Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
JACE
“Fucking finally.” Grant puffs at my belated entrance. Sitting on his black velvet king’s throne, he’s chomping on gummy bears and being a delightful dick as usual. “We can start now that Prince Pussy Whipped has arrived.”
“Fuck off.” My eldest brother, Sire, scoffs on my behalf. “We all wear a pussy crown with pride.”
“Ahem.” Nick, our gay brother, clears his thick, inked throat.
They’re all reclining on their thrones, drinks in hand, mouths shooting the shit.
“Sorry.” Sire nods respectfully toward Nick. “We also proudly wear big prick crowns.”
Nick raises his glass, tossing back a vodka shot as I close the door behind me.
“And if you say another word about the pussy I worship…” Crossing the room toward my throne, I warn Grant, “I’ll punch you so hard in your prick, Delphine will bury its pieces.”
Brotherly death threats and love: it’s how we roll.
“What is prick and pussy?”
Sasha, our newly discovered sister, leans over, whispering her innocent question to our mother. Sasha is Russian and trying to learn English, while Mom is trying not to whip our asses for corrupting our little sister. Sure, Sasha’s an adult, but our sister isn’t ruthless like us.
Yet.
“Penises and vaginas,” Mom answers Sasha, refusing to be ashamed of sex. “Sorry, dear. It’s all your brothers talk about.”
Understanding enough English, Sasha rolls her lips, amused.
“Excuse me?” Axel rules from his first king’s throne, sipping vodka. “We have something far more serious than sex to talk about tonight.”
Our other queens aren’t here. Their white velvet thrones are empty. Not that we exclude them from meetings, it’s just that they have more important work. They’re either home with their babies or doing their jobs like the recon mission I just sent Delphine on.
Grant won’t mind that I asked his wife to start following Vivian’s ex-husband. Once I called Delphine and told her what an abusive piece of shit he is, I couldn’t stop her.
“After we discuss this business”—I plop down on my throne—“I have another mission for us.”
“Two deadly missions at a time, please.” Sire jokes. He knows we can handle it.
“Fine.” Axel waves his inked hand. “Jace has a mission. We’re sure it’s named Vivian, and we’ll do it, but first, let’s discuss Sheremetev. We have intel he’s in town.”
Tension skyrockets in the room. Eyes dart to Sasha, and I don’t mind Axel’s humor about Vivian. He doesn’t know what I’ll tell them later, while we all know exactly what Valentin Sheremetev did to our sister.
“It’s what my torture extracted from our captive,” Loch seethes. “Sheremetev’s little bitch boy, Carter, choked up that Sheremetev bought an island for him and Sasha around here.”
“He not have me.” Sasha’s furious aqua eyes mirror Loch’s, her twin. “I bite his prick if he touch me again.”
While Sasha’s English isn’t perfect, scratch that not-ruthless part; she’s definitely our sister.
Valentin Sheremetev is our Bratva father’s archenemy. Those two have fought over territory and trade for decades—the immoral human trafficking trade—and that’s why Sheremetev took the one thing our father gave a shit about: his daughter, Sasha.
Don’t ask me why our father, Ruslan Kholodov, cared about his daughter when he abused the fuck out of us, his six sons, and his wife until we escaped.
Maybe it’s because Ruslan knew our mom was in love with her second king, Maxim.
Maxim died helping us escape our father, and of all my mom’s children, whose paternity she can’t be sure of, Ruslan knew Sasha was definitely his, by force and by blood, but his.
It’s why Ruslan drugged our mom during childbirth and took one of her twins. He lied to her, telling her that only Loch had survived, when, in fact, Ruslan had hidden their daughter, Sasha, from her.
Maybe it was a matter of pride. When Valentin kidnapped and forced Sasha to marry him, it was the ultimate disgrace for our father.
Ruslan’s sons, his princes, had already escaped him, and now his daughter, his princess, was taken from his palace in Moscow, from right under his nose.
He wouldn’t abide by that.
It’s war.
Or maybe, though it’s as likely as the devil finding redemption, my father found his soul when he finally had a daughter: his lastborn. Of all the suffering he’s put upon women and girls, including our mother, he needed to repent and rescue his daughter?
Not likely.
But I don’t waste mental time on my maybe-father. He’s already scarred my mind enough.
Because of him, I have a crippling fear of small, dark spaces. I was only four when he’d lock me in a wooden trunk in his office. It was my punishment for being “too emotional.”
When really, I was too young to know what a coffin was, but that’s what it felt like. I thought I was dying. I screamed until I lost my voice and mind, and it was my brothers who helped me get them back.
Particularly Grant.
He’d joke with me and make me laugh until I fought back. Then he’d pull me into a silent hug and hold me because he understood.
It’s why we like to hate on each other. It’s a humorous layer hiding our shared trauma and brotherly love.
Either way, there’s nothing that can tear the kings and our queens apart. We’ve shared too much pain and passion. Together, we can’t be defeated.
Case in point: it was Loch’s queen and Nash’s daughter, Alena, who rescued Sasha from Valentin’s clutches. Valentin tried to kidnap Alena, too, but he fucked with the wrong lioness. Alena escaped, taking Sasha with her, and here we are.
Keeping our sister safe.
And sending a big FUCK YOU to two of the most sadistic men in the world.
It’s another reason why Vivian’s ex-husband is a twig I can snap compared to this forest of fucks we find ourselves in.
It’s why I shouldn’t bring Vivian into my real life either. Not like this. Not when we’re caught in two deadly crosshairs.
Though goddamn, the empty queen’s throne beside mine beckons to be filled like my aching heart.
All of my brothers have their queens.
All have the love of their lives.
Except me.
“So now what?” Nash asks. “We hide and wait for Sheremetev to come for us?”
“Fuck that. We’re not hiding anymore.” Sire leans back. “Ruslan and Sheremetev know where we are. Two warring Bratva armies flank us while we have the one thing Ruslan needs and the one person Valentin wants.”
Nick huffs, sarcastically amused like all of us. “A kidney and Ruslan’s kid.”
It seems our father forgot that money can’t buy you out of death. Ruslan’s dying from kidney failure, rejecting the one Sire donated for our sake, and now he’s back for another one. He’ll only take flesh from his flesh.
And it seems that Sheremetev didn’t know that the worst enemy to make is a mother.
Because our mother, The Queen of the pride, will charge after him like a lioness, clamping down on his neck before ripping his stomach open while he’s still alive for what he did to her daughter.
She’ll feast on our father’s enemy before she turns her bloody fangs toward him.
It almost makes me laugh.
They say most mothers are naturally nurturing.
Yeah, well, they’re definitely deadly if you fuck with their kids.
On that note…
Our mother arches her elegant brow. “That man will get what I am willing to allow.”
“Which man?” Sire clarifies because she won’t even dignify the men by saying their names.
Mom’s sapphire eyes darken. “The thief of my baby girl. The man who will crawl to me on his dying knees if he wants to live. If he wants any of my sons to give him a goddamn thing again, he’s going to beg me for it.”
Oh, Ruslan.
Good ol’ dickhead Devil Dad.
“What about Sheremetev?” Loch fumes, and I don’t blame him.
Loch had to fight so hard for Alena’s hand. First with her father. Next with our family. Then with Fate. The fact that Sheremetev tried to kidnap and traffick Alena, as well as Loch’s twin, Sasha, has Loch on the warpath. He won’t rest until he’s smashed Sheremetev’s skull open.
“If we tame Satan,” The Queen decrees, “we’ll destroy his demons.”
Grant cocks a confused brow, so Sire explains, “If we make a deal with Ruslan to save his life, his army will destroy Sheremetev once we find him.”
“So if you save Ruslan’s life again, then what?” Nash fumes. “This shit never ends.”
I cross my arms. “It ends if part of the deal with Ruslan is that he has to step down as Pakhan, and the new Pakhan agrees to leave us the fuck alone. We’re not Bratva and never will be.”
“It’s decided.” Axel raps his inked knuckles over the golden lion carved into his throne’s armrest. “We’ll meet with Ruslan and strike a deal.”
“Where will we meet?”
“The club,” The Queen answers Sire. “On my territory.”
“When?” Loch wants to know. He has Alena’s initiation and their wedding to plan.
“It’ll take at least a month to secure,” Axel reasons. “Until then, we’ll get tested as potential kidney donors, and we’ll get our paternity confirmed. We’re going into that meeting with Ruslan fully armed with ammo and intel.”
We nod.
Some of us may be Ruslan’s. Some of us may be Maxim’s. But it doesn’t matter.
Because we all belong to The Queen.
Grant smirks, turning my way. “Alright. Now that we have a plan, how can we help you, Prince Pussy Whipped?”
Grant sits one king’s throne above mine. Some even mistake us for twins. We’re not, but I can read him like a mirror. He’s giving me shit, circling back to this because he knows I love Vivian, and he cares for her. Hell, we all work together.
“Vivian’s being bribed by her shithead ex-husband. He has an intimate video he took of her without her consent.” I scan the circle of kings, explaining, “I want that video and want him dead so she can be free.”
Sire squints, crinkling the ink on his cheek. “Dead dead, or just a little dead?”
My nostrils flare, remembering Vivian’s plea. “Leave him to me but kill that video.”
“We need to find the servers.” Grant leans forward.
Tech is his specialty. “Digital files aren’t in some fictitious floating cloud; they’re stored somewhere physical.
And if he’s smart, he’s got copies housed on several servers in different locations with directives to release them under certain conditions. ”
“Tough to say how smart he is or isn’t,” I seethe. “The fucker wears yellow Crocs and has a chronic case of crotch grab.” I turn to Sasha, explaining, “That means he has a little penis, so he has to touch it all the time because he’s afraid someone will rip it off.” I smile. “Like me.”
Sasha giggles. “Yes. Little penis. Big problem for man. I know.”
She makes us laugh before Nash adds, “Give me a week, and I can crack his accounts. He’s got to be paying people to help him and leaving a money trail.”
“Done.” I turn to Grant and Axel. “Delphine’s following him. I’ll get Ruby to stalk him too. Our queens are smart and know how to blend in. Maybe he’ll lead them to wherever he’s hiding those servers.”
Grant and Axel nod. They don’t doubt their wives’ skills.
Nick juts his chin. “Is he a football fan?”
Nick plays for the NFL, and I smirk, clocking his plan. “Yeah, he wears your team’s jersey like a dress.”
Nick tongues his teeth, grinning. “Maybe I can bump into him at a party and steal his phone’s SIM card. That’ll give us plenty of intel.”
“Just be careful,” Sire cautions. “If he suspects we’re after him, he can really hurt a woman like Vivian. Hell, for so many women, revenge porn is a huge problem.”
Loch cracks his knuckles, jutting his chin at me. “How can we help you hurt him because that’s some wicked shit, exploiting a woman like that. Is she okay?”
Goddamn, I love my brothers.
Will they kill men? Yes. Because they care about women.
It’s how our mom raised us, as she calmly interjects, “No victim is okay until they’ve survived. Until they get safety and justice, and she will.”
She casts her determined glare around the room, over her sons, including Nash, and lastly to her daughter.
Mom pats Sasha’s hand, proclaiming, “It’s time we get justice our way.”