Page 57 of The Russian's Forced Bride
“We’re talking about Joaquin here,” Maxim reminded me. “I’m not surprised he was able to pull a perfect stunt like this.”
A perfect stunt like erasing Mateo’s entire existence and creating a new one for him.
Fuck.
My heart suddenly started racing as a strange feeling crept into my heart, flooding my head with images of Arlette lying with a slit-open throat in a pool of her own blood. I didn’t waste any time as I dialed her number. There was still time. I could warn her and get home right now.
But each time I called, it went straight to voicemail.
I then reached out to the two men I had ordered to always watch her, and on the first ring, one of the men picked up—his voice fucking groggy, like he had just awoken from sleep instead of doing his job.
“Where is she?” I wasted no time asking.
“She left with her brother about some hours back. But she’s fine, Boss, they do this all the time,” the bastard assured me.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
I ended the call, my hands quivering as my head spun. And then I was back at that mansion. Trapped in that fucking room with the sound of water dripping in the distance. It was dark, cold, and my lungs couldn’t take in as much air as I needed.
I couldn’t breathe. I loosened my tie, running both hands through my hair in frustration before slamming my phone against the desk, pacing around restlessly as Maxim’s eyes watched me.
“Calm down.” Maxim’s voice was leveled, controlled. “Knowing Joaquin, he won’t hurt her right off the bat. He’s probably keeping her as bait.”
I was trying to be calm, but it wasn’t working. The thought that I let that bastard live for this long when I had every chance to kill him made me mad. I grabbed my phone from the desk, dialing Arlette’s number one last time, and surprisingly, it went through.
“Kroshka.” I sighed in relief—only for a snicker on the other end of the phone to cause my insides to twist.
“Who could’ve known, Rafael, that all I had to do to get on your nerves was take your little plaything from—”
“I will kill you,” I snarled into the phone.
“Oof,” Joaquin laughed. “So you do have that Kamarov fire in you. But you see, I’d be careful,amigo. We don’t want that video going all over the internet, now do we?”
I scoffed, feeling blood start to drip from my palms at how hard my nails dug into my skin in anger. “I don’t give two fucks what you decide to do with that video, Saavedra. Touch a strandof hair on my wife’s head, and I will have your head delivered to your family.”
Joaquin laughed—a manic one that made you wonder if he really wasn’t just sick in the head. He felt powerful, having me lose it.
He felt he had won. He had made me snap.
But he wasn’t ready for the hell he had let loose.
His irritating voice then seeped through the speakers, “Well, it’s not my fault, Rafael. At least, unlike you, my nephew cared way more about your pregnant wife than you did. It was nice talking to you,amigo, but this is where this game ends. I won.”
The line went dead.
But one word kept ringing in my head like the chiming of bells.
It echoed tauntingly.
Pregnant.
Pregnant. Arlette was…pregnant.
And then it all dawned on me. All the times she looked sickly and pale. The oversized hoodies she had been wearing for weeks. And how it felt like she always had something to say.
But I never gave her the time of day. In my eyes, I had been protecting her by isolating her. I was too busy playing these psychological and financial games with Joaquin. Too blindsided by my own ego.
Why hadn’t I just killed him at the club? For the Bratva’s sake, I kept my composure. I wasn’t just a murderer anymore—I was a strategist—and a sick, twisted part of me enjoyed destroying all Joaquin had worked hard for slowly. But that didn’t matter now, because I hadn’t put a bullet through his skull when the opportunity presented itself.
