Page 75 of Bratva Knight

“Dostatochno!” Enough!

Years of conditioning made me freeze instantly, my fist hovering an inch from Illayana’s cheek. God, if I wasn’t entirely sure Father wasn’t there, I could have sworn that was him. It sounded exactly like him.Exactly. I knew that was the only reason Illayana froze too.

Loud footsteps reverberated around the now-quiet room and then Illayana was yanked off me by the back of her shirt. I jumped to my feet quickly, catching Aleksandr’s disappointed glare. He was still holding Illayana up by the back of her shirt.

“Don’t look at me like that.Shestarted it.” I pointed an accusing finger at Illayana.

She opened her mouth to respond, but Aleksandr shook her roughly.

“Quiet,” he snapped. “Youbothknow Mother’s rule. No fighting in the family room.”

“She’s the one—”

Aleksandr growled, slicing his hand through the air to silence me. “I said,quiet. We have more important things to deal with, so we’re going to settle this right now. Illayana has the right to issue you with a challenge, andyoudo not have the right to deny her. Father’s rules.”

My fists clenched at my sides. He was right. Father invented the concept of the ring for several reasons. One of which was to settle any disagreements between us. He didn’t want us holding grudges or resentment towards each other. We would challenge them and fight it out instead. Once the fight was over, that was it. The matter was considered settled and we both had to move on.

Aleksandr finally let Illayana go and forced her to look him in the eyes. “Do you still—”

“Damn fucking straight I do,” she gritted out behind clenched teeth.

“Fine.” I cracked my neck. “Let’s get it over with, then.”

I reared back, avoiding Illayana’s fist, ducked underneath her arm and jabbed her in the ribs. She sucked in a pain-filled breath, her eyes widening. I dropped, stuck out a leg and spun, kicking her feet out right from under her and making her slam to the ground. I rose to my full height and placed a foot in the centre of her chest, keeping her down. I didn’t applytoomuch pressure. I wasn’t trying to kill her. But she’d pissed me off so much, I wanted to at least make it hurt a little. Or a lot.

We’d been fighting for the better part of an hour, and I feared there was no end in sight. My sister wasangry. Beyond angry. I think a lot of that anger stemmed from being hurt. Instead of dealing with that emotion, she leant hard on her anger, letting herself succumb to it.

I was having a hard time holding her back anymore. She just kept coming, and coming, and coming, refusing to tap out or give up.

As the challenger, the fight couldn’t end untilsheended it, by tap out or KO. And I was running out of options on ways to end this fight safely.

“Give up, Illayana.” I’d said those same three words multiple times already and she’d done the same thing she was doing then; she bared her teeth and shook her head, flat out refusing.

“I’m not stopping until I knock your fucking teeth out.”

I sighed, applying a bit more pressure, making her choke. “You’re going to look back on this moment and regret how much of a fucking idiot you’re being.”

She gasped. “No, I won’t.”

“Yes, you will. You’re overreacting.”

“Overreacting?” she screeched. “Youliedto me foryears. You hid this massive, traumatic event from me—”

“Look how you’re acting!” I screamed down at her. “Can you honestly blame us?”

Movement behind me made me glance over my shoulder, catching sight of Tatiana climbing into the ring. People stood around the outside, watching on. Aleksandr, Drea, Lukyan, Illayana’s guards and a few other soldiers. Way at the back of the crowd stood Ivan, his feet planted firmly on the ground and arms folded across his chest.

“Let her go, Nikolai,” Tatiana commanded.

I took my foot off Illayana’s chest and stepped back. She immediately jumped up and went to run at me again, but Tatiana wedged herself between us, stopping her.

“I’mthe one you really want to fight, Illayana. Not Nikolai. If it were up to him, he would have told you all about it the moment that it happened.I’mthe one who told him not to say a word.”

“Tatiana—”

“No, Nikolai.” She put a hand up, telling me not to say another word. “You know it's true. I’m the one who wanted to keep our relationship a secret. I’m the one who didn’t want to tell them. The only person to blame here is me.”

There wasnobodyto blame. Tatiana and I had the right to keep what was happening between us private. We weren’t obligated to tell anyone a damn thing. I wanted to say it. I even opened my mouth to do so, but one glance from Tatiana had me snapping my mouth shut.

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