even exist. You were so angry, and you wouldn’t even let me help you.”
She was right, of course. I had shut her out as I threw together a plan, not wanting to have her know what was going on. She wouldn’t have gone for it, but what I did wasn’t right. She was my wife, and I hadn’t treated her like one. “I didn’t know how to pull in what was happening, Emma,” I answered. “I couldn’t even fucking see straight.”
“You hurt me.”
I sighed. “I know, and I will spend the rest of my days making it up to you.”
She unfurled her legs and stood. “I need to think.”
Fuck. “Of course,” I said tightly. “Take the master bedroom. It’s yours anyway.” Everything I fucking had was hers, and I would willingly lay it at her feet if it meant that she would let me off the hook this time. I had hurt her. I had made her think that her brother, her fucking brother, was dead and that I had killed him even though I had promised not to harm her family.
I was the asshole in her life. I was the monster she had accused me of being, and for the first time in a long while, I didn’t want to look myself in the mirror.
She walked back inside, and I dropped my head back, looking up at the star-filled sky. Never in my life had I given a shit about anything. If this had been anyone else today, I wouldn’t have even given it a second thought.
But the way Emma had screamed was going to stay with me for a long time. I had caused her that pain. I had made her call me a monster, hit me, tell me she never wanted to see me again.
I knew I had made her question her love for me, but she would never know how fucking hard this had been for me today. It wasn’t an excuse by any means, but I had hurt every time she had.
The conversation with her brother had been short, but he had gotten the gist of what I needed.
“Um, yeah, I can do that, I guess. Does Emma know about this plan?”
I sat in the car, waiting for Emma to be escorted down from our suite. I knew she was pissed at me. I knew I was hurting her, but I didn’t know what else to do. Declan had my sister. Emma’s own life would be in the balance if I let her in on the plan. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t. I had to be the fucking asshole she had never seen, pushing her away to keep her safe.
I couldn’t let her go back to her fucking father. Not now, not when I had just found everything I needed in her. She thought I would be willing to trade her for my sister, and while I loved my sister, I wasn’t about to give up my wife either. Emma was the future that I wanted, the one I didn’t know I needed. She would be the mother of my children, the woman who helped me through life when it got too fucking hard, like it was now. “No,” I told him. “She doesn’t know, and I want to keep it this way.”
Harvey whistled. “Yeah, that’s not a good idea, man. Listen, she loves you. She can handle it.”
“No, she fucking can’t,” I shot back. “I can’t put her in this. It’s better that she doesn’t know this plan.” I didn’t want to keep it from her, but the moment I told her what was going down, I was injecting her into a situation she might not be able to handle. I wasn’t going to let Emma be hurt by anyone, but if she had to be, then it might as well be me.
“Okay whatever,” Harvey sighed. “Just know she’s going to be pissed when she finds out the truth. I hope you can talk her out of beating your ass, man.”
Harvey had been right. Emma had been pissed, but I never meant for the decoy to be killed either. When Declan had tried to shoot me, I had to improvise. I had to make shock value happen so that I could get my sister and Emma away from the danger.
Shooting the decoy hadn’t been my finest moment. If I could do it all over again, I would have had the real Harvey in the fucking car so Emma wouldn’t have had to live through the pain I caused, and she would have understood immediately that her brother was alive and well instead of having to think that he wasn’t.