Page 16 of The Bratva King's Auctioned Bride

No, Mila was a queen on this chessboard I’d set up between our organizations, ruthless in her own right and ready to move to defend herself. But it was still my chessboard. There was no way not to admire her tenacity, though, and I even started to chuckle as I started off after her at a leisurely pace.

Until I heard a shot ring out from the front of the house. What the hell? Forgetting the pain in my head, I tore off after her, no longer charmed. Outside, the door guard lay on his back, blood oozing between his fingers as he clutched at his shoulder.

She fucking shot my guard.

“Hey,” I shouted, quickly leaning down to see it was only a flesh wound.

“I’ll be fine,” he grunted in his thickly accented Italian.

He probably thought this was going to be a cushy gig when he was hired to guard the empty villa. Now, he was shot.He’d live, but Mila hadn’t hesitated. She was far more dangerous than I gave her credit for, and I wasn’t laughing at all now.

The guard waved in the direction she’d taken off running, and I followed at a breakneck pace, no longer leaving it up to the other guards to stop her. At the end of the path leading to the gate, I heard someone shout and skidded in that direction. She’d skirted the gate, but for what purpose? Did she think she could run in circles around the perimeter and wear us all out?

No, it seemed she thought she could scale the wall, and had actually made it almost to the top. The gate guard had his firearm aimed at her head, and I watched as she turned and raised the weapon she’d neatly stolen from me. Fuck. I was still yards away as I watched their standoff.

I hadn’t had time to give too many instructions to the guards, but I was well aware that the man I put in charge of hiring them would have told them they were authorized to shoot intruders. I was already running flat out, but the thought of watching my woman get shot down off that wall gave me a burst of inhuman speed.

“Damn it, Mila,” I hissed, slicing my hand at the guard to stand down. A second later, I was at the wall, grabbing her ankle.

Her wide-eyed look of shock, as I yanked her to the ground, told me she was so focused on the guard she wasn’t aware I’d arrived. She was fearless, but currently acting out of panic instead of training, and if I’d been anyone else, she might be dead or gravely injured. It was all I could do not to crush her to me and breathe her in, grateful I hadn’t been too late. Instead, I smacked the gun out of her hand before she could turn it back on me, well aware that the safety was off now.

“No way,” she grunted, headbutting me and managing to slither out of my grasp.

For about three seconds. I landed on her as she scrambled across the well-tended grass, knocking the wind out of her. Immediately moving so she could breathe, she took that fresh opportunity to kick me in the gut and roll toward the gun I’d tossed toward the guard.

He stepped in and grabbed it, aiming at her with a very pissed-off expression.

“No, don’t shoot,” I shouted, repeating it in Italian for good measure.

Basically, assuring Mila she wasn’t in any real danger. She smiled at that and gained her feet, taking off again.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I muttered. Enough was enough.

Catching up to her in a few quick strides, I grabbed her around the middle and held on tight. Her arms flailed, her nails trying to claw at any part of my flesh she could reach. I swiveled her into a bear hug, her face pressed into my shoulder and her heaving chest pressed flush with mine, giving me the kind of thoughts that should have been the last thing on my mind.

The guard came forward with a pair of handcuffs ready, offering to take over. The feel of her soft, hot body made me hold her tighter before turning her to see what might have been in store for her if I hadn’t intervened.

“I should let him interrogate you,” I said, holding out my hand to retrieve my gun.

She gasped, knowing full well what that word meant in our circles. I wouldn’t, of course. I wanted to keep her close for more reasons than the fact that she was full of fire. With a firm grip on her arm, I led her back to the house, pulling out my phone to call my uncle.

“Let me go,” she sputtered, dragging her feet and whacking me wherever she could reach with her free hand.

“Not likely,” I said, waiting for Eldar to answer. “Not now that I know what you can do with a gun.”

She actually looked proud for a second and put her chin up at me. “Next time, the safety won’t be on.”

“Exactly why—” I stopped sparring with her when Eldar finally picked up. “New plan,” I told him. “Send the priest here. Immediately.”

She stopped fighting when she heard that, just as if she’d completely run out of battery. I wasn’t sure I liked this meek, uncertain version of her, not when I’d seen the warrior queen emerge. But it was certainly easier to get her back in the house. She had the good grace to look shaken when we passed the puddle of blood on the terrace. Her face went chalk white, but she didn’t ask if the guard was all right. I wasn’t in the mood to disabuse her of the notion that she wasn’t a murderer, because it wasn’t for the lack of trying.

Once we were inside, I told her to have a seat as I cleared away anything in the kitchen that might be used against me. The knives were the first to get locked up in a spare bedroom, and I put the heaviest pots out of her reach. By the time I took the time to face her again, she was seething mad and about to blow.

“Go ahead and get it out,” I said, glancing at the time. “We can consider this pre-marriage counseling.”

She sputtered, blue eyes flashing. “There’s not going to be any marriage. I would rather die than go along with your plan,” she spat. “And you’ll be worse than sorry if you try to make me.”

While she continued outlining all the reasons I’d never succeed and the ways her brothers would torture me, I calmlypulled out the very gun she’d tried to kill me with and pointed it at her. Right between her beautiful eyes. This was cute and all, but I was done. To make sure she understood how done I was, I wrapped my finger carefully around the trigger.

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