Page 59 of Used By the Bratva

That’s the only explanation I have. I would think the boy is one of Leon’s cousins, but he looks nothing like Maxim.

I look at the photo again and notice how Leon has put his arm over the third little boy's shoulder and is leaning closely into him.

I put the picture back in its sleeve as the door opens. My spine stiffens, but I know it’s pointless to hide the album.

Leon stops in his tracks. “What are you doing?”

I turn to him, and my stomach tightens into a tight knot. “I saw you sitting on the terrace the other night with this album. I wanted to know what you were looking at.”

He clears his throat, walking over to the bed. “Why?”

“I thought I might find some more information about your family that you haven’t shared with me. And maybe something about me, too. Leon, I need to know more.”

“So, you decided to snoop around instead of just asking me?” His voice is hollow as he sits beside me on the bed and stares at the album in my hands.

“I am sorry. I know you don’t want to talk about the past, but it’s time.” I turn the picture to him and try to lighten the mood. “Look how cute your little chubby cheeks were back then. What happened to you?”

He snorts and rolls his eyes as he moves closer to me. “I've become ruggedly handsome.”

“Well, maybe you’re right about that.”

He can’t look me in the eye even if he jokes with me. There’s a sadness that makes me feel like I’m looking into a bottomless pit in the middle of the ocean.

There is so much despair that I wonder if he will ever let me in, but I’m not giving up now.

My heart aches for him as I lean against his side and put the album down to take his hand in mine. “Who was the third boy in the picture? I know the other one was Sergey, but there was a third one I didn’t recognize.”

His Adam's apple bobs up and down. “That’s my younger brother, Pavel.”

“Why wasn’t he at the wedding?” I ask softly as my thumb glides over his scarred knuckles. “I've met many of your family, but not him.”

Leon takes a deep breath; his shoulders slump inwards.

For the first time since I've known him, Leon looks like a man who has experienced the worst that life has to offer over and over again. The lines on his face seem more profound than ever as he kicks off his shoes and flops back onto the bed.

He pulls his hand out of mine and digs the heels of his hands into his eyes. “Your father killed him fifteen years ago.”

The urge to throw up rises quickly. I hold a hand over my mouth, forcing the bile back into my mouth as I jump up. My vision blurs as I look at my husband on the bed. His eyes are a million miles away as he folds his arms over his chest.

“My … my father?” I stammer in utter disbelief.

Leon sits up, gets off the bed, and paces from one side of the room to the other. “You were born Natalya Reyes to a man named Antonio Reyes. He was the bastard who killed my brother. He took my best friend in the entire world away from me without so much as a second thought.”

A chill runs down my spine. I reach for him, but he pulls his hand away.

The way he flinches back from me stings, but I can’t blame him. If I were faced with the memory of my brother’s death, I wouldn’t want to be touched either.

I'm doing my best to stay calm because making a scene now wouldn’t help either of us. I want to give him the space to feel everything he’s going through.

“I’m sorry about your brother. I didn’t know my father was a murderer.” I say quietly.

He shrugs and pauses to look down at me, but his skin is pale, and he looks like he’s seen a ghost. “You didn’t know. You were just a kid then.”

“And why didn’t you kill me?”

We both pace the room and my body trembles. Leon runs a hand through his tousled locks in despair. It’s my first time seeing him look anything less than perfect. Even when he’s half-naked in bed and the sheets tangled around his body, he still looks perfect.

And now it looks like the pieces of his life are tearing themselves away from him. Every single brick that built him up is beginning to crumble.

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