My fingers tightened around the strap of my bag.
“That isn’t your decision.”
His gaze did not change.
“It became my decision the moment you fed her.”
The words struck me harder than they should have.
I looked at the baby tucked against his chest. Her cheeks were flushed now. Her breathing was slow and even. One tiny fist rested beneath her chin.
“She needed help,” I said. “I helped her. That’s all.”
“Nothing is ever only one thing.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means people saw.”
I glanced around the cabin.
The flight attendants had disappeared toward the rear galley. The pilots remained behind the cockpit door. Nikolai’s men watched us without pretending otherwise now.
Three bodyguards.
One near the aisle.
One beside the stairs.
One behind me.
A cage made of tailored suits and calm faces.
Nikolai shifted the baby slightly, supporting her head with a tattooed hand.
“My daughter’s existence is not public knowledge,” he said. “The people who know about her are either loyal to me or useful to me.”
“And what am I?”
His eyes moved over my face.
“I haven’t decided.”
A cold wave passed through me.
I forced myself to breathe slowly.
“I’m getting off this plane.”
“No.”
“You can’t kidnap me.”
His expression remained almost bored, but something flickered in the eyes of the man nearest the door.
Nikolai noticed.
He noticed everything.
“I can,” he said. “But I would prefer that you understand why first.”
“I understand enough.”
“No. You understand fear. Fear is rarely the same as truth.”
I laughed once, a sharp, humorless sound.
“You just told me I can’t go home while three armed men block the exit.”
“They’re not blocking the exit.”
I looked toward the stairs.
The guard stepped aside.
The path was clear.
For one hopeful instant, I thought Nikolai was releasing me.
Then he said, “Walk out.”
I hesitated.
“You’re free to try.”
Something in his voice stopped me.
I looked through the open door.
Beyond the stairs, the airfield stretched toward a chain-link fence. A row of black SUVs waited on the tarmac, their engines running. Farther away, near a service building, two police vehicles sat beneath yellow lights.
I almost moved.
Then headlights appeared beyond the fence.
A dark sedan rolled slowly along the perimeter road.
Nikolai turned his head toward the window.
One of his men touched a finger to his earpiece.
The sedan stopped.
Its lights went out.
The guard beside the door moved so quickly I barely saw his hand reach beneath his coat.
Nikolai looked back at me.
“That vehicle has followed us since London.”
My pulse stumbled.
“That’s impossible.”
