Page 132 of Lies He Told Me (Bratva Crime Syndicate 1)

“It’s been a pleasure.” Walsh grabs my chain-link leash and nods to Osip, who’s already leaving. “We’ll be in touch.” To me, he says, “Come now.”

Struggling is no use. My limbs are tired and woozy from the drugs Osip injected me with back at the fake police station. When I try to fall to stop him, he merely scoops me up again like a rag doll.

Seconds later, it seems, we’re in his car.

“Now,” Walsh says, looking at me with a gleam in his eyes that’s downright terrifying. “What are we going to do with you?”

32

Gavril

The blackness extends everywhere. There is a wall three feet to my left, another about the same distance to my right, same for in front of me and behind me.

Outside the darkness, there is nothing. No sound, no sight. Hardly any thought.

There’s no way to escape.

I sense only pain. The Skull Kings beat me thoroughly before I blacked out.

At some point, the light snaps on, the door opens, and Osip saunters in with a gun. So, this is it, then.

“You lied,” I say. It hurts to talk, to breathe.

“So?”

“But you didn’t …” I need to know the truth. However horrible it is.

Osip grins. “Gave her to Walsh. He wanted a new toy. Must’ve broken the last one already.”

I struggle against the ropes holding me. “You bastard.”

“She’s got a temper on her, I’ll give you that. You always did like ’em feisty. Me, I prefer the ones who don’t put up a fuss. Or can’t.”

I sag back to the wall. “So you’re here to kill me now.”

“I am.” He cocks the rifle nonchalantly and presses it into my forehead. “Any last words?”

“You don’t have to do this.”

“Fuck’s sake, I know I don’t have to do this! Stop telling me what to do.”

I breathe. We wait.

“You aren’t scared?” he asks a beat later.

“I know who I am.” It isn’t an answer, but at the same time, it is.

“Worried? Mad?”

“Just do it, Osip.”

“Sad?”

“Just do it!”

“Stop telling me what to do! Fuck!”

Osip chucks the gun aside and starts punching me. My aching body tries to fight back, tries to block his blows. But I don’t. I can’t.

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