Page 28 of Marked & Bred By the Bratva
And she’s the best thing I’ve ever had.
* * *
“Is he talking or bleeding?” I ask, stepping through the warehouse door.
Yuri looks up from his crouch next to the bound man and shrugs. Fucking psycho. “Little of both.”
The guy on the floor used to work for us. Easy gig. Good money. Kept his mouth shut until he didn’t. Now he’s twitching in a puddle of his own piss, jaw broken, fingers splayed.
I roll up my sleeves.
“Then we’re not done yet.”
Our business is cleaner than it looks. Blood makes it seem messy. Screams make it seem cruel. But at the core, it’s math. Cold, brutal equations. Someone skims, they die. Someone talks, they burn. We don’t run on chaos. We run on fear and precision.
I still think about my girl while I work. About her mouth. The way she moaned my name last night, sweet and desperate, like I’m the only man she’ll ever need. About how tight her little pussy was wrapped around me when she came. About her smiling this morning, wearing nothing but one of my shirts and the marks I left on her thighs.
Yuri tosses me a towel, grinning with all his teeth.
“You get crazier every time we do this.”
“Not crazy,” I mutter, wiping the blood from my knuckles. “Efficient.”
Ava texts me while I’m overseeing cleanup.
Ava:You okay? Haven’t heard from all day. Miss your face.
I stare at the screen for a few seconds, shaking my head. Then I text back:You’ll get it tonight. On your knees.
Yuri coughs. “You smiling, boss?”
I wipe it clean. Deadpan. “No.”
But inside, yeah. I fucking am.
Seventeen
Ava
I’m trying to act normal. I really am.
But I’m walking like I got rearranged in a porno last night, which I did, and I can’t stop smiling about it, which is worse.
“You okay?” Kira squints at me as I refill the coffee station. “You’re all…dreamy today.”
“Just tired.” I try to shrug it off. “Didn’t sleep great.”
Not a lie. My body did not get a single fucking hour off. I’m sore in places I didn’t know had muscles. I had to bite my lip in the shower this morning when I saw the bruises on my hips. Not because I was upset but because I almost came on the spot.
It’s been one day of being with Lev. Of being his.
And now I can’t imagine going back to Before. Back when I thought being single was peaceful. Safe. Wise.
Back when I thought orgasms were just something I had to give myself.
* * *
Lev is leaning against the driver’s side door when I finally get off work. On a big, gleaming black SUV. Wearing a black t-shirt, jeans, boots and sunglasses. Looking like a goddamn GQ model, scary guy edition.
