Page 48 of Thorns of Lust
“Drinking in the morning,” I scolded her.
She shrugged. “It’s just mimosas. They are meant for the morning.”
When in the fuck did my baby sister grow up?
My chest tightened as I hugged her, kissing her forehead. My half-sister was half my age. Too good to be around men like me. Maxim and I had done our best raising her away from prying eyes and the dangers of the underworld. Nobody could connect her to us. Her friends were clueless about who we were, right along with Isla. It was the safest life for her. And them!
“How are you?” I asked her, her petite frame barely reaching my chest. The abundance of her ginger curls made her seem even smaller than her five-foot-three. Almost as if a strong gust of wind could break her frail form. Sometimes I wondered how she managed to hold her violin for hours as she played.
And she could play. I’d seen grown men weep when she played that violin. She had a way of getting those tunes right into your soul and making your heart bleed.
“Much better now that you’re here,” she beamed.
When she looked at me like that, she reminded me of that little girl who always watched me with unfiltered adoration and admiration. No matter how sullied my hands were, that little girl depended on me. To protect her. To shield her from our world. Especially from the men in our world who’d find a way to get to her and exploit her.
My eyes flickered to her friends and traveled over them. It was always the same crowd. Somehow Isla connected with the illegitimate daughters of other mafia families. It always surprised me to see them together. They were all so different - a violinist, a painter, a writer, a fashion designer, and pianist.
It was the last two girls that I was always surprised to see. The Romero girls. The old Romero didn’t have a good handle on his daughters. I’d venture that their wealthy grandmother had something to do with it.
“So what’s going on here?” I asked, flicking a gaze to my brother who looked fucking high. He sat slumped in the chair, looking at the girls with glee in his eyes that made me sick to my stomach.
I clenched my jaw, the need to teach him a lesson and then to punish him drummed through my veins, deadly and cold. He’d be dealt with one-on-one.
Our sister didn’t need to hear any of ourbusinessshit. And her friends even less. The Romero girls were just as oblivious to the dealings in the underworld. The others certainly knew nothing about it.
Oblivious to the tension traveling between her brothers, Isla shrugged as she turned to her friends. “Maxim showed up yesterday and said you wouldn’t be coming so I called the girls. We were going to hit up a few clubs but–”
“We can go back to our apartment,” the youngest Romero daughter said as she pushed her chair back and started signing to her deaf sister.Let’s go to our place.
All the girls started to nod, obviously understanding the sign language perfectly well.
“No, that’s okay,” I said. “You ladies stay. Maxim and I have some business to deal with anyhow. We’ll leave you to it.”
“Are you sure?” Isla whirled around, watching me curiously.
I smiled, although right now I wanted to stride over to my brother and wring his neck. “Yes. But tomorrow, we’re spending time together. Okay?”
A smile spread across her expression and her entire face lit up. “You got it, brother. We’ll go to my room then.”
I nodded and the girls scattered away. Maxim got up, preparing to leave too.
“Not you,” I said in a cold voice. The tension in my jaw and shoulders was ready to snap, but I had never lost my temper with him. Through all the years, right or wrong, I had always protected him. But now, he went too far.
We had never looked less alike than we did right now. His abuse of drugs had aged him. His eyes were dull and unfocused, his hands slightly shaking.
“Have you run the paperwork on the new manufacturing plant for me?” I had given him the task two weeks ago. It was a two day job. I had taken care of it already, but he had been too high to notice it.
“I will. Next week.”
I shook my head. “Have you acquired more servers?”
He shrugged.
Once upon a time, Maxim could run circles around the top programmers and could set up a dark web within seconds. Now, I ran it all and oversaw everything, covering for his shortfalls. I started to wonder if I didn’t do him a disservice by going easy on him our entire life.
But now I felt a stronger urge to protect Tatiana from my brother’s demons and whatever her dead husband had brought to her doorstep.
“How did your meeting with the Yakuza go?” I asked casually.
