16. NIKOLAI
Chapter sixteen
T he cigarette burned between my fingers as I lifted it to my lips. I drew in a deep drag, let the smoke coil against the roof of my mouth, and exhaled into the frigid, damp night. The tendril drifted, curling upward like a ghost.
The Sacrifice was in full swing, just across the street from where I waited. I had eyes on every exit, every window. I’d been standing here monitoring the camera feeds for the past hour.
I could’ve sent someone else. Should’ve, maybe. I had men trained to tail, protect, and report. I owned an entire security firm, for fuck’s sake.
But she was mine to look after.
And tonight, I was on edge.
The moment Carmine had called, I’d known something had gone sideways.
Last night, I’d finally cracked the club’s internal system.
For now, I only had access to the security cameras.
Delgado paid well for his network protection, but it wouldn’t hold up much longer.
It was only a matter of time before I’d be able to peel back the layers, gut the code, and strip it down until I owned it.
But I didn’t need to see anything else to know what Delgado was doing here.
He’d shown up in person tonight.
Front table. Center seat.
And she had danced like her fucking life depended on it.
Because it did.
I’d watched it all from my phone. Every roll of her hips. Every breath.
Something deep inside me had erupted into fury every time she turned her eyes toward Delgado.
She’d been performing for him—only him.
And I had almost lost my goddamn mind.
At one point, she’d missed a grip—slightly, but I’d caught it. Then her entire demeanor had changed. She’d looked directly at him, remaining frozen for a half-second before shifting into overdrive—sensuality distilled and served like fine wine in a crystal flute.
I took another drag, holding it in so the nicotine could settle my simmering anger.
The bastard hadn’t come to drink. He’d come to measure her worth—her loyalty.
She must’ve known it.
And yet…she’d calmly seduced him. Right there onstage. In front of every man in the room. She moved with slow, powerful confidence, as if offering her body to a man like him was nothing.
My cock had responded like a goddamn traitor with her every bend, roll, and thrust.
She’d submitted.
Not to me.
To fucking Delgado.
My fists clenched.
She wasn’t some inexperienced little lamb after all. The way she moved—like seduction was second nature to her—told me everything. She knew exactly what she was doing and what it would do to a man like him.
And I hated her for it.
I hated how she made me want her more with every passing second.
What did she think this was?
Some game?
A performance to earn favor with the devil?
Even now, I could see her in my mind—knees wide, wrists crossed in front of her cunt like she was begging for handcuffs, giving him that soft little smile, offering herself up.
Christ.
I needed to get control of myself.
Needed to get control of her .
She didn’t even know how close she was to being torn apart.
I flicked the cigarette butt into the gutter and crossed the street. The bass from inside The Sacrifice hummed through my body as I turned the corner and entered the alley behind the club.
Around back, I stepped into the space between two dumpsters.
The minutes dragged on as I waited for her to leave.
My mind drifted to Delgado’s man showing up at Xyst with Jarvis Hayes yesterday.
Xyst wasn’t a playground anymore, and those boys running the place weren’t bystanders.
It was time they became made men—bound by blood, by silence, by oath—swearing allegiance to me.
I wouldn’t take loyalty that wasn’t freely given.
Only the willing survived. They would need to bend the knee or get out of the way.
Then the back door of the club creaked open, interrupting my thoughts.
Lyla stepped out, her sneakers whispering against the ground, that goddamn hoodie pulled up over her head. I was going to burn that thing and buy her a proper coat.
Her arms were crossed, her shoulders hunched, but her eyes…her eyes scanned the shadows.
She was looking for me.
Of course she was.
Fuck.
Now she expected me to be here. Why? To keep her safe? Or throw her up against a wall and kiss her until her knees buckled?
Near the end of the alley, she slowed down and hesitated, as though waiting for me to make a move on her.
I should have approached her, talked to her like a civilized human being.
But I didn’t.
I followed her, staying in the dark.
Let her walk alone.
I tracked her every step with my eyes, my boots silent on the concrete as I moved.
She couldn’t see me, but she sure as hell could feel me.
The tension in her spine, the glances over her shoulder, the way her breath caught when I drew just a little closer told me so.
The moment she disappeared into her building, I crossed the street, keyed in her code to escape the drizzle, and stepped into the vestibule, pulling up the camera feed for her living room to confirm she’d made it to her apartment.
As I waited, a scream tore through the stairwell.
High-pitched. Primal. Ripped straight from her lungs.
I didn’t think; I just moved.
I stormed up, boots hammering the stairs as I took them three at a time. There was another scream, muffled this time, and some scuffling just up above on the third floor.
“No! Stop—get off me!”
A man twice her size had her pinned to the wall, with his forearm to her throat and the other hand grappling for the doorknob behind her.
She stared up at him, wide-eyed, her face bloodless as he huffed out, “Shut the fuck up, you little whore.”
And those were the last words he would ever speak.
I closed the distance in two strides.
He turned his head at the sound of my approach.
“Too late. You’re dead!” I roared.
I grabbed him by the collar and yanked him backward with enough force to crack his spine.
He hit the opposite wall with a grunt.
I slammed my fist into his throat, then reached behind him and grabbed him by the back of his hair and secured him in a chokehold. My face was inches from his as his hand clawed at my jacket, scrambling for a grip.
“Wrong girl,” I growled.
He bucked and twisted, but it was no use. I swung my other arm around him, my fingers hooking his ear. I wrenched his head sideways with a powerful tug until his neck gave with a sickening crack.
His limp body dropped into a crumpled pile of dead weight.
Lyla stood frozen, hands over her mouth. Her eyes were wild with terror, darting between me and the guy on the floor at my feet.
“Good to know,” I muttered, turning away from her. “You still have the capacity to be afraid.”
I dragged the corpse into the man’s apartment and kicked the door shut behind me.
When I turned back, she hadn’t moved.
“Go to your apartment,” I said flatly. “Now.”
But she didn’t.
She shook her head, backed up a step, and pointed a shaking finger at me.
“You—you’re a fucking madman,” she spat. Her voice cracked. “You killed him. Just—just murdered him like it was nothing. Like Carlos did. Like all of you goddamn monsters!”
I took one step toward her.
She skittered back—but only a few feet. Then she stopped, trembling. Her hand was pressed against the wall as if she needed it to stay upright.
I exhaled once through my nose and closed the distance between us. My hand caught her by the back of the neck.
Her breath hitched.
Firmly, I pulled her toward me and rested my forehead on hers. Her chest rose and fell in short bursts.
I inhaled deeply.
Her fear was so tangible, I could taste it.
Something feral uncoiled inside me as the primal instinct after a kill roared to the surface—demanding I claim her, fuck her right there until she was moaning against the very door where a dead man lay cooling inches away.
“Run,” I whispered.
Then I let her go.
As though she’d suddenly been released from a spell, she spun and raced up the stairs. The clatter of her footsteps echoed loudly in the narrow stairwell.
I didn’t move.
I just stood there, listening. A few seconds later, her apartment door slammed shut.
Silence settled like ash.
Maybe this was for the best.
She needed to see this side of me.
The cold-blooded killer. The man born and bred to rule the underworld.
Justice wasn’t necessarily pretty. It didn’t always come via court order. Sometimes it came in the shape of a broken neck.
Joel Epstein had a record five inches thick—sealed and buried under bribes, backroom deals, and the kind of favors traded in dark corners of the system.
He should’ve already been serving time. Should’ve been labeled a sexual predator.
But instead, his charges had been quietly reduced in each case—sexual assault downgraded to misdemeanor battery, victim statements sealed, evidence “misplaced.” Justice hadn’t just looked the other way; it had rolled over.
I’d researched every tenant in this building, and Epstein stood out like a stain—a man who’d left a trail of broken lives behind him. And tonight, he’d gone too far, putting his hands on Lyla, making her afraid.
He’d gotten exactly what he deserved.
And if Lyla was going to survive in this world, she needed to understand that.
The underworld had its own kind of order, lines you didn’t cross.
Here, rules didn’t come from honor; they were born from necessity.
They were brutal, but they existed for a reason.
They were the only thing separating men like me—killers with principles—from the monsters who trafficked in flesh.
Without people like me, men like Epstein would be kings.
Power protected. Weakness meant death.
She’d learn.
Or she’d break.
I pulled out my phone.
Clean-up on aisle two. Sending the location now. One body, 3B. No damage to me or the girl.
A reply came mere seconds later from the on-call DarkMatter crew. Understood . We’re on it. ETA 10 .
I shot Rory a quick text: Pick me up. Now.