Page 121 of Mob Knight

Glan. Clear.

With three men posted at the doors leading outside, my family and I creep up to the main bedroom. I’m certain the piece of shite’s awake by now. We’ve been silent, but every man in the Four Families has a sixth sense. It’s how we’ve lived into our thirties. It’s how all our parents have lived into their fifties. He’s probably already texted his brothers and cousins.

I’m behind Dillan when we separate, so three of us stand on each side of the door. I tap my cousin’s shoulder, and he kicks open the door. I enter first, my rifle pointed right at him. The other guys stream in, taking positions by the windows, the closet, the bathroom, and the door.

“Aleks, you went too far this time.”

Aleksei Kutsenko—Niko’s older brother—shrugs. Motherfucking shrugs. He sits in bed like he hasn’t a care in the world. We all see the pistol on the mattress beside his left hand, and the knife in his right. He won’t do shite to us, but I’m about to fuck his world up.

“Cormac, don’t be so dramatic. You and Niko act like you’re still in the high school drama club.” His Russian drawl makes me want to ram my fist into his throat and crush his voice box.

“You blew up my fiancée’s apartment when she was there.”

“Pozdravlyayu s pomolvkoy.”

“I don’t need your congratulations on my engagement.”

He shrugs again, but I see the surprise that I understood him. He probably thought I’d struggle to Google Translate it later. Fuck him with knobs on.

“Why?”

“Why what? Target you? I can’t stand you. Use Joey? Because she was there.”

It doesn’t surprise me he knows my pet name for her. He’s baiting me. Seamus and I developed reputations as the hot heads because we’re almost always bigger than everyone else. I’m bigger than Aleks, even if not by much. He’s an inch and a bit taller than me, but I weigh at least fifteen pounds of muscle more than him. I’m about to let him see the reputation I cultivated, but I’m shockingly calm. If I fuck this up, it’s my brother’s and cousins’ lives, and it’s my future with Joey.

I put a bullet into the headboard precariously close to Aleks’s left ear. If he’d flinched—which I knew he wouldn’t—fucking psychopath—I would have hit him. I point the muzzle to a few inches past his feet and fire again.

“Explain the holes to your wife and tell her how lucky I only put them in the furniture and not you.”

I shoot the knife blade beside him, not caring if the ricochet actually hits him. The ping of metal on metal shifts his attitude. He gets serious mighty fast.

“Don’t act all holier than thou, Cormac. You’re just as shitty as the rest of your ragtag family. Don’t come into my house accusing me of shit, or none of you will leave alive.”

“Did you have to call your big brother and cousins to come help you?”

My sing-song voice is fucking obnoxious even to my ears.

“Or will it be your baby brothers to the rescue? Let them come. We’re ready. You have no men left here, and your family won’t take any away from guarding their wives. They definitely won’t leave kids unprotected. They won’t wait around for extra men to get here. Sergei and Anton definitely won’t make it in time. That leaves Maks, Niko, Bogdan, Misha, and Pasha. Five against the six of us, plus the thirty men we have scattered around your property. Call your brothers and tell them false alarm. You and I deal with this just the two of us.”

“You know that’s not happening.”

“Fine.”

I nudge my chin toward Aleks, and Sean and Shane rush forward. They have his gun and knife away from him in a heartbeat, then Aleks is pinned to the mattress. I wrap my hand around his throat. There’s no erotic pleasure to this like when I hold Joey in place this way. My hand tightens until he grunts, and his chin comes up. It gives me space to drive my fist into it and snap his head even farther back. I slam my fist into his left cheekbone, making sure to nail his nose too. My next punch breaks his nose. Neither Shane nor Sean recoil from the blood. I bet they don’t even notice.

I lean into my hand around Aleks’s throat, pushing a good portion of my weight onto him. My fist is indiscriminate where it lands now. It just rains down on his face five or six times. When I release his throat, I seize that chance for the throat punch.

“You could have taken away my chance for a family with Joey. Maybe now I’ll take away your chance with Heather.”

I ram my rifle’s stock into his junk. I catch him entirely unprepared because he tries to howl in pain, but no sound comes out.

The bratva leaders were conditioned to never show any reaction to pain. Their leader before Maks beat any reaction out of them, nearly killing them in the process. None of them know we found our way into the old bratva warehouse where they trained. When we were all teens, we spied on Aleks, his brothers, and his cousins. My brother, cousins, and I wanted to know what we were up against since we suspected their oldpakhantortured them during their training. He did.

I spy a wedding photo on the dresser. I saunter over to it while Sean and Shane keep holding Aleks down. I pick up the frame, turn to him, and grin.

“I bet this is one of Heather’s favorites. You don’t look like a bear’s arsehole in it.”

I bring it down over his now bent knee; the glass contacting the bare skin. It shatters and some shards cut him. I look at the photo, curl my nose in disgust, then toss it on the bed beside him. I won’t damage the photo because I’m punishing him, not Heather. Shane steps away, and I pull back my arm.

---