Page 91 of The Pakhan

And the last thing I saw before I started to black out was a face.

His face.

His angelic face.

Vadim

The devil was always in the details.

It was a saying I’d heard for a long time and one I completely understood.

Maybe my arrogance had gotten in the way, allowing me to feel comfortable with the people working for me and my surrounding environment.

“I’m here, zavetnyy,” I told her. “Stay with me.” She looked so damn lifeless, her eyes already rolling in the back of her head, her breathing shallow.

What the fuck had she been thinking leaving the house?

A loud hiss jerked my head away from her.

Christ.

The asshole wasn’t unconscious yet.

As the fucker continued to fight back, somehow managing to use the wall as leverage, lunging toward me, a part of me thought this shit was getting way too old.

I’d had enough. I threw the assailant against the wall and used my forearm to crush down on his windpipe.

“Fuck, boss,” Nikolay said from behind me.

I’d made it to the brownstone before he had, racing up the flights of stairs as if they were nothing. Joshua had obviously been a very bad boy, attracting some dangerous people.

But I couldn’t give a shit about the kid’s dead body. All I could think about was getting to Caroline.

“Get Caroline out of here. Now!” I snarled. All I wanted to do was snap the jerk’s neck, but I needed info. I had to know who was hiding underneath the mask.

When I ripped it off, the blood splattered on his busted lip and cut eye from my savage punches couldn’t hide who he was. Neither could the scratches my beautiful hacker had caused. Fuck me.

“Francois.” I stated his name with zero inflection. There was no reason to give a shit, other than he’d been in my top tier. Betrayal was typical in an organization such as mine. In truth, it had become far too much of the norm in today’s business world as well.

No wonder my girls had been found at the mall. “I trusted you,” I said, although it meant nothing.

“You were a fool.”

Yeah, so I was.

Things had changed significantly in a decade or two. If this had occurred fifteen years ago, my father would have tracked down every member of Francois’ family, making them all pay for the man’s sins.

In very painful ways.

Then again, in those days very few would dare go against their Pakhan.

But greed was powerful. So were threats.

I’d acknowledged that years before.

“Who fucking ordered you to do this?”

He had enough of his chutzpa left to spit blood on my face.

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