Page 38 of The Bratva's Forced Kidnapped Bride
I picked up a knife, tossing it between my hands, staring at the empty chair, still picturing Masha there. That was as far as my imagination would allow me to go. I couldn’t find a way to think it would be possible to drag that sharp edge anywhere on her soft, pale skin.
As mad as she was at herself for inadvertently putting her family into the middle of a war, I was pissed at myself for wanting her more than I wanted to make her suffer. It should have been funny that she was actually suffering, knowing she’d basically handed me the ammunition I needed to take out both my rivals, but not even that was any comfort. It only added to my anger somehow.
There was a lot to unpack there. A lot I didn’t want to face. Thankfully, Uncle Miron called before I could find some excuseto go back to the room—my own room—and make sure Masha was all right. When I was the one who was still in pain!
“Yes?” I said dully as I walked up the stairs and back into daylight. As bright as it was outside, with desert sunshine pouring in through every window, my mood was stormy and dark. This should have been easy. Kidnap my torturer, get revenge, take back what was mine.
What went wrong? I knew the answer, but it would have to stay packed up for now. Maybe forever, because it wouldn’t help a damn thing, and I didn’t want to know how much worse anything could get.
“I just heard about Enzo Santino going missing,” he said.
“That was fast.”
“So you did have something to do with it?”
I sighed. “It’s taken care of, Miron. You don’t have to worry about it, but I think it’s best if we don’t get into bed with the Organization, so to speak.”
“Leonid is already making deals with them,” he said, and I could almost hear him shaking his head in disgust.
“He’s not still trying to get everyone to agree with handing everything over to Konstantin’s widow?” I asked, scrambling to get the conversation away from the Collective. I was about eighty percent sure they’d take the bait and blame the Fokins for Enzo’s death, but I wouldn't breathe completely easily until Masha was out of danger.
“That foul woman,” he sputtered. “We learned that she was having an affair that probably preceded your brother’s death. With one of the Arganov sons.”
Oh, this was great. One of our biggest rivals is in Volgograd. When we were there, Masha had jokingly said thatmy family could have its own reality show, since there was so much drama, quickly adding that hers probably could too. My first instinct was to tell her this new part of the saga with Konstantin’s scheming widow, but she was currently locked in the bathroom stewing after trying to make sure I never had any heirs. The woman was too far under my skin.
I thought Miron was going to keep complaining about this, but he swerved right back to my little problem.
“I think you’re not telling me everything,” he said, like a headmaster trying to get someone to confess to cheating on an exam. Which meant he knew everything.
I inwardly swore, trying to recount everyone who was there yesterday. Someone was answering to Miron, and I didn’t like it. “Jakob,” I said, accusal in my voice.
Some distant second or third cousin, he had followed us back, eager to start out in LA and swearing up and down no job would be too small. Of course, he was on my uncle’s payroll, keeping an eye on me.
“This wasn’t part of the deal of me helping you out,” I hissed.
“Help us out?” he said. “As if we’re some street urchins you’ve taken pity on? We’re your family, though you forgot long enough. We must stick together.”
“By spying.”
He cleared his throat. “You didn’t call and ask how things should be handled,” he said coldly.
“Because I didn’t need you to tell me how things should be handled,” I told him, enunciating every word. “I’ve been getting along just fine, better than fine, without your input, butas soon as Konstantin shuffled off, you came running to find me, remember?”
“Please be respectful of your brother’s memory,” he sniffed.
“Why? Because he was double-dealing and cheating you since he took over? Because he married some gold digger who tried to take everything you and Leonid and everyone else worked for for generations?” I was just getting started, but Miron cleared his throat again, and suddenly I was tired of fighting for a family that hadn’t fought very hard for me.
“He did marry unwisely,” he admitted, then let me have it with both barrels. “As it seems you might have. It was a shock that you brought home a Fokin, but we considered that it might be a bridge to a valuable alliance. But can’t you see Masha has just put us in the middle of something dangerous as well as ruining our chances of making the Collective an ally?”
“So you know,” I said. Jakob was on the first plane back to Russia, and he should count himself lucky if I didn’t break more than two or three bones before I sent him on his way.
“That it was Masha who killed Enzo Santino? Yes. We think you should renounce her and hand her over to the Collective. Throw yourself on their mercy.”
All of those suggestions made me want to punch a wall. “Like hell,” I said.
“As stubborn as your father,” he muttered. “But as many times as that worked for him, it just as often didn’t. This is a big problem she’s gotten you into.”
He continued to talk in his calm, reasonable manner, explaining things I already knew and fully understood. My wife was a liability, and it was likely that my ruse wouldn’t work andJulio Santino would figure out I was behind it, bringing him down on me and possibly causing repercussions as far as Russia. Everything could be solved, including my original objective, if I did what he asked.
