The Promise (Darkest Lies Trilogy Book 2), Bethany-Kris [top 50 books to read .txt] 📗

bargain with Katina—just let me know he’s okay first. I need to know. The repeated mantra did little but distract Karine from Claire’s fast words to the man on the other end of the phone call.

“Yeah it’s better if he—no, he doesn’t have his phone. He said he left it in New York on purpose,” Claire said, rubbing her forehead with the back of her hand, and pressing her eyes closed. “But, Demyan—”

The darkness came to Karine fast. Just before everything went pitch-black, she felt Masha’s hand on her arm and heard Claire calling her name.

After that, there was nothing.

Nothing but Katina.

Her voice, a sweeping echo.

You shouldn’t have trusted him, Karine. You shouldn’t have trusted anybody.

NINETEEN

Roman rolled through the four-way, driving with an arm hanging out of the window in the dark, a lit cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. He squinted his eyes when the smoke rose up in front of his face, a split second when his attention wasn’t one hundred percent on the road.

Or his gaze, anyway.

His mind was another matter.

Instead of Karine, who always took up all his headspace, but especially when the world was quiet, the person he currently thought of, was Masha.

Rather, the words she said to him earlier. Words she said partly in fear, he knew, and because of the unknown. He didn’t doubt they were still words of truth, though.

He might have been angrier with her stupid need to take a stand, if he didn’t think Masha was right. She wasn’t entirely wrong in saying that Karine was in a different kind of prison now. Just because she liked her new prison and was happy there—well, that didn’t really change what it was.

It wasn’t like Roman wanted to hide her away in Vermont forever. She deserved normalcy in her life.

He wondered what pushed Masha to the edge when she—knowing her place, risking punishment—chose to speak out of turn. Roman wasn’t the kind of monster who would punish her for the behavior, but she didn’t know that.

That’s why he worried.

Did she know something?

Hear something?

Roman wasn’t really paying attention to the road while he drove—the vast freeway bare but for a few sparse cars with headlights they didn’t even bother to dim behind him, or speeding on by. Assholes. Shit, he was already doing twenty over the limit.

At least, he had his new apartment to look forward to.

Finally, a friend of his, connected to another captain in the bratva had procured an apartment Roman could safely hide away in. For a few months, anyway. He was exhausted moving to a different hotel every few days.

He was back to that ... no bed of my fucking own.

Marky was supposed to meet him for a drink when he finally rolled into the city, but he needed to pop over to the apartment first and grab his phone. Not to mention, the damn time.

He didn’t take the phone with him to Vermont because he wanted to disconnect from everything. There were a lot of ways he could be traced, he opted to eliminate as many as he could. It was selfish enough for him to go there in the first place. The very least he could do was lessen the trouble it might bring.

It wasn’t like he was totally disconnected from what was happening outside the bubble he’d created for Karine. The bulls were there—they all had access to phones. His mother always had a direct line to his father.

Not that he expected Demyan to be impressed by his trip, either way. Some shit never changed, right?

So far, his quick jaunt to Vermont had passed smoothly, and he was glad he got to see Karine—even if it was just for a night. What harm had he done, really, even if it was only inspired by his selfish need for him to have her hear the words that had been festering inside him.

But what good would loving her do when she also learned he still hadn’t told her the truth about her father. Maybe next time he would, so for now she could remain blissfully unaware. He, on the other hand, let the guilt gnaw away at the ice in his chest.

That shit had been melting for a while.

Apparently, he had a heart.

Perfect.

At least, it was for her.

Roman reminded himself of that as he tightened his grip on the steering wheel after chucking the cigarette out of the window. He was about to turn up the volume on the stereo touchscreen when he felt his hands lose their grip on the wheel.

All at once.

Time had never slowed for Roman—except for the moment he saw Karine in that pool—but it did right then. It didn’t feel entirely the same, but the sense of impact was still very much real.

A split-second later, his body crashed to the side, and then forward. Straight into the airbag that had already blown. His car spun out of control, metal scraping pavement as glass instantly cracked and shattered all in one go.

It had flipped.

His car rolled.

Roman was already confused.

Somewhere behind the rushing of blood in his splitting ears, a horn blared continuously,

He’d been hit.

Surreal couldn’t quite explain it, but then he lost consciousness, and it didn’t even matter.

• • •

Fuck.

When Roman regained any sense of awareness, the first thing he saw were his hands dragging through the glass of his blown-out windows. There was a brief moment when he actually thought he was dead, but the rapid welling of pain made sure he knew that absolutely wasn’t the case.

The high pitched ringing in his ears made him want to throw up, until he realized ... nope. That was still just his horn blaring. He could scream just from the noise alone, and the pain it caused in his left ear.

No doubt, some damage had been done there.

He hadn’t been moved, still half in, half out the wreckage that had become his driver’s door. He wasn’t sure he could move. It was nothing more than mere luck that he was