Page 5 of Bratva Butcher

The moment he was gone, it was like all of my strength just evaporated, making my whole body sag forward. Now that hewasn’t there, now that he couldn’t see me, I didn’t have to put on a front and act like I wasn’t hurting.

Exhaustion filled me, and I didn’t even try to fight it as I slowly slipped into unconsciousness.

Chapter Two

Autumn DeValos

He’s one tough motherfucker,I thought, watching from the shadows as Dipshit held an open flame to his identical twin brother’s stomach. The man barely fucking flinched. Barely made a sound except for what sounded like a frustrated growl.

For hours, I’d sat there—we’d all sat there, actually—watching the man dangling from the ceiling take a fucking beating without screaming or crying out in pain once.

I mean, shit, I thought I had a high tolerance for pain, but this guy? He was on a whole other level. A whole other fucking planet.

Since my incarceration in that shithole, I’d seen a lot of people being tortured… Myself included. Some of it was very unoriginal.

“Tell me what I want to know!”Punch.“Who sent you?”Kick.“Answer me!”Slice.

When that didn’t work, they got a little more creative. Waterboarding. Electric shocks. Sharp objects under the fingernails. I’m not going to lie, it all hurt. A lot. But no amount of pain would ever get me to talk.

Client confidentiality was abigthing in my profession. If I revealed who hired me to kill Dominik Volkov, it wasn’t only my job I could kiss goodbye, but my livelihood, too. My life.

No one would ever hire me again. There’d be a black mark on my name, saying I couldn’t be trusted. I’d be blacklisted from every event. All my contacts would shun me. And that wasonlyif my employer didn’t kill me first for ratting.

So, no, I was never going to say a damn word, no matter what that bastard put me through.

Was I still salty because Dominik had somehow managed to figure out I was trying to kill him? And thwarted it?

Yes.

Wasthatone of the reasons why I refused to give him the answers he so desperately wanted?

Yes.

I was petty like that.

A month’s worth of gruelling research, hard work and sucking up to his lackeys, trying to get close to him… All fucking wasted. Not to mention the resources and favours I had to call in to even get the information I needed on him.

When I was hired, I was given a file containing basic details about my mark. Name, age, last known location, a photo so I’d know what he looked like. Anything else I needed, I had to acquire on my own. I dug deeper into his history. I knew he had a twin brother, Dimitri. Knew he had a daughter, Rayna. No wife. A slew of barely legal girls in his harem. Never stayed in one place too long. Was paranoid by nature.

I studiedeverythingI could on that motherfucker. His likes, dislikes, where he got his fucking coffee. Everything.

But in the end, it didn’t matter. He somehow managed to find out what I was up to and stopped me before I even realised what had happened.

I was still bitter about the whole thing.That stupid, ignorant asshole—

“Slab!”

My eyebrows rose in surprise at that harsh, abrasive tone and Dominik’s flinch of fear. I didn’t know what that word meant, but the way it was delivered was downright fucking menacing.

I listened closely as the brothers spoke, studying their interaction for any angle I could use. They hated each other. Clearly.

Dominik was brimming with anger, resentment and jealousy. Dimitri was just angry. So, so angry.

From my vantage point, I had an unobstructed view of what was going on. I could see the blood dripping down Dimitri’s torso. That deep, primal rage hidden in his eyes. The way he looked at his brother with complete and utter contempt.

When Dimitri started to laugh, Dominik struck him so hard across the face that his body swayed back and forth. It didn’t stop the man from continuing to laugh, though, despite how much that must have hurt.

Embarrassed, Dominik stormed out of the room with his goons behind him. The moment he was gone, Dimitri slumped forward, almost like his body was just completely drained of energy. He wasn’t moving, and his eyes were closed.

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