Page 122 of Bratva Knight

“Have a heart.”

“You soulless bastard!”

I didn’t respond to a single one, which seemed to upset them more. It solidified the whole “heartless” thing they all kept yelling at me.

One thing I noticed as I went to each cell was that they were all in incredible shape. The men had no shirts on, so it was easy to see they worked out in some way or another. The same went for the women. They all wore identical sport bras and shorts. A few of them even had a better set of abs than I did. Whether they could fight or not was a whole other story, though.

Father was still doing his pull ups when I finally approached his cell. The woman was sitting on the bed, throwing balls of rolled up toilet paper at him. He just ignored it, heaving his body up and down, up and down. The slight tick in his jaw told me it pissed him off though.

She looked roughly the same age, with wild red hair, bright green eyes and, despite the angry scowl she was aiming my father’s way, a soft, delicate face.

How long had they been locked up in there together? Long enough to drive each other crazy, that was for sure.

Father dropped from the bar and landed flat on his feet. He was panting heavily, sweat dripping down his body. He rolled his neck along his shoulders and then walked towards the bars with complete casualness, not in any hurry. Like he had all the time in the world.

Now that he was closer, I could see the scars on his skin. Knife cuts. Purple/yellow bruises. Cigarette burns. He’d been tortured. Whether it was at the hand of my uncle or Talon, I had no idea.

Seeing him like that was harder than I thought it would be, but I tried to lock those feelings away. They wouldn't help me, only hinder me.

“What are you doing here, boy?” he spoke out of the side of his mouth, his words barely above a whisper. He was angry. That was the only time he pulled that stupid “boy” crap, like I was still some shithead teenager.

I grabbed one of the plates and crouched. Father followed, slinking down.

“We have a plan to get you out,” I said softly, pushing it through the gap slowly.

“We?” He took it, placing it off to the side. “You rope your siblings into this?”

“It was a joint effort, actually.” I passed the next plate through. “Tell me about the collar.”

“Titanium steel. Set to explode if we pass through the cell doors, unless deactivated first. Equipped with anti-tampering and remote activation.”

I internally cursed. This Talon dude was really,reallypissing me the fuck off.

That meant we’d have to get the collar off him before trying to go anywhere, and the anti-tampering device would make that next to impossible. One step forward, ten steps back.

“Go home, Nikolai,” Father whispered, catching the last water bottle I rolled through. “There’s no way out of this. Get out while you can. That’s an order.”

I stood to my full height and he did too. I fiddled with the front of the cart as a cover to continue the conversation, even going so far as to add a frown.

When I spoke next, I barely moved my mouth, but he heard every word. “Sorry, Father. You’re notPakhan. You don’t give the orders anymore. Aleksandr does.”

His eyes narrowed into slits. Before he could respond, the woman came bounding over, picking up one of the plates.

“Who’s this?” she asked covertly behind a piece of steak. At least she was smart enough not to outright blow our cover.

“Mind your own business, devil woman,” Father hissed with venom.

She smiled and it seemed completely innocent, until she stomped down hard on the back of his leg. Father stumbled forward, smashing his forehead right into the metal bars with a painful grunt.

“Asshole,” she hissed back, her smile still firmly in place. She walked back to the bed and started eating her food, not paying any more attention to us.

Father grumbled in annoyance, wiping away the blood that had started to drip down the side of his face. When he made no move to retaliate, I gave him an odd look.

“What?” he snapped under his breath.

If I had more time, I definitely would have questioned him, because the Dimitri VolkovIknew would have never let a transgression like that slide. Maybe he didn’t want to risk injuring her, since she was his fighting partner. Any weakness she had, he had too.

Still, the interaction was…strange.

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