Page 34 of Stolen By the Bratva

“Yusef,” I supplied.

“You shut the fuck up, bitch,” Yusef shouted. “You’re a dead woman.”

Alek stepped on Yusef’s crotch. “Talk. Now. Don’t look at her. Just tell me what the fuck you’re doing here.”

“I was sent to kill her.”

I blinked, stunned that the man was speaking so easily. Or maybe it was difficult. He winced and gasped in pain as Alek kept his boot on his crotch, his gun aimed at his head.

“Who ordered the hit?” Alek demanded.

“Her father.”

I went still, freezing at Yusef’s reply. My father? He wanted me dead? I knew he never cared for me, but to wish me dead? I tried to grapple with this revelation without letting any emotions cloud my mind.

“If she can’t serve her purpose as a virginal bride to the head of the Valkovs, she’s better off fucking dead.” Yusef turned to scowl at me with pure hatred in his dark eyes.

“Sergei wanted his daughter to marry the head of the Valkov family.”

“That would be Pavel,” Alek argued.

Yusef hissed as Alek pushed his foot down harder. “Andrey. He wanted her to marry Andrey so she’d bear a son. Or she’d keep trying until she got a son. Then Sergei would put a hit on both of them, husband and wife.” He rolled his head on the floor, sneering at me on the bed. “Her virgin pussy is all that matters. Her bearing a Valkov son would be the end and complete the coup. Power would be transferred.” He growled, reaching uselessly for his gun with his mangled arm. “But it looks like you’ve already taken her.”

No, not yet. But almost. I resolutely refused to let his words sink into my brain. My father wanting a coup. His eagerness to kill me off in order to get what he wanted.

Alex didn’t speak, staring down at Yusef. I couldn’t look away as he remained still and pensive like that, eerily calm and not alarmed. He moved like that predator again, always in charge and sure of his motions and how he held his body in the face of danger. Yusef was no longer a danger. He couldn’t grab his gun, let alone aim it. His knees were shattered, and he wouldn’t be running. With the copious amount of blood leaking from his body, he was damn near dead.

“And you can’t blame him for wanting it. All the glory, the power. The Valkov name was once so feared and revered,” Yusef taunted. “Back when your father was alive, at least.” He chuckled, but the mirth seemed forced and mean, like he wanted one last chance to hurt Alek in any way he could. “He saw to that.”

“What do you know of my father?” he demanded, kicking him in the nuts. “Who saw to what?” Dropping into a low crouch, he yanked Yusef up by gripping his shirt.

“Your father,” the man said, smirking with a delirious tone. “I was there.”

“You were where?”

“At the… shop. When Pavel shot…”

Alek shook him. “When Pavel shot what? Who?”

Yusef breathed shallower and shallower, and his head lolled to the side. “Your father.”

Alek released him as though his fingers burned. Yusef slumped down, crashing to the floor littered with glass. Still, he spoke on his deathbed, confessing, “Pavel shot your father, boy. Because he wanted it all.”

A few more labored breaths left Yusef’s mouth, and with a gut-wrenching sob, he exhaled one last time. Blood stained the rug as his life drained from him with a steady, pulsing push.

I’d never witnessed someone’s death. I knew it happened every day in our world. Violence was a way of life for the bratva, but until this moment, I’d been sheltered. I’d never been asked to handle anything that would lead to such gore and killing. The threat was always there. Every day and night, the danger of losing lives lurked so close to each and every one of us.

Until this moment, with Yusef bleeding out on Alek’s rug, I’d never witnessed it firsthand. I didn’t stare at him. I didn’t allow myself a chance to take in a single detail of the soldier’s lifeless body. Instead, I latched my concentration on Alek as he stared at the man. As long as I looked at this protective enemy, this man who’d shielded me from being murdered, I could breathe. I could see him and know that as long as he stood between me and the rest of the world, I might have a chance to make it out of here alive.

After a long, tense span of silence, he lifted his face to me. He holstered his gun and looked me over, nodding to himself. I didn’t know what that nod meant, but I replied in kind. If he was seeking me out for a visual reminder that I wasn’t killed, then, yes, I’d acknowledge that.

Without a word, he got to work cleaning up the mess. I couldn’t have helped if I’d wanted to. I knew not a thing about transporting a dead body and handling that much blood. I was bound to the bed, and it didn’t seem like a good time to repeat my request that he untie me. I didn’t want to interfere with getting rid of Yusef, and I wouldn’t have been much help in physically dragging him anywhere.

Instead, I faced the ceiling and stared at it, letting the activity in the rest of the room fade to a blur in the corner of my eye.

Alek took minutes to remove Yusef from the place. I didn’t know where he took him, but he had to have had practice with this. A plan was likely in place for these sorts of things. After he rolled Yusef up in the rug, which must have had plastic beneath it because no blood had leaked to the hardwood floor, he disposed of him by carrying him out the front door. Knowing Alek had left me alone for those few minutes was unnerving. I was tied up, slightly naked, and vulnerable. If anyone else had intruded, I would’ve been dead.

But he returned shortly, leading me to assume he’d dumped Yusef out a window in the hall or something. I didn’t know, and I didn’t care. All I took comfort in was that Alek was back, sweeping all the broken glass and setting the studio apartment back to as much order as was possible.

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