Page 3 of Bratva Knight

“Alright,” I nodded. “You three”—I pointed to three of our soldiers hunched over with their hands on their knees, catching their breath—“clear the rest of the outside area. We’ll take the house. Have you seen Aleksandr? Or Father?” I asked, turning my attention back to my brother.

“No and no. They're probably inside.” He looked at Tatiana. “Thanks for the save, by the way.”

She smirked, giving him a playful wink. “Don’t mention it.” Her smirk turned into a frown as she glanced over Lukyan’s shoulder, staring intently into the house through the glass sliding doors. “Who’s that?”

Chapter Two

Tatiana Andreeva

Iwatchedthesmall,pixie-sized woman leap onto the back of one of the attackers, tackling him out of sight. I’d never seen her before, and I knew everyone in the Bratva. Even though I wasn’t a soldier, I was still very much a Bratva woman. I went through all the training, did all that hard work. I even went through the initiation, only to later discover it wasn’t what I wanted to do with my life. Not really.

It wasn’t the brutality of it. The blood and the killing. That shit didn’t faze me (though it was annoying every time one of my nails would snap off after a sparring match, especially after I’d just spent $500 on a new set). Not to mention the uniforms the enforcers had to wear were the ugliest pieces of fabric I’d ever seen in my life.

Itsurprisinglywas none of those things that made me decide not to go down the same road as my dad. It was simply because my heart wasn’t in it.

I wanted to explore fashion. I wanted to design my own clothing line, like Brooke Davis, and move to one of the fashion capitals of the world. Paris or Milan. Hell, I’d even take London. Anywhere that would take me away from the man who’d broken not only my heart, but my soul.

Nikolai Volkov was every woman’s wet dream. Huge, broad shoulders. Hard, firm muscles. Dark hair. A face that put all of those Hollywood movie stars to shame. Square jaw. Flawless tanned skin. High cheekbones. He was tall. Hunky. Fierce. His eyes were what I loved the most, though. It was so easy to lose yourself in them. Sparkling blue, like the ocean.

I’d had a crush on him since I was sixteen years old, following him around like a little puppy dog. He barely noticed me though. I was just his sister's idiot best friend. He’d just grunt a “Hello” any time I was over, and that was it. He wouldn’t even look at me, always having his head stuck in that laptop he carried around everywhere he went.

Some time after I turned nineteen, though, that all changed.

I’d been staying over one night and he cornered me in one of the many dark hallways of their home, looking all gloomy and mysterious.

“What are you doing wandering around all alone, Tati?”

A shiver ran down my spine. I stopped dead in my tracks, goosebumps pebbling my skin. The hallway was dark, so dark I could barely make out Nikolai’s silhouette as he leant against the wall in front of me.

I was acutely aware of the fact that I wasn’t wearing any pants. I’d woken up in the middle of the night, mouth as dry as the Sahara Desert. I always slept in my underwear, so I hadn’t bothered to put on a pair of pants before going down to the kitchen to grab a glass of water.

If I’d known the big, bad wolf was stalking the halls…I still wouldn’t have. Let’s be honest, I’d been trying to get Nikolai’s attention for years. And it wasn’t until recently that he’d started to return that attention with long, heated looks that burned my insides. He set my whole body on fire.

“I could ask you the same thing. Do you usually stalk around in the dark at three in the morning?” I asked, arching an eyebrow. I didn’t cover myself because I wanted him to look at me, to see me as a woman and not just some little kid.

Nikolai took a step forward and a sliver of light brought his face into view. Fuck, I’d never get over how handsome he was. He took my breath away every time I saw him. My heart slammed in my chest, beating so hard that I could hear it in my ears. I wanted him so badly, to feel him touch me, his hard, calloused hands on my skin.

His eyes ran down my body and up again in slow perusal, like a man committing every single detail to memory. “Sometimes. Depends on who I’m stalking.”

Why did that statement piss me off? Who the fuck was he stalking when he wasn’t there?

I took a bold move and stepped closer. His head tilted to the side curiously, his gaze running over my legs again, almost as if he couldn’t help himself. It was the most exposed I’d ever been around him. Did he like what he saw? I couldn’t tell. There might have been a glimmer of interest in his eyes, but I wasn’t sure.

“Are you stalking me, Nicky?” I whispered softly, trailing a hand slowly down my front. I stopped at the waistband of my underwear, running a finger over the exposed skin of my lower belly. I wanted to test him, to see if he really was interested. I didn’t chase after men who didn’t want me. Not anymore.

Nikolai watched my movements like a predator watching its prey. Deathly still. Laser focus. Muscles bunched, like he was ready to strike at any moment.

“Don’t call me Nicky,” he growled low in his throat, his eyes still locked on my hand.

“Why? I kinda like it. Nicky, Nicky, Nicky—”

A muffled gasp flew out of my mouth when he rushed me, his hand curling around my throat as he pushed me up against the wall. His body was flush against mine, his breath fanning over my face. I could feel every glorious inch of him. All those hard, toned muscles, built from a lifetime of training.

He’d never been that close to me before, never touched me before. The excitement bubbling inside me exploded to the point that I could barely breathe.

His tongue ran across his bottom lip as he stared at my mouth, eyes burning with what I was sure was want, desire. “Careful, Tatiana,” he rumbled. “I like to punish little girls like you.”

“Do you?” I whispered, exhilaration filling me up inside. “Show me.”

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