Page 83 of Shattered Altar (Makarova Bratva Duet)

Rob looks around and the color drains from his face. His eyes are desperate and searching, but there’s no changing the reality. No way to spin this as a victory for him.

Aleks Makarova holds all the cards.

His shoulders slump. “Drop your weapons!” he barks into an invisible microphone in his shirt cuff. “Now.”

None of his agents listen. They keep their weapons up despite the Bratva guns jammed into their jaws.

“Do it!” Rob bellows.

Finally, after some hesitation, the agents drop their weapons, one by one.

Looking amused, Aleks moves closer to me, angling his body just behind mine. I see Rob’s eyes bulge. He makes a fumbling grab for his gun, and I don’t understand why—until I feel cold metal press to the side of my head.

The stench and weight of Aleks’s gun sends shivers of fear racing through me. Oil and metal and blood. Heavy with death.

Would he really shoot me? Something inside of me is saying no. But I don’t think I can trust my own intuition anymore.

Truth be told, I haven’t been able to trust myself since I first met Aleks. Since I learned who he really was. I should hate him, but I don’t. I can’t.

And that’s all I need to know to know that I cannot be trusted.

“This is what you did, Robert,” Aleks says calmly. “She is at my mercy now because you decided to overplay your hand.”

“Drop your weapon, motherfucker!” Rob screams.

“You first.”

Rob’s hand is white-knuckling on the butt of his holstered service pistol. But every single soul in the room but him knows he can’t draw it. Or rather, won’t draw it, for fear of what would happen to me if he does.

And eventually, he realizes the truth, too: that he’s lost. I can see the defeat splattered across his face.

I’m sorry,he mouths to me.

I close my eyes and crinkle my nose, the same way Dad used to do when we were kids. I wish I could say something to him. Something that will convince him I’ll be okay, no matter what.

But my throat is locked down tight. I can’t even seem to get a sound out. Breathing itself is hard.

“Order your men to leave,” Aleks says. “Now.”

“L-leave?” Rob stammers.

Aleks nods. “I want them out of here in two minutes or I will blow her pretty little head off. What are you going to tell your mother, Robert? What are you going to tell Mia? That your baby sister is dead because you refused to sacrifice your pride?”

“Keep my family’s names out of your mouth, you fucking snake.”

“Ninety seconds left, Agent Lawrence.”

Rob raises his hidden microphone once again and gives the command in a mumbled growl. There’s scattered talk, but a minute later, I see motion through the windows. The agents set their weapons down and retreat to their vehicles, with Aleks’s men shadowing close at their backs.

Rob looks at Aleks with uncertainty. “My men—”

“As long as they cooperate, none of them will be hurt,” he says.

We all watch in strangled silence as the FBI agents load up into their vans and disappear.

Rob stays where he is, mired in loneliness and despair a few feet away. He’s still got his gun in his holster, but his hand hangs next to it, limp and useless. He might as well be unarmed.

Aleks raises his hand to the side of his face as someone gives him a report through the earpiece. He nods once and turns his gaze on Rob. “Looks like you’re alone, Robert. The way it should have been from the beginning.”

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