Page 34 of In Her Blood
The feeling in Otto’s chest mutated into an anger that better matched the look on Pyotr’s face, and he took a large step forward. That shit was over.
His fingers had only brushed the handle of his gun when another clicked at his ear. “So sorry, Otto,” Grisha said. “You know how it is.”
Son of a bitch.
Lina folded her arms over her chest, her eyes flicking in Otto’s direction before narrowing again on Pyotr. “Awfully big talk for a coward who had to flip Pakhan Mikhail’s lawyer just to try and screw me out of my rightful inheritance, and then still wasn’t brave enough to own his identity when he called in the hit on my life.”
Pyotr’s hand tightened on the paper, crinkling it until it looked more like an old fan. “You shouldn’t be talking at all! Get—”
A smirk tipped Otto’s lips as Artem lowered a gun beside Pyotr’s temple and the air rushed out of the room. In another heartbeat, several men leapt from their seats, only for Artem’s men to match them with drawn weapons of their own. A subtle shift behind him told Otto even Grisha had become uncomfortable.
“What,” Pyotr finally breathed, “what the fuck is this?I’mpakhan now!”
“No,” Artem said, “you’re not. And I for one will never recognize you.”
“Pyotr,” Lina said, still mercifully without a single gun actually aimed her way, “the title of pakhan isn’t as easily decided as who owns this house. And if it were, well, obviouslyOtetswanted to complicate that for all of us.” When Pyotr’s brow twitched, she lifted her phone from her jeans pocket. “Oh, and if we’re deciding who owns the house based on one-sided printouts of questionably acquired wills, then you still lose. You should really have checked in before running your mouth, cousin. I got my signature on file.” She tucked her phone away. “Yesterday.”
Pyotr shifted. “Impo—”
Artem clicked his tongue. “If you think I won’t shoot, go ahead and take a step. But remember, Grisha’s a little preoccupied.”
“I could still pull my trigger,” Grisha said. Whatever discomfort Otto had heard, it didn’t carry into his voice.
Lina raised hers. “Iwillbecome pakhan. I will rip out however many cowards in here are dipping their toes into the Morozov pool, or any other. I will crush any closed-minded, sexist asshole who refuses me for no reason other than that I have a vagina.” She turned her head to glance around the room. “Newsflash, boys—guess where you came from? That person who had the strength to bring you into this world, who carried you inside her for months and gave you life? She had a goddamn vagina, too. We’re not weak.” She snapped the full force of her glare onto Grisha. “And I will prove that to every fucking one of you who gets in my way.”
Chapter eleven
Over the Line
Watching Grisha put agun to Otto’s head had snapped one of the last fraying ropes of Evelina’s sanity. It was good Artem had swooped in and used the men he’d pulled together to make a show of force when he had, or she might have ended up just getting them both killed. She knew she owed the man, again. But in truth, she barely rememberedhopping off the table after her speech. She had a vague memory of watching Pyotr make a wise retreat.
Probably she should have stuck around.
But if even a single asshole had gotten in her face with anything other than absolute compliance, she’d have started another scene. She knew it.
That was how she wound up marching all the way back into her suite, Otto half a foot behind. Her body was damn near vibrating with all the pent-up feelings and unreleased energy the morning had generated. Sitting still was the last thing she should be doing.
“Lina.”
She let out an exasperated sound, spinning in place. “Maybe we just kill them all. Burn everything down and start again. You, me, and Artem’s crew. Your dad’s cool, and I don’t have a problem with Kirill, so they can just conveniently be away when it goes down. What do you think?” She’d feel guilty, but it wasn’t like she knew for sure who was responsible for her father’s death, either. Hell, it had quite possibly been a complicated plot involving people from many groups. That kind of shit happened.
Otto’s hands settled on her shoulders. “Lina, breathe. You’d regret that eventually. We’ll figure this out.”
She dropped the side of a fist to his chest. “Grisha had his gun to your head, dammit!”
Otto’s lips twitched. “We both know that’s not the worst thing he’s done to me.”
His words were true, and Evelina never liked to remember that fight. A fight that had started between her and Pyotr likeso many others, until Pyotr had escalated it into the physical and actually wounded her—and Otto had stepped in to do his job. Grisha hadn’t just cut him off while Pyotr fled, he’d snapped Otto’s arm and wailed on Otto until Evelina’s shrieks had drawn her father’s staff into the room.
It was probably one of the only times her father had taken her side, even slightly. Though she had always been angry that Grisha stayed.
Evelina pushed the years’ old memory away and splayed her fingers over Otto’s chest, the fabric of his shirt rumpling beneath her movement. “Don’t defend him.”
“I’m not.”
She frowned.
Otto exhaled harshly, his grip tightening. “It’s not about me havin’ a gun to my head for a minute. What happened out there’s about you, Lina. That was”—his Adam’s apple bobbed with a hard swallow, as if he were searching for the right words or unsure how to speak them, and his hands dropped down to her waist—“fucking amazing. Watchin’ you up there was amazing, Lina.”
