Page 66 of Shattered Altar (Makarova Bratva Duet)

“No.”

“Then why ask?”

“Maybe it will help me… to know.”

I smirk. “Help you resist me? Or help you feel okay succumbing?”

She stares at me with a desperate look in her eye. Then she turns away fast to stop me deciphering it.

I just want to grab her and shake her. I want her to unravel right in front of my eyes so I can see all the broken pieces she’s trying to hold together.

“Please don’t tell my brother. He won’t understand.”

“Don’t force my hand, Olivia,” I say. “It’s that simple.”

“Have you always gotten your way?”

The question is asked without judgment. She’s just curious about me. How I operate, how I’m put together on the inside. Much the same way I’m curious about her.

“I don’t get my way. I make it.”

“How can you maintain any relationship like that?”

I frown. “What do you mean?”

“I mean exactly that. Relationships, romantic or otherwise, require compromise. Give and take. If you’re always getting your way, surely that means everyone else gets the short end of the stick.”

“I’m the don.”

“So?” she scoffs. “That means that everyone just yields to you?”

“When they don’t, I fight. Unfortunately for everyone else, I’m very, very good at it.”

She takes a deep breath. “I don’t think your mother is happy, you know.”

I’m already uncomfortable with the liking that my mother has taken towards Olivia. Her statement only makes me more so. “Oh? Did she tell you that?”

“Of course not,” Olivia covers up quickly. “But I can tell.”

I nod. “Interesting.”

She leans forward on her elbows, her eyes searching my face. “Don’t you care?”

“If I can’t do anything about it, caring is a waste of time.”

“But she’s your mother.”

“And?”

She blinks at me before shaking her head. “I don’t understand you.”

“I’d advise you not to try.”

“Do they beat it out of you young?” she asks, her tone flickering with ice. “The humanity? The compassion?”

I smile. “More like they train the cruelty into you. But they didn’t have to do much work with me.”

“And that makes you proud?”

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