Page 35 of Malevolent King

He hauled me up, and precious seconds ticked by as I tried to help, but I swung powerlessly as his superior strength hauled me over the edge of the railing.

He pulled me into his arms as the entire metal railing shifted to the side, detaching from the wall. The screech was deafening. We fell hard to the floor.

I clamped my trembling hands over my ears, squeezing my eyes shut, as I lay in a ball.

After a moment, when the world didn’t fall away under me, I realized that he’d done it. Somehow, against all odds, Nikolai had pulled us inside just in time.

I opened my eyes, searching for him, only to find his gray gaze fixed on me and his arms strong around me. I knew in my bones I’d remember the look in his eyes for the rest of my life.

Then he was wrenched away from me. Twisted and pressed to the floor. His gaze stayed on me, his head in my direction, his neck turned sharply, his body prone on the scratchy carpet. At least three De Sanctis men had guns trained on him, and another was tying his hands together at the small of his back with zip ties.

“Got you this time, Chernov. If the boss was going easy on you before, that’s over now.” One of the men chuckled.

I recognized him as one of Silvio’s men.

He dug his knee into Nikolai’s spine and leaned forward. “Welcome to Hell.”

11

NIKOLAI

When I was a boy, ripped from my homeland by my all-powerful, uncaring father, my mother and I lived in a cabin in the Pennsylvania woods. “Cabin” was a mild word for the huge, wooden mansion he’d stowed us in. But regardless of the number of empty rooms and modern conveniences, my mother, Irina, had recognized it for what it really was. A cage.

It hadn’t dawned on me that we were Viktor Chernov’s prisoners until I came home from playing in the woods one day and found my mother swinging from the shower rail. She had been fond of telling me, “Niko, it’s better to die than do nothing.”

That day, I learned that sometimes, dying is doing something.

Since then, I’d lived in darkness. It was a hard thing to find out as a child that the only person you loved in the world didn’t mind leaving you. It was a hard thing to accept that you weren’t worth holding on to. In the end—or in my case, from the beginning—I learned that everyone was alone. I guessed I was ahead of most other people, learning it as young as I had.

After she’d died, I roamed the woods. I slept under the bare sky, with only the stars as my companions, until Viktor sent for me to join him in New York. The days of innocence and starry, unspoiled skies were over for me by the age of fifteen. I would never, ever get them back.

The smellof the basement was the first thing that hit me as I slowly rose from a dark lake of unconsciousness. Damp stone and festering rot. A place full of earthy, hidden things, and now, it seemed, my new home. My wrists burned where they’d been tied, and the floor was freezing beneath me.

The previous events rushed back to me. Was it a few hours ago or days? I had no idea. Everything was murky.

One memory rushed back faster than others. The sight of Sofia falling over the fire escape and the terror that had burned through me. I’d felt nothing like it since I’d gotten home from the woods and found my mother’s body swinging from the shower rail. The day my childhood had ended.

I jerked against my restraints as a shoe scraped on hard concrete beside me.

I wasn’t alone.

“Bravo. He’s waking up,” a deep voice called to the side of me.

“That’s quick. He has some resistance to the sedative,” another male voice, this one steadier, replied.

I tried to blink my eyes open, and then I felt it. A blindfold was pressed against my eyes, pushing my eyelids shut. A dim light showed around the corners, but it was all I could make out. I was no stranger to being tied up and taken somewhere hellish. I’d made a career out of it.

Clearly, Antonio had learned from his mistake and wasn’t taking any chances with me this time.

There was a shuffling noise before me. The two soon-to-be-dead men discussed what was going to happen to me with amused voices. Right. Now I remembered. These were De Sanctis’ men, and they had me trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey. I’d no doubt pissed them off with my escape attempt.

A sharp kick connected with my side, and I gritted my teeth.

A chuckle floated to me. “Does that hurt, you bratva swine? Anything you want to ask?”

“Yeah, do either of you guys have a smoke?” My insolent question was met with outraged silence, and then the kicks began again.

When the pair of lackeys tired themselves out, they let out exhilarated laughs, high on the thrill of spilling another man’s blood. A tied-up, defenseless man, at that.

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