Page 3 of You Know I Love You

"Teddy!" I hear my brother roar over the crowd.

"Move!" Vasily barks, his hand wrapping around my wrist before he's moving back through the crowd again.

"What's happening?" I shout to Vasily, but he keeps moving, his hold on me unbreakable but somehow gentle too. My heart is beating a mile a minute.

When we break through the crowd, I see my uncle West. Where the hell did he come from? He lifts his leg, kicking in a door. It explodes inward. There is only one reason he'd be here. Teddy. He has an obsession with her.

The two of them have been sneaking around in secret since he came to the island shortly after my father died. I knew about them. Teddy and I don't keep much from each other. I didn't even know I had an uncle before he arrived, but it wasn't shocking. I am always left in the dark.

I have to run to keep up with Vasily as he begins to move closer to the room my uncle entered. I gasp when we get inside and I see West hitting someone. He doesn’t even stop when the person falls to the floor.

He’s on top of him, throwing blow after blow. My brother rushes into the room, and he and Vasily both have to pull him off. They pin him to the wall, but West still fights them to get back to the person on the ground.

I look down at them and realize that it is Derrick. I gasp, putting my hand over my mouth. He goes to school with us. Teddy appears to be in shock. It’s the first time I’ve seen her look afraid.

I want to go to her, but Vasily pins me with a stare that lets me know to keep my butt in place until they get the situation under control. Well, get my uncle under control, that is.

It doesn’t go unnoticed by me how my body reacts to his glare either. For someone who has been going on about rebelling, I’m finding that I like when Vasily tells me what to do.

“Teddy! Help us here,” my brother shouts to her. She breaks out of whatever haze she was in and rushes over to them.

“West.” The second my uncle sees her, he starts to calm down. You can see the effect she has on him. “Let him go.” They slowly release their hold on West, and he pulls Teddy into him. She tells him over and over that she is okay.

Derrick groans from the ground. He has had a crush on Teddy for a while. But he has banged almost every girl at our school, and I think it irked him that Teddy wouldn't give him the time of day.

Every time he saw her, he would try to persuade her to go out with him or flirt. He ignored me for the most part, but when your brother is Rich Haven, it was that or deal with him.

Derrick coughs and tries to rub his eyes, only to smear them with blood. I cringe, stepping back and running into a hard body.

“You okay, Princess?” I nod my head at Vasily’s question.

I want to ask Teddy if she is okay, but I can tell right now she is not only taken care of but is taking care of West too. I’m happy for her. Teddy is always making sure everyone is okay. West is good for her, but I know things are going to change. Things have been changing since my father's death.

“Take him to the mainland,” Vasily tells two men who have stepped into the room. They follow his order without question. The men pick up a bloodied Derrick and drag him out of the room. The door falls closed behind them, leaving Vasily, West, my brother, Teddy, and me. “I’ll clean this up.” Everyone looks to Vasily.

“Why?” West asks him.

“I have my reasons.” Vasily glances over to me, making my stomach dip. He’s cleaning this up for me? Why would he do that?

“I don’t want him back on this island.” The coldness in West’s tone is chilling. But how can you just order someone not to come around? I’m sure it was all self-defense on West’s part anyway. Teddy wasn’t alone in this room with Derrick of her own free will, meaning Derrick dragged her in here, and I don’t want to think of what he was going to do.

“He won’t be,” Vasily says as though his word is law, making me believe he is a lot more powerful and has a way bigger reach than just running this fight thing. I don’t even know what you call it, but I know it’s not legal. Ireallyhave jumped off the deep end here. I have to admit, even though it’s a bit scary, it’s also exciting. A feeling I haven’t had in a very long time, and I can see myself getting addicted to it.

“What the fuck are you two even doing here?” Rich glares at me and then turns to Teddy. Oh, like he has room to talk.

“Watch it.”

“Don’t speak to her in that tone.” Both Vasily and West speak at the same time.

“Are you fucking kidding me right now? That’s my sister, and she is pretty much my sister too. This is exactly why they shouldn’t have been down here.”

“I take responsibility,” Vasily says. “This is my operation, and no one should have been able to get into one of these rooms, let alone without one of my men seeing it.”

“If you can be here, I can be here too,” I fire back at my brother. I'm done with him attempting to control any portion of my life.

“You won’t come back here.” I go to tell him I can do what I want, but Vasily beats me to it.

“Enough!” he roars. For once, my brother actually keeps his mouth shut, but I'm guessing he wants to continue fighting here. I assume that Vasily serves as his boss in some capacity. Still, my brother and I glare at each other. The whole room goes quiet. “Go, you have to wrap up oryouwon’t be back here.”

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