Chapter Thirty-Two
LUKYAN VOLKOV
“Oh, shit.”
His body rammed into me and hit me with the force of a fucking freight train. He picked me up in a running tackle and slammed me up against Sergei’s desk. A knife came speeding toward my face.
I blocked it just in time, holding it away from my eye.
“What the fuck, Mr. Average?! I thought we were friends!”
Vernon growled, trying to drive the knife forward and pierce my stunning blue eyes. How dare he! They were my best feature!
While holding his wrists in place to ensure the blade didn’t get any closer, I swung my elbow up in a swift move, hitting him in the jaw. He barely moved. Barely fucking felt it. I hit him again and again, and still, the blade kept coming, inching closer and closer to me.
“Get”—whack—“the fuck”—whack—“off me!” Whack. Whack. Whack.
The dude didn’t budge, and my arms were beginning to tire. I didn’t have much longer. I needed to get the fuck out of that position quickly, or I was going to end up joining Sergei.
Think. It slid an inch forward. Think. Another inch. Think—
I flung my arm out to the side, clasped a glass snow globe, and smashed it into the side of his face.
He roared in anger, fumbling backward. I kicked him in the chest. He grunted at the impact, shuffling back another few steps. I got back onto my feet and moved away from the desk. I needed space. The freedom to move around. Getting backed into a corner with that dude was not a good idea.
Vernon cracked his neck. The knife was still in his hands.
With a twirl, he switched it into a reverse grip, the jagged edge facing outward for maximum damage.
He seemed to change right before my eyes.
Where I had once deemed him as an unassuming man, quiet and non-threatening, he was suddenly the complete opposite. Deceiving. Lethal. Dangerous.
Turned out, we had a lot more in common than I thought.
I palmed the other blade behind my back and flipped it to match his grip. We eyed each other cautiously as we circled around the room.
“Who are you?” I asked. His footwork was impeccable, his stance immaculate. He was a man with training, that much was clear, and that made him a man to be weary of.
“I’m the man hired to watch over Sergei.”
It was the most I’d ever heard him speak.
My gaze flicked to the man in question, dead in his chair, and back to him. “You ain’t doin’ a very good job. No offense.”
Noises reached my ears from the rest of the house. Sounds of battle. Fighting. Screaming and gunshots. That was when I knew Sergei’s last act before he died was completely and utterly fucking us over.
“You’ll die for that,” Vernon said, his body tensing. There was no more discussion. He struck hard and fast, swinging his blade in a powerful arc upward. I reared back, avoiding the strike as the blade whistled through the air.
He twisted immediately and went to stab me in the thigh. I pivoted, light as a feather on my feet, and swung my elbow back. He blocked it by placing his palm up near his face and tried to jab me in the stomach. Our blades clashed as I brought mine up to intercept.
We locked into an intense knife fight, slashing and hacking at one another with deadly, quick strikes.
He was very good. Fast as fuck, and not at all hesitant in his moves or attacks.
He got me a few times, slicing up my forearms and biceps.
They were superficial wounds. Nothing to be concerned about.
The adrenaline hammering inside me masked the pain, making sure I could barely feel the thing.
I kicked the knife out of his hands. It clattered to the ground.
The fucker tried to tackle me again. I swerved out of the way, twisted so I was at his back, wrapped my arm around his neck, and stabbed him in the chest from behind.
He cried out in pain, struggling against me.
I pulled the knife out and struck again, stabbing him in a different spot.
I did it over and over and over again, hacking away at him with fury.
Even when he started to slowly sink to his knees, I kept going, like a man utterly possessed.
The squelch of each impact was like music to my fucking ears.
I finally let him go, and he fell to his back, choking and gagging on his own blood. Brown eyes looked up at me, full of pain and anger.
“You—have no idea—what you’ve done,” he gasped out. A puddle of red began to form around him.
I panted, slightly out of breath, my chest heaving.
“They’ll come for you for this. You’ll—all—die.”
Dropping to one knee at his side, I grasped his shirt and pulled him toward me. “Who? Who will come?”
He smiled, and it was eerily familiar to the one Sergei gave me during his final moments. Triumphant. “Everyone.” Then, he slumped, dead.
I rose back to my full height and put my hands on my hips. “Well, that was ominous as fuck.”
I didn’t waste another second thinking about it.
I didn’t have the luxury. If I just got attacked, it was likely my father and Autumn had been too.
My father told me he’d started gathering numbers for a coup against Sergei, but whether they would fight with him, instead of against him, I didn’t know.
Until I knew more, I had to assume it was just us three together.
I bolted out of the office. My body collided with another one the second I stepped out into the hall.
A knife came speeding toward me without hesitation.
I blocked it, holding his wrist at bay, and rammed my knee into his stomach.
He curled over, sucking in a harsh breath.
I wrapped both arms around his head and snapped his neck.
Another one of Sergei’s soldiers came zooming around the corner. He raised his machine gun.
Christ.
I threw myself to the side, bringing the dead body of the soldier I’d just killed with me. He served as a shield, bullets meant for me hammering into his back. I threw my knife as I rolled us, my blade slamming into the other soldier, right between his eyes.
I got up quickly, my senses on high alert. Disarming both men seemed like the most prudent thing to do, so I quickly stripped them of their weapons and kept them for myself.
“Lukyan!”
I spun quickly, my gun up and taking aim.
My father appeared at the end of the hall. Autumn was at his side, both of them covered head to toe in blood and…Is that someone’s ear in her hair? Jesus. There were four soldiers with them, but they weren’t attacking them. No. They were protecting them. Guarding them.
What the fuck is going on?
My brain ran a mile a minute, trying to piece it all together.
“You alright?” he asked, jogging over to me.
“Fine.” I nodded. “You know what’s happening?”
He shook his head. “No idea. Sergei’s men just attacked us out of nowhere.”
“Yeah,” Autumn agreed. “And it wasn’t like an, Oh, I just wanna teach you a lesson kind of attack. It was a I wanna fucking murder you kind of attack. And we’ve got no clue why. They just turned on us.”
“I think I know why.” I dropped to one knee and pulled out the pendant I had suspected was around the dead soldier’s neck at my feet. It was lit up brightly.
Autumn’s eyes widened. “Hey. Those soldiers who attacked us had those too.”
“So did Sergei. Right before I killed him, he activated the one around his neck.”
“Wait, you killed him?” Father asked. “He’s dead?”
“He’s dead. So is Mr. Average. He came bursting into the room right after, and tried to kill me because of it. He said something. Something concerning.”
Father kept a close eye on our surroundings. “What? What did he say?”
“That they’ll come for us. That we’re all going to die.”
“Who is coming for us?” Autumn’s face hardened with strength and determination.
“Everyone.” My gaze flicked between them.
“He said, ‘everyone’. I think this was Sergei’s final plan.
He knew we were trying to kill him, and he came up with something that ensured if we succeeded, we’d die too.
This necklace is some sort of beacon. When he activated his, all the others tied to it activated, too, signaling them to attack. ”
“Not all of the soldiers have them, though.” Autumn pointed to the four men standing guard at the end of the hall.
“He might have only given them to the people he could one hundred percent trust. If he suspected soldiers were turning against him, Sergei would have been selective about who he included in his final plan.”
Sounded right. “We have to clear the grounds. Anyone with these pendants is a target.”
“Agreed.” Father nodded. “Let’s get to it.”
We got into formation, Father in the lead, Autumn and I at his back, and the four soldiers behind us.
We made our way through the house, sweeping every room as we went.
Dead bodies littered the floor. Blood coated the walls.
Father and Autumn confirmed they weren’t responsible for some of the bodies, which meant the soldiers with pendants weren’t just trying to kill us.
They were trying to kill anyone who didn’t have one.
Anyone Sergei didn’t trust. Which turned out to be half of his forces.
We worked to clear the house first. It was hard, but we worked together well, and along the way, we came across more soldiers who were being targeted.
When they saw my father, strong and powerful, cutting his way through the enemy like it was nothing, they joined us, his strength giving them strength.
It was what always made him such a great leader—the ability to inspire and embolden those around him.
People flocked to him and the power he exuded, looking for support.
Guidance. Help. And at that moment, a moment of uncertainty where they weren’t sure who the fuck they could trust, my father was a like a beacon of light in the darkness.
Following him was the easiest decision in the world. I would follow him into death, and I knew I wasn’t the only one.
By the time we’d cleared the house, our numbers had increased to twelve. Fifteen including Father, Autumn, and me. We’d lost a few along the way, which was unfortunate but unavoidable
“Now what?” I asked, slightly out of breath. We stood in the foyer of the mansion, gathered together, all looking to my father for the next step.
He didn’t crumble under the pressure before him. “Now we clear the grounds. Look outside.”
I did as he asked, peeking out through one of the windows next to the front door. It was chaos out there. People were running everywhere, in every direction, not sure who was friend or foe. Total fucking carnage.
“We’re not safe until we eliminate every single person with those fucking pendants.” Father turned to the soldiers behind him. “Kill anyone you deem as a threat. No one lives.”
“Yes, sir!” they all yelled.
Something caught my eyes in the distance. What the fuck is that? “Father?”
He must have sensed something in my voice because he came right to me, looking over my shoulder. “Fuck.”
Half a dozen cars came speeding down the road. They rammed straight into the gates, not even slowing down, completely bowling them over. People got out and immediately started attacking.
“Those aren’t Sergei’s men,” Autumn said, her face a mask of worry.
“How do you know that?” I asked, checking the magazine of my machine gun. I didn’t have many bullets left.
She pointed to a man slicing through people like fucking butter. “That’s Morris Tyrell. He’s an assassin. So is she,” she said, pointing again. “Maggie Jones.”
“What?” Pieces clicked into place, and dread filled me. “Vernon said ‘everyone’ would be coming. He didn’t just mean Sergei’s soldiers.” I looked closer at the new arrivals. I pointed a finger. “They’ve got those fucking pendants.”
Father cursed.
“Sergei must have paid them to come if things went bad.” Autumn’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “They’ll be under contract. Obligated to follow it through regardless if Sergei is alive or not.”
“We’re fucked!” one of the soldiers behind us yelled. “We should just run! We’re going to die! We’re all going to die—”
Another soldier slapped him across the face. “Pull yourself together!”
“No one is running,” Father growled. “You shoulder your fucking weapon and fight, or I’ll kill you myself.”
“Fuck,” I breathed out. “There’s more.” Another three cars came racing toward the house.
The look on my father’s face mirrored my own thoughts. He knew we most likely weren’t going to get out of there alive. There were just too many of them. Too many to try to take down on our own.
I stood taller, refusing to let even a sliver of fear take root inside me. If I was going to die, I was going to take as many of those fuckers down with me as I could.
Father nodded, face solemn. He gripped the side of my face and brought his forehead to rest against mine. “You’re not too much,” he whispered. “You’re perfect, just the way you are. Remember that.”
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath in. His words meant more to me than he would ever know.
He pulled back to look at Autumn and smiled. “Love you, Devil Woman.”
She smiled back. “Love you back, Your Royal Grouchiness.”
Father allowed himself one more moment of weakness, his eyes filling with so much emotion it seemed to almost cripple him before he shut it down, a dark, evil beast rising in his place.
He raised his gun into the air and roared, “Kill them all!”
“KILL THEM ALL!” we roared back and ran out of the house.