Page 91 of Corruption

Despite everything, I’m relieved to see her. Despite everything, I know I’m safe when I’m with her.

“Hush, Pretty Girl,” Nadia says, placing a kiss on my forehead. “I’ve got you. I’ve got you.”

“Vaughn. He…”

“I know. Isaak told us everything.” Nadia begins to lead me back out the woods with two of her men dealing with the bodies of the guards.

“No. No he didn’t. Vaughn—Where’s Alik?” I say upon noticing Nadia’s husband isn’t here.

“Confronting Vaughn. He’s gone too far now. The Fantonis. You. Beating his son almost to death.”

“Alone?”

“Wouldn’t be the—”

“He’s going to kill him.”

“I wish Alik would. But alas, they’re brothers.”

She’s lying. I can see it in her eyes. Alik has every intention of killing his brother, and Nadia knows it.

She continues, “Besides. Doesn’t mean it’s going to be pretty for—”

“No. Vaughn is going to kill Alik.”

“He’s not. If he hasn’t after this long—”

“He was looking for a reason to. He knew if he didn’t have a reason to kill Alik, no one would back him for it, and it might start a war.”

“What reason does—”

“I’m pregnant.”

Nadia stops guiding me out the woods to look at me, stunned. Then her wide-eyed gaze turns into a frown.

“Yeah… that would definitely give Vaughn a decent enough reason.”

34

Alik

You don’t live to your mid-thirties when your family is in the business of black market weapons, violence, and other major crime without having great instincts, whether natural or honed from experience. So when I get to Vaughn’s house, I know something’s not right. Well. Nothing has been right with our family for years now. So maybe the more accurate way to describe the feeling is that I know something’s going to irrevocably change today.

The last time I had a feeling like this was when my father ordered the deaths of Nadia’s entire family and bloodline. Nadia was in the car next to me as my new, reluctant bride. I had no thought of what I was going to do with a bride or whether I even wanted one when I approached Nadia with the proposal eight years ago. Just that it was the only way to possibly save her from the judgment my father had decided he was going to bring down on her.

I didn’t give her any choice in the matter. Just immediately called to make the arrangements after the meeting where my father declared the judgment. Picked her up from her house and took her to the church where a priest and two witnesses were waiting. I explained to her what was happening and that I wasn’t taking no for an answer. Somehow, I managed to get the words out calmly despite my heart racing in anxiousness and my hand clutching my gun in case my father had already sent someone to execute his judgment.

I wasn’t wrong.

My fatherhadalready sent someone to get Nadia, so our priest married us with one of our witnesses bleeding out on the floor and us ducked behind the alter for cover while I periodically waited for a lull in the attack before standing up and shooting precise shots back at our attackers. Just long enough for Nadia and I to be married and invoke my right to reserve the judgment against her as her husband.

The remainder of my father’s men who had come after us escorted us back to where my father was waiting. By the end of the day, I’d had the bulk of my inheritance stripped from me and had every finger on my hand broken. But Nadia and I had gotten out of the encounter alive. I had gotten away with standing up to my father for the first time when it should have been a death sentence.

My brother waits for me in the very same house where eight years ago, everything changed. For the worse and for the better. Something tells me it’s going to be much the same this time.

This wouldn’t be the first time in my brother’s tenure that I’ve stormed into this house to confront him over something stupid he did that could endanger the brotherhood. Blaming Addy for killing our father when he knew full well she was innocent. Throwing his fiancé out naked in the cold.

However, storming to confront him this time feels different than those times. It feels ominous. Just like that day I was escorted in with Nadia to see my father.

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