Page 65 of Forced Bratva Bride

“Get Maxim on the line, let him know what happened. He must get to the second location and meet with our allies. He needs to explain to them what happened and convince them that we're not involved in all this shit. They need to understand that he just saved their lives.”

Fyodor is dialing Maxim on speaker and pacing up and down the room. All of us have our eyes locked on him as we sit in silence, listening to the phone ring.

“Fyodor. What happened?”

“There was an explosion, as we expected. You have to get to the new location and—"

“I have to go home. My team just let me know that Stefano escaped.”

“Fuck,” Fyodor mutters.

“It must have been him,” Paval snaps.

“We have to get back to the scene and get that evidence before anyone else finds it,” Kiril says.

“Agreed. We have to go now. The meeting is going to have to wait.”

Through the speaker, Maxim’s voice interrupts their conversation. “Guys, I have no idea what's going on there on your side, but I have to go and find Stefano.”

“No problem, we have things covered. Go.”

Fyodor hangs up the phone and the brothers all stand. “Let’s get to the warehouse. We have to move fast. It might not be the only device that was planted to implicate us.”

“What about the meeting?” I ask, feeling overwhelmed by everything that's going on.

“We can’t worry about that now. Maxim will call later and apologize and reschedule.”

The brothers start talking between themselves, and I shake my head. We can’t just leave the clients stranded there without knowing what is happening. I study their preoccupied faces.

In that moment, I decide I'll go to the meeting. They're busy with things that are too important to interrupt, and Maxim is chasing after Stefano. I can handle a business meeting. I know what the plan was, and I can fill in for Maxim.

I leave the room, heading out to my car. “Where are you going?” Paval asks.

“To the second meeting location,” I say, as calmly as I can manage.

“You can’t do that—"

“I can, and I'm going to. You guys have to deal with everything else, but we can’t lose these clients. I can do this. Trust me.”

Paval’s face tightens for a moment, but then his intense gaze relaxes. “Fine. Stay in contact.”

“I will,” I say with relief. I expected him to fight me on it, and I feel quite pleased that he has enough faith in me to let me do this, though I guess at the same time he didn’t really have much choice. It had to be Maxim or me since it's my father’s client.

“Chiara,” he calls as I duck into the car.

“Yes?”

“I mean it. Stay in contact with me.” The seriousness in his expression catches me off guard. Is he concerned about me?

Then he disappears and I shake myself into action, heading toward the arranged location of the real meeting.

It doesn’t take long before I arrive and park my car outside. I lean over to grab my handbag, but my attention snaps to the driver’s door as it gets yanked open.

I scream as someone drags me out of the car and a hood is thrown over my face.

I kick and scream again and a hand clamps over my mouth.

“Who the fuck is this, I thought we were meant to capture a guy?”

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