Page 58 of Monstrous Urges

Color me curious.

“Drazen.”

The plane’s engines are still cycling down as I leave the cabin and walk down the stairs. The helicopter that will take us from the mainland across to my island sits prepped and ready a few hundred feet away. Another private jet is parked nearby as well.

Waiting near the bottom of the staircase is Yelizaveta herself, dressed all in black and surrounded by ten of her elite guard—all very conspicuously armed to the teeth.

The White Queen herself smiles warmly as she purrs my name, but I’m smart enough to see through that.

Yelizaveta is as much a politician as she is a ruthless gangster. The smile doesn’t mean we’re friends. It means “watch your back”.

“Yelizaveta,” I say as I walk toward her. I stop a few feet away, and even allow the indignity of two of her men patting me down.

“I’ve always appreciated your eye for caution,” I continue, a practiced politician’s smile on my face.

“I have grandchildren these days, Drazen,” she says grimly, her alto voice heavily accented as she speaks to me in English. It could very well be intended as a dig at my mixed, i.e., “not pure Russian” blood. If it is, I choose not to give her the satisfaction of seeing that it’s pissed me off.

Honestly? It didn’t.

“And I plan on seeing them ascend to the Table before I’m dead.” She smirks. “Caution is part of the game.”

“True,” I reply. My brow furrows. “My second tells me you were eager to speak face to face.”

Yelizaveta nods, taking a slow, measured breath and clasping her hands in front of her.

“This business with you seeking to join the Iron Table…” She frowns as she dips her chin. “I think it’s time we put that aside.”

My jaw tightens. “Is that so.”

“Yes, Drazen,” she murmurs. “And I think perhaps now is as good a time as any to explain why, so that you can stop wasting your time chasing smoke you will never catch.”

Darkness throbs inside me. But I hold it at bay, keeping my expression neutral.

“I’m sure you’re aware that while you aren’t exactly popular with anyone at the table, I have been the main voice of opposition to you joining.”

“Really.”

She levels a withering look at me, her silvery-white brows arching as her almost purple eyes bore into me.

“Let us not insult each other, Drazen.”

I smile faintly, tilting my head.

“I think it’s only fair that you know why, so that you can focus your efforts elsewhere.” She clears her throat. “I was close with the Brancovich family.”

Yeah, no shit. Which is how she and the rest of the Table probably helped that spider Vadik Belov weave his web and murder my entire family.

“I think I’ve heard as much,” I growl quietly.

“I doubt you’ve heard that we were so close that Mihajlo Brancovich was my godson.”

Fuck.

Fucking fuck. I had not, in fact, ever heard that. At all.

My eyes narrow involuntarily.

This is… seriously not ideal. I didn’t personally kill Mihajlo and his wife. That privilege went to infighting or perhaps a mutiny within his ranks, if the stories are correct.

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