Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
ALEKSEI
Atug of something stirs. Prickles of unease race up the back of my neck, like an awareness or a warning. Flicking off the shower, I grab a towel and one of my pistols, and meld into the shadows coating the walls of my suite, looking for answers.
I know there’s no one inside my suite. Nalla would have appeared on her silent feet to warn me. Roshka, always the opposite to my girl, would have barreled through the door in his need to protect. They both stand next to me, waiting for instruction.
There's another pull-like sensation from somewhere within my chest. Not like an ache or a flash of pain; it’s completely different but no less physical.
I have learned to trust the inexplicable, and it guides me towards the double doors separating my small wing of the house from Sergey’s.
Something outside the doors triggers the security cameras to activate, and the screen flickers to life, giving me a crystal-clear view. A woman’s profile fills the screen. She’s listening to someone, or trying to, her features not hiding she’s finding it hard to follow.
Nalla pushes her forehead into my hand, waiting for direction and, sensing my unease, ready for instruction on what she can do to help. Roshka stands behind us, waiting too.
My fingers fly across the system settings, splitting the screen so I can see the view from a different angle.
Straight away, I recognize Larisa as the person pressed up against my door.
She is one of Sergey’s most popular and expensive call girls at his club.
She’s easily recognizable; her raven-black hair shines like polished ebony, her femme fatale trademark ruby-red lips drawn tight.
I’d like to know why she’s only wearing a very sheer black G-string and hissing like a banshee. But it’s just background noise.
The other woman is all I can see and hear. There’s something about her, a familiarity which makes no sense. I want to snatch her off her feet and lock her inside my suite, which makes even less sense.
I can’t stop watching. Her eyes are hidden as she stares down at something, and I want to say there’s the smallest hint of a smile on her lips. I turn the volume up, but the vulgar threats Larisa is screaming at her don’t correlate with the grin on the stranger’s lips.
The words Larisa is spewing become worthy of attention when she makes bold proclamations about why she’s at my door.
Sergey said he would send someone to me, and that’s what Larisa is saying in a roundabout way, but Larisa is taking it further, like we have history and perhaps even a future.
She can say what she likes; it doesn’t matter to me.
What is important are these games Sergey enjoys.
And I refuse to be drawn into them. Because, with Sergey, there are always consequences.
Using Larisa, like he obviously wants me to do, will have repercussions. Not taking her will result in a similar fallout.
The white noise intensifies, like swarming bees, the more I think of my brother.
The instant she opens her mouth, everything stops. Including my heart. Her voice is low and husky, drawing blood straight to my knot.
Her voice is a siren’s song, and my eyes close as I fall under her call.
“Honey, I don’t give a shit whose cock you are about to suck.
My issue is not about you being a whore.
Honestly, I think sex workers deserve more respect in the world, so don’t even bother going there.
Anyway, the problem is, you’re a fucking thief, wearing my lingerie you stole from my room. That’s gross.”
Two things happen at once. Three things, if I’m honest.
My eyes burst open, and I see the moment the stranger with the pouty lips and foreign accent raises her eyes at the screen.
She looks right into the middle of the camera, like she senses someone’s watching.
I was right about the smile; I see the carefully concealed humor in her eyes.
I’m here, and every cell in my body wants to be there, to be a part of the fun she's having. With her.
The yank from before was her.
I’ve seen those eyes. I thought it was a fever dream.
The thing that was tugging before breaks free. At a speed of a thousand miles an hour. I fall against the wall, my focus on the screen, every part of me wanting to get closer.
Whatever it is inside is now alive and makes me feel like I’m at the top of a roller coaster, waiting for the final loop. Backward. In the dark. With no safety harness on.
It’s equally euphoric and terrifying.
I come face-to-face with my destiny.
Her.
No matter how hard I wish differently, she’s as real as a heart attack. I didn’t imagine her; I’m pretty sure I bit her.
I look down at her hand, searching for proof. There’s no mark left of my claim, but I swear I can feel it still.
A sudden pool of worry threatens to steal the moment, not because of maybe bites, of stunning shock. It is so much easier than that. My worry centers on who she is.
She’s my Helen of Troy. Or you could call her my Nefertiti, Cleopatra, or Eve. Any name given to the woman who changed a man’s history would fit.
Consequence whispers through my thoughts. Nalla licks my fingers as my anxiety spikes, then spikes some more. Roshka’s whole being is vibrating as he picks up on my energy, as he waits for my command to leap into action.
I can’t drag my eyes off hers, and it’s as if she can see me through the closed door.
But the floodgates of my subconscious have opened.
Like a plug has been removed from something hiding my memories, I’m back in a foreign country, in a small community health center, fighting against the drugs ripping my insides apart while my life source bleeds out.
Now I see the scene from a different angle, like an out-of-body experience.
I watch, remembering, and it’s like the first time. Her eyes hold me hostage.
They’re iridescent blue, like the hottest part of a flame.
I remember how she set my soul alight that night too.
With a look, she does it again, and for a heartbeat, I forget there are other people around. Consequence beats louder than the pound of my own survival.
And then the last thing I need to remember but have conveniently forgotten drops into sight. Sergey appears on the screen, his harem of demons close behind.
I have to protect her from him.
I have to twist the protective urges making me move in the opposite way I want.
But it’s an irrevocable, unchangeable, unshiftable drive, exactly like nature intended, that brings peace in the turmoil.
A bone-deep need to keep her safe strikes, like a lightening.
When I open my door, Larisa shrieks and falls backward into my suite. I don’t look at my mate, hopefully, in turn, hiding my true connection from Sergey.
My hand latches around Larisa’s throat, giving me something to hold on to as I drag her, kicking and gasping for air, right to Sergey.
I want to sweep his fiancée off her feet and keep her in my suite for the rest of my time. Protect her from him.
What I want and do are two very different things. Intentionally, I act as though she is as inconsequential as Larisa.
I know Sergey. I know his game of consequence.
And if he thinks for even a second that she is my Omega, my entire fucking reason, he will break her slowly, piece by piece, in front of me.
For no other reason than for shits and giggles.
Like he has done since the day I was born.
Like he will do until one of us is dead.
As I pass her, though, I drag her scent deep into my lungs—sweet vanilla, textured and emotive. I move so close to her, I could count the freckles over her nose, but I act like she is not even there.
It nearly breaks me to treat her so badly. My chest hammers harder under the weight of my guilt. I should be on my knees, worshipping, and I am acting like she doesn’t even exist.
I feel my designation stirring to life like a bear from hibernation. I lock down that side of me, too, like I have done since the day I rose as an Alpha. If Sergey gets wind of anything he perceives as a challenge, he’ll retaliate. Exactly like a toddler would.
One day, I will incite him enough for him to lose control again. One day, I want to show him how right he was about me being the strongest Alpha born in this family. But not until I have her tucked somewhere safe, with everything she needs surrounding her.
After dumping Sergey’s “gift,” I look at him. Turning to my good side, my hand rubs over the long, uneven scar, my reminder of consequences and Sergey’s little games.
“Brother, all this”—I wave my hand around, careful not to point at him—“can wait until I return. Honestly, reminding our friends of who they are working with is more important than filling a cunt.” I grin at him.
“It was a hard choice. Of course you send me someone as fucking gorgeous as she is, but you are, and always will be, my priority.”
I feed his ego with my carefully considered wording, hoping the smoke screen is enough for him to forget about his future wife. At least until I know what the fuck to do.
Sergey throws his head back and laughs. “Fine, fine. No doubt she prefers my cock, anyway.”
“True,” I muse, fighting the internal war to stay bland and unaffected while the truth is far more… lethal.
His eyes move over his fiancée slowly. “Look at the trash Victor sends me. I should have stopped this.”
I step in front of him, obscuring his view. “We will find a way to make it work, Sergey. We focus on the door it opens, nothing else.”
“My girls don’t like her either.”
“They don’t need to. What we do need to do, though, is keep her properly protected. What if Larisa decides she likes Dmitri’s small prick again?”
“I never would,” she insists, still planted on her ass at our feet.
I see the moment my words sink in, and my ploy of turning this from anything to do with his future wife to the recent humiliation Sergey had to suffer from one of his most faithful friends and associates is successful.
Dmitri was his confidant, his most loyal, until Dmitri decided he wanted the glory of power over friendship.
The politics in the Russian mafia have always been a tinderbox, igniting with the smallest provocation.
Loyalties are traded more often than Sergey’s mood flips, making the power dynamic of the Bratva shift like the seasons.
Sergey turns to his mistress talking in Russian. “Go back to my suite, Bambi. Take the girls with you. I need to talk to my brother.”
They scurry away like rodents. They know the consequence of not doing what Sergey says or daring to question his will. It’s why they have lasted as long as they have. He glares at his fiancée, still frozen on the spot where I first saw her, until the sound of the others is completely gone.
I flick my chin at the guard, and he leaves so Sergey and I can talk in confidence.
I talk quietly as soon as we are alone, not worried she will hear since we speak in Russian.
“I’m away until the Irish are done. We need to lock her down.
If Dmitri finds out about her, he will search for answers as to who she is.
If he discovers your alliance with Victor, all your patience and hard work will be nothing but a waste of time.
You’ve done what no one else could, brother—diplomatic immunity is the key to places no one else can open.
The only thing more satisfying is knowing you’ve achieved the unachievable without anyone suspecting a thing. ”
“It’s been a long time since Father and I sat in the consulate’s office,” he admits. And then he rubs a hand over his face, uncharacteristically dropping his guard.
I see how tired he is, and it pleases me to no end. Though, I act his concerned, always-eager-to-help brother.
The reason we went out last night should have been resolved before dawn, but a series of small issues festered into huge fucking problems that cost us a lot of money and the lives of a handful of our men.
Which is a solid reminder of how fate invariably brings a series of events at the right time so preordained destiny can fulfill itself.
Some find the concept impossible to accept, but it brings me peace knowing all this is for a reason and is happening how, and when, it needs to happen.
Sergey, though, is not as “open-minded” as I am. His drive for power and success is the only thing that makes sense to him.
He looks at me, searching for reassurance, and I return it to him in spades. “Lock the house down. All of it.”
I nod, agreeing in an instant. He’s been adamant that he wants to give the appearance we weren’t rattled by the moves Dmitri has been responsible for.
The lavish parties, not having security on his future wife, having meetings in his office downstairs have been done as a show of his strength and power.
A sign he isn’t afraid of the unrest or that he considers Dmitri a threat.
But it’s also a sign he knows the end is in sight with Victor.
I nearly sag with relief.
“Let the dogs roam the grounds again,” I suggest.
We’ve always had dog patrols, but he scaled that back, too, not wanting anything to add to the appearance of being weak. But now is not the time for him to be worried about how others will view his actions.
Though, the dogs outside are not like mine. I trained mine. I trained them to recognize how dangerous Sergey is.
“Can your contact in Ireland wait?” I ask, my voice dropping down to a whisper.
“Ney, I’ve already committed there. We lose too much money if we walk away, Aleksei. We lose too much face too. You, and only you, must be the one to kill Paddy O’Connor and his stupid witch wife.”
“Understood.” I grip the back of his head and drag his forehead to mine.
“Don’t be rash. Take guards with you everywhere you go.
You need to shit when you are out, take someone with you.
And don’t be a fucking hero for the sake of any of your girls.
Pretty pussy is plentiful around here; you’ve made sure of that. ”
He laughs, taking my words and twisting them into something he can be proud of. “Aleksei, deal with that problem for me. Fucking blyad.” He flicks his chin towards his future wife.
“I vow it, brother.”
And then he walks off, waiting until I hear him barking instructions at the guard. Relief floods my system before another wash of emotions takes hold—excitement, fear, apprehension, and more.
I take a steadying breath before I turn to face those blue eyes.
Letting him call her a whore, lying to her, even by omission, is going to be like drinking acid. But I’ll do whatever necessary to keep her safe.