Page 77 of All the Dangerous Things

I counted to ten and ran my hand over my jaw, trying to grapple with my anger issues where the Petrov bastards were concerned.

“She’s mine,” I stated matter-of-factly. “And I'm not letting her go.” I leaned forward, clasped my hands together, and stared them in the eyes. “She’ll be my wife, and I’ll protect her and our baby with my life.”

Nikolai exchanged a glance with his brother, their unspoken communication clear. They wereworried about their sister. I knew they were also worried about what this meant in the long run—not just for her world but for all of ours.

“Listen,” I said, putting myself in their situation because I’d been in their shoes. Twice. “I know how you feel. I’ve had to deal with the same shit you two are feeling right now… withyourwives.” I cocked an eyebrow when they didn’t respond. “Seeing my sisters married off to you two dangerous fuckers was hard to accept, but I went with my gut and watched how you treated them.” I leaned back in the booth, glancing between them when I told each of them individually, “And I knewyoucared about Amara, andyoucared about Claudia. I knew both of you would kill to protect them. You’d die to keep them safe.”

They leaned back, and I felt some of the tension and their animosity fade as my words hung between us.

“That’s howIfeel about Tatiana,yoursister. She’s mine forever,capisci?”

After a long moment of silence, they let out identical exhales, as if what I said was good enough… for the time being.

“Good. That's what we wanted to hear,” Dmitry said. “Now, back to business.” He sat up in his chair,and I switched gears and focused on the ugly and gritty part of my world. “There’s some shit we want to talk about. Shit that’ll affect not only us but you and yours as well.”

I was all ears now, focused on what needed to be done.

“We’ve learned about a new threat.”

Instantly, I was on the offense, and my mind immediately thought of Carmine. “What kind of new threat?”

Dmitry didn't speak right away. He gestured for another round of drinks, and once we were left alone again, Nikolai was the one to start talking.

“They call themselves The Stygian Syndicate.” His tone was dark and menacing.

I frowned, leaning forward slightly. “What do you know?”

“We’ve learned of a new rogue group that is trying to infiltrate and rise in power. They’re clearly working with another group, one that has insider knowledge in order for them to know the shit they know,” Nikolai said, his voice growing deeper from his anger.

The tension was edging back in, and mine grew the more I thought about what Nikolai stated—“...has insider knowledge…”

Again, Carmine was the forefront of my mind, and the more I thought about it, the more I needed to broach this with the Petrovs.

“They’re staying underground, and it’s been a bitch finding any useful information about them.” Nikolai slowly grinned. “But it’s been fun as fuck experimenting with how far motherfuckers can be pushed to get what I want.”

I knew the sick Russian fucker was talking about torturing people to get information. Hell, I knew he did heinous shit to his enemies. There was even talk that Nikolai had torn the finger and toenails off a man for just cutting him off in traffic. That was always the rumor that popped into my head whenever I thought about just how crazy my brother-in-law was.

“Had to get creative just to get the minuscule shit we got.”

Dmitry snorted and shook his head after his psycho sibling spoke. “They’re organized and know their shit, given they’ve been able to do what they’ve done on our territory so far.” He cracked his knuckles. “They’re obviously powerful in their own right, and it’s clear they’re slowly making moves against not only us, but you and yours, too.”

“Maksim was just one piece in their plans,” I murmured to myself.

I thought about what they said, let that shit sink in, and knew I had to bring up my suspicions with them about Carmine. It was dangerous, though. We might’ve been allies because of family bonds, but we were still two very different sides of the same coin.

My thoughts kept circling back to the Head of Italy. After hearing about this new syndicate and all the moves that had taken place up until this point, I had no doubt Carmine was involved. It was just too convenient, all the things falling into place about him being a major player.

Was he the leader of this new threat? Was he working with them in hopes he could gain more power? If I revealed all this shit to the Russians and I was wrong, this could blow up in the worst possible way.

But if I was right….

“We have a lot of shit between us, Gio,” Dmitry said. “You didn’t come to us after helping Tatiana, and you killed one of ours on our territory.”

I knew that wasn’t something they could just let go. It would eventually come back full circle. But it was clear that right now, we had bigger issues and threats.

I ran my hand over my jaw, and the sound of my palm moving over my scruff seemed overly loud.

Why had Carmine really ordered Maksim’s death? Why did he want specificallymeto do the kill?

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