Page 12 of Maksim

I continue creeping her way.

“Stop or I’ll shoot!” she yells, growing panicky. She either agrees that she needs me, or she’s lost the nerve to end a life.

I don’t respond, nor do I slow my pace. I want to see if she’ll do it, if she’ll pull the trigger.

Her face pinches with anger as she points the gun just to the right of my head and clicks, trying to fire off a warning shot. Her eyes widen as soon as the click sounds, and she backpedals, horrified that her metal friend failed her.

“No!” she screams when I chase her down, securing her in my arms and squeezing until she stops thrashing. The gun falls on the dirt, adding to the dust cloud she’s creating.

“Enough,” I growl in her ear. “Stop fighting.”

“Please,” she cries, thick tears streaming down her rosy cheeks. “Te lutem mos me vrit.”

“Ya ne govoryu albanskiy.” I don’t speak Albanian. I say it in my native tongue just to be a smartass.

“Please don’t kill me.”

My hold on her slackens as she crumbles in my arms, whispering things in her language I don’t think are intended for me anyway. Before I realize what I’m doing, my hand rubs over her back to soothe her.

I have many more reasons to kill her now than I did when I parked my car. My side is bloody, my nose is bloody, my head is bruised. My ego hurts most of all.

But I don’t think I’ll kill her. Not now that she’s useful.

It was probably a bad idea to begin with, trying to get out of Nikita’s cruel game. If I don’t allow him to punish me now, he’ll find something worse.

“I’m assuming you do, in fact, know how to drive?”

“Yes,” she replies meekly.

I pull away from her and rip my shirt over my head, then I inspect my wounds for a moment before pressing the cloth to the holes seeping blood.

“Do you know how to use a GPS?”

She nods, hope brewing in her irises, a pretty golden brown I’m just noticing.

“Good.”

She just stares at me, perplexed, waiting for me to go on. I don’t blame her. There are so many unknowns for her, the biggest one being if she’s going to keep breathing for long. Her head must be ready to explode.

I can’t answer her questions. I have too many of my own.

Blowing out a breath, I hold out my hand as a sort of truce that I hope she understands. A sort of, let’s not kill each other for now, agreement.

She hesitantly takes my hand and allows me to shake once before I let go. “I’m Maksim,” I say, nodding to signal it’s her turn.

She crosses her arms over her chest as if the desert heat has any kind of chill in the summertime. Finally, she speaks.

“Elira.”

4

ELIRA

The blond-haired devil passed out fifteen minutes ago.

Every now and then, I look over to make sure he’s breathing, and he is, steadily. Sometimes I’m relieved. Sometimes I’m disappointed. Sometimes I wonder why I haven’t pushed him out of the car and driven somewhere safe.

But I know the answer. There isn’t anywhere safe. These people, they could find me, they could find James, and then it’ll be his body in the ground along with mine. The only way to keep him safe is to not call, but without help… They would find me before the sun came up. And if I let Maksim die, I’m terrified of what my death would look like.