Chapter 2 - Avgust
They called it an auction.
I called it a gathering of cowards who paid to feel like gods over the cries of helpless women.
The ballroom was buried under the city, turning it into a place where no law could reach.
But these people were strong enough to turn the law according to their will anyway.
Gold chandeliers hung low, dripping light onto velvet chairs and marble floors.
Places like these made me sick, but being who I was, I couldn't escape them.
Men in tailored suits spoke in low voices, the air thick with whiskey and rot.
I stood among them because sometimes you had to walk into hell to recognize the devil.
“Mr. Chernykh,” a voice greeted from behind. Slavic and thin.
I turned slightly, just enough to catch the reflection of the man in the glass column beside me. He was short, had a sharp nose, and wore too much cologne. He had the kind of eyes that had seen too much but learned nothing. Much like most of the people in this room.
“Kirill,” I said, finally looking at him.
He smiled like he wanted to live. “Didn’t expect to see you here. I thought the Chernykhs kept their hands clean of such—”
“Entertainment?” I cut in. “We do.”
His throat worked, swallowing whatever else he was planning to say. Smart man. I have a reputation for being unable to tolerate bullshit, and it always works best when everyone remembers that. For me, but especially for them.
I took a slow sip of the scotch in my hand, scanning the crowd.
A dozen families were represented tonight, including many minor players, foreign investors, and the usual parasites.
I recognized faces from the east side docks, a few from New York, and at least one man who’d been missing from the Italian circles for over a year.
That told me enough. This wasn’t just a small auction.
I had known about events like these happening once every few months, with only the best of the lot for such powerful men, but I had never attended. I hated every little thing about this.
The Morozovs wouldn’t like it. Neither would my brother, Iosif.
I caught my reflection in the mirrored pillar again, light blonde hair slicked back, the edges still damp from the rain outside.
My dark burgundy eyes looked colder than the drink I was nursing, but the tailored black suit fit like a second skin.
I stood taller than most men in the room, which drew even more attention towards me, but that was something I was already used to.
A Chernykh never went unnoticed in whatever room they walked into.
Every movement in this room was deliberate and predatory, just like my own.
I only had one reason to be here.
“Any word on the new family?” I asked quietly, without looking directly at Kirill.
He flinched. “You mean the Russians?”
“I mean the Russians that are silent and smart enough to make the old Russians nervous.”
Kirill hesitated. “All I have heard are whispers. They’re apparently buying properties under different names. Hotels, restaurants, and whatnot.”
“Do you have the names?”
“Not yet,” he replied, “Do you think they’re moving on Morozov territory?”
The Morozovs were the largest and most prominent crime family in Miami.
The Chernykhs were already in a close alliance with them, but if the new family tried to go against the Morozovs, it would only lead to bloodshed.
A war each one of us will be forced to enter.
I wanted to shut them down before things escalated any further.
“I think,” I said, swirling the drink, “they’re testing the waters. And I don’t like anyone dipping toes in what belongs to us.”
He nodded quickly. “Of course. If I hear anything—”
“You’ll tell me first,” I finished for him, pinning him with a stare.
He nodded and left, clearly eager to breathe somewhere else.
I didn’t blame him. It wasn’t always easy to breathe around me.
Music floated through the room in slow, haunting notes from a grand piano in the corner.
No one was really listening; they were much too busy watching the stage being prepared.
The red velvet curtains were drawn as the spotlight shifted, increasing the anticipation in the room, which was already heavy enough to choke on.
A woman in a crimson dress brushed past me. Her perfume expensive and suffocating.
“Alone tonight?” she purred.
“Always,” I said, without bothering to look at her.
Her laughter trailed away as she found another target after clearly finding that I was uninterested in whatever she had to offer.
Women like her always found a way to get into places like these.
The entire ballroom was swarming with the likes of her.
It was a special talent. And I had a special talent for staying away from these women. Everything about them disgusted me.
The thing about these places was that everything had a price. Some sold bodies. Others sold souls. And most of them no longer knew the difference between these two.
I had no interest in either.
I was here for nothing but information. A new family from Russia, silent and strategic, had started crawling into our city like smoke.
As per Kirill, they were buying businesses, and as per my recent stakeouts and investigations, they were simply gathering leverage and studying alliances.
They were showing the kind of patience that only meant long-term trouble, and I had no desire to sit idly while they expanded their network around my family and our allies.
Iosif had asked me to wait. “They’ll expose themselves,” he’d told me. “And we’ll crush them when they do.”
But I didn’t like waiting. It always got people killed.
So I came here instead, where the worst kinds of men hid behind silk and smiled over suffering. If this new family had any connection to the underworld trade, this was where their scent would linger.
But so far, all I could smell was decay.
“Avgust Chernykh,” someone muttered nearby, trying not to look at me directly. “I didn’t know the boss’s right hand liked these events.”
I turned my head just enough for my gaze to meet his.
I had seen him around, but I did not know who he was.
I didn’t even need to. He was clearly irrelevant.
The man froze, all color draining from his face.
I didn’t even have to say a word to cause that reaction.
That was the benefit of a reputation. You didn’t need to raise your voice when your silence could do the job.
I checked my watch out of habit. It was midnight.
Almost time for the auction to begin and for me to get out of here.
The new family was nowhere in sight, and I was not going to stay and watch these sleazy assholes bid on poor, terrified women.
I was already compelled to start a blood bath down here purely for the amusement I would feel in hurting men the likes of them.
But that could wait. Right now, my mission was something else.
Before I could turn around and leave, the announcer appeared on stage. He was a tall man with slicked-back hair and a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. He tapped the microphone once, the sharp echo slicing through the chatter.
“Gentlemen,” he began, voice dripping with charm. “Tonight, we continue our tradition of exclusivity. Our selections are rare, our opportunities even rarer.”
A few men whistled, their glasses clinking.
I set mine down. The smell of scotch suddenly made me nauseous.
It wasn’t the first time I’d seen something like this.
The world had dark corners, and I’d spent most of my life crawling through them.
But this kind of filth never stopped tasting like ash.
It was common in the Bratva world, but our family and those of our allies condemned it.
My jaw tightened as the first girl was led onto the stage, blindfolded and trembling.
Even standing was difficult for her. I could only imagine the horrors she must have been through before being brought here.
She had wounds all over her exposed arms and legs.
The bids rose fast, and she was gone within minutes, replaced by another.
Then another.
I forced myself to stay still, to watch. I wanted to leave, but this allowed me to learn who was buying, who was selling, and who stood to gain from it all. Still, every laugh, every cheer, scraped against something sharp inside me.
If I let that something loose, the floor would be red before the night was over.
I took a slow breath. You’re here to observe, Avgust, not to kill.
The thought barely stuck.
“Item four,” the announcer’s voice echoed, smooth and practiced. “Fresh blood of Russian descent. She is eloquent, educated, and untouched by our world. We’ll start the bidding at fifty thousand.”
I almost didn’t even look. Just like at the others.
Almost.
And then she stepped into the light, and all thoughts vanished in that moment.
She hadn’t walked out. She was pushed.
The two masked guards flanking her released her in the center of the stage like she was something they wanted off their hands. The lights hit her face, and for a second, the entire room fell away. She was small, not fragile but delicate in the way porcelain could be right before it shattered.
A black dress clung to her like sin, torn at one sleeve, slipping against pale skin that gleamed under the gold lights of the stage. Her reddish brown hair was heavy and wild as it spilled down her back, catching the light with every tremor of her body.
And her eyes. Christ.
Green, bright, terrified, and furious all at once.
The kind of eyes that begged and fought in the same breath.
Something cold slid through my chest, sharp and unfamiliar.
I’d seen beauty before. I’d ruined beauty before.
But this was not beauty. It was chaos wrapped in silk, and I wanted it all for myself.
A protective urge rose in my throat, a feeling that had not taken root in my heart for years.
“Do I have anyone for fifty thousand?” the announcer asked, and the first hand went up.
“Fifty.”
Something twisted inside my gut. I could not sit there and let this unfold before my eyes.
Another hand shot up. “Eighty.”
The air shifted, buzzing with greed. I felt it crawl under my skin.
Her chin lifted slightly, defiant despite the tremor in her hands. That single act, barely noticeable, set something off in me. Like the muscle memory of a life I didn’t remember living.
I shouldn’t care. I didn’t care.
But the way those bastards looked at her made my jaw ache with having to control the anger that was threatening to overtake everything. Everyone accused me of having a perpetual scowl on my face, and in that moment, the scowl turned into a frown that was impossible for me to ignore.
“She’s scared,” someone muttered nearby, sounding amused. “They’re always scared at first. That’s what makes breaking them even more exciting.”
“I love the screaming and the crying. It turns me on,” someone replied.
I wanted to turn around and break his nose. Sadistic bastards.
My fingers tightened around the edge of the glass in front of me until it cracked. The sound was small, lost beneath the next round of numbers.
“One hundred.”
“One twenty.”
“One forty.”
Her gaze flicked over the crowd, searching for something or someone, anything that wasn’t this. When her eyes found mine, the air between us stilled. It wasn’t recognition. Not at all.
It was an impact.
For one impossible moment, I felt the entire room drain of oxygen.
The noise around me blurred. The lights dimmed.
There was nothing but her before me, blood rushing beneath pale skin, the faint tremble of her mouth, and those eyes locked on me like she already knew I was the lesser evil in a room full of monsters.
She didn’t look away. Not once.
And neither did I. Somehow, having her gaze on me made me feel slightly calmer, as if it was a reminder of the fact that I could control the situation.
“Two hundred!” someone shouted from across the room as laughter rippled.
I didn’t blink.
“Two fifty!”
A man in a red tie smirked, lifting his paddle higher. “Three hundred.”
My blood ran cold. I didn’t plan the next part. I didn’t even think it. The words just came out, low and precise.
“Five hundred.”
The room went quiet.
All heads turned. Some towards me and others towards the announcer, waiting to see if I was serious. The man in the red tie let out a short laugh. “Half a million? She'd better be able to breathe gold.”
A few men laughed nervously. I didn’t respond.
I just continued to stare at her.
The announcer’s smile twitched but recovered quickly. “Five hundred thousand. Any counteroffers?”
Silence stretched thin. No one dared.
He raised his gavel. “Sold.”
The sound of the strike was a dull echo that shouldn’t have hit as hard as it did. Her lips parted, barely, like she couldn’t believe what had just happened. Neither could I, if I were being honest. My pulse hammered once, then steadied, falling back into the familiar rhythm of control.
I’d just bought a stranger.
A girl with fire in her eyes and chains around her wrists.
I didn’t know why.
Maybe because every instinct I had honed to survive, the same instincts which warned me of lies and death, were suddenly screaming that if I didn’t take her with me, someone else would.
And she wouldn’t be able to survive that.
Maybe because the look in her eyes reminded me of something I’d buried years ago, the exact sound before I failed to save someone else.
Someone who was once dear.
Either way, it was done.
I set down the cracked glass and stood, buttoning my jacket. The crowd parted like water, but no one dared to meet my gaze. No one wanted to.
They’d all seen what happened when I wanted something.
I didn’t lose.
I didn’t explain.
And most definitely, I never shared.
The announcer’s voice faded behind me as I walked out of the ballroom and into the corridor. The heavy door closed, sealing the noise inside. For a brief second, I just stood there in the half dark, breathing in silence, feeling that strange pulse still burning under my skin.
I’d come here to gather information.
Instead, I had ended up buying a woman.
And for the first time in a long, long time, I wasn’t sure if I’d made the smartest move of my life or the most dangerous one.
Guess we were going to find out soon enough.