37. Konstantin
KONSTANTIN
F ierce. Fearless. My queen.
It wouldn’t be easy, but then nothing worth having was. Sofia Volkov, our enemy, would pay for this. I was many things, but forgiving wasn’t one of them.
Alexei lost the men following us, but we remained on high alert until we got home. Vasili and Boris already waited for us there. They must have just arrived themselves. The moment we pulled up, Branka appeared at the entrance too.
She ran into Sasha’s arms. “God, I was so worried.”
“Ah, kotyonok. Didn’t we talk about useless worries?” The slightly psychotic brother became a kitten under his wife’s gaze. She should call him kotyonok , not the other way around. Honestly, it would be comical if we weren’t just attacked while getting discharged from the hospital.
Leaving them all behind, I took the stairs two at a time until I reached our bedroom. A fire already burned, I noted, satisfied. The staff learned Tatiana’s likes and dislikes in the matter of a day. While they were barely ever seen, they were efficient as fuck.
Just the way I liked it.
I carefully placed my wife on the bed, then covered her up. Her tremors subsided, but she was still pale.
“Are you okay?” I asked, crouching beside her and holding her hand in mine.
She nodded. “Yes. The car chase… It freaked me out. If you get hurt, I couldn’t–”
Her neck bobbed as she swallowed. “I’m not hurt. We are not hurt.”
She let out a heavy sigh. “It’s so stupid. Suddenly, I was back at that accident, and it felt like déjà vu.” Her eyes shimmered like the surface of the clear blue sea. “I won’t survive losing you, Illias. Just make sure you always come back to me. Okay?”
I groaned, her words hardening my dick. She was all I ever wanted and more. There was nothing I wanted to do more than slide between the sheets and stay in bed with her.
“I promise you,” I vowed. “I will always come back to you.”
But there were answers I needed. Threats I had to eliminate. Starting with my aunt. I needed to know what agreement Adrian had with Sofia Volkov. The chip was destroyed. There were no chances of resurrecting it.
Then why did Sofia Volkov attack today?
“Should I send Branka to sit with you?” I didn’t like the idea of leaving her alone. Not now.
But my queen smiled, her strength shining through. “No, let her be with Sasha. I’m going to take a nap with our twins.”
Another kiss on her forehead.
“I’m going to be back.”
* * *
An eye for an eye. Blood for blood.
The moment I stepped into my dungeon and saw my aunt, Jane Ford, hanging from the ceiling with her wrists tied, my gut clenched.
I didn’t like seeing women in pain. In fact, I fucking hated it. My father was crazy about Mama, and as far as I knew, he never hurt a woman. Until the night she betrayed him and he put a bullet in her head.
It was his undoing and things went downhill from there.
I swore I’d never become him. Yet as the years passed, I found myself in the same fucking situations as him. I put a bullet into Isla’s mother. Now, I’d have another woman’s blood on my hands.
My aunt’s.
Fuck, I had never tortured a woman. Every fiber in me revolted at the thought. But if it came down to this woman or my family, it’d always be my family. Jane Ford could have been my family, but she chose to work against me.
So if I must, I’d torture the information out of her. There was a first time for everything - even this. As despicable as it might be.
My knuckles hurt from clenching. Slicing her throat would have been a better way to go, but it wouldn’t give me any information I needed.
Her eyes, green like my mother’s, meet my gaze. Instantly something resembling disgust flickered in them.
“I take it you recognize me,” I said coldly.
“You look just like the devil who snatched my sister,” she spat out.
I ignored that comment. The past didn’t matter to me. Not anymore. I wanted to focus on the future. My children’s future. My wife’s future.
Slowly, I walked to the table where all the instruments of torture sat and I started going through them. There was a reason we kept them in plain view. It was psychological more than anything. The captives usually saw the assortment and they spilled their life story.
I picked up a pair of pliers. “We use this to pull out nails,” I stated, conversationally.
Glancing at her, she met my gaze and her expression turned ashen, matching her silver hair.
“And this one–” I picked up a small sized saw that truthfully, we never fucking used, “ –we use to saw off fingers. One by one.”
A whimper filled the room and I grinned savagely.
“My dear Aunt Jane, I make the devil look like a saint,” I remarked wryly. “But then, I’m sure you knew that already.”
She bit into her lip to prevent another whimper from traveling through the air. I couldn’t help but wonder if my mother would look like her if she lived. Minus the fear and the dungeon, the woman looked to be in good health.
Pathetic how little I knew about my mother. It took Adrian slamming into my life and threatening my woman for me to dig into her life. This woman was the last link to my mother’s side of the family. Possibly the last link to my humanity.
However, as we watched each other, I knew - just fucking knew - she’d rather die than give me what I want. Answers. Still, I’d give her a chance. Everyone breaks eventually.
“What do you want?” Her voice shook like a leaf.
Smart woman.
I had to get to Sofia Volkov and learn her end game. It was clear that she wanted power and was a threat. You didn’t make a deal to obtain a chip that contained secrets against people so you could destroy it. You went after it to gain something from it.
“I want to know how Adrian made contact with Sofia Volkov.”
I saw the exact moment her eyes flickered with recognition of that name. But she still decided to fight me on it.
“I don’t know who that is.” She stared at me unblinkingly.
I stepped in front of her, the little saw still in my hands. I tapped it pensively against the palm of my hand.
“See, my dear aunt, I don’t believe you,” I drawled. Tap. Tap. Tap . Her eyes bounced up and down, following the saw movement. “I think you helped Adrian come up with the plan. He might have had the ideas but you had to have helped him. To recover. To taunt my wife. To play games.”
She shook her head frantically. “No, no, no.”
I slammed my fist against the table, the tools on the table rattling. “Stop fucking lying.”
“It’s the truth.”
“It’s a lie.” I put the saw down and reached for the gun. “We both know it’s a lie. But luckily for you, I’m feeling generous today.” Perspiration shone on her forehead. “I’ll give you one more try to tell the truth. To help your nephew out.”
Hatred flickered in her eyes, green as those of a poisonous snake, and she snickered.
“You killed my son, my real nephew,” she spat out. “Adrian was the son my sister loved.” Okay, that jab hit the spot, but I refused to let it show. “Why would I help you with anything?”
I offered her one of my coldest smiles. “Because you’ll want at least a fraction of your family’s legacy to carry on through my children.”
Her eyes widened. Harsh breathing and silence mixed with the dampness in the air, until her lips thinned.
“I hope she gets them,” she said, her eyes shooting poison at me. “And I hope she ends your children before they take their first breath.”
It took a fraction of a second to pull the trigger. The bullet hit her knee and her shriek echoed through the dungeon, traveling down the dungeon hallways.
I flicked a glance at Boris. “Patch up her knee. Just enough so she doesn’t bleed out on me. We’re far from done.”
Then I left her to think about her options while I went back to my wife.
But first I made a stop. I needed a stiff one.
I climbed the stairs two floors up and headed for the library. I had a fully stocked bar in there for emergencies. This was one of them. It was obvious my newfound aunt knew something about Adrian’s deal with Sofia Volkov. The question was how far I’d have to go to find out what that was.
The library used to be one of my favorite rooms when I was a kid. Ironically, I’d come here because my mother usually spent her time here. She said she loved the quiet here. So did I. The fire in the fireplace threw shadows over the room, and I didn’t bother with turning the lights on.
Heading straight for the mini bar, I pulled out a tumbler, threw in three jumbo-sized ice cubes and then poured myself some cognac.
“You willing to share some of that?” Vasili’s voice came from the corner of the room and my gaze found him. That was how much all this with the woman in my dungeon fucked with me. I could have been shot in the back of the head, and I’d never see it coming.
I fixed another identical tumbler and headed towards the couch, handed him the drink, then sat in the leather chair opposite him.
I took a big gulp, then let the brown liquid burn its way down my throat and my chest.
“That bad, huh?” Vasili questioned.
I took another gulp and swallowed it down. “It could be better.”
He nodded in understanding. “I’m guessing she wasn’t willing to share information.”
“Affirmative.” The ice rattled in my tumbler.
“Want me to take over?” he offered.
I shook my head. “No, you don’t need this family shitshow on you.”
Vasili chuckled. “Trust me, we’ve had plenty of our own family shitshows. Starting with my own mother.”
I nodded in understanding. Everyone knew Vasili’s mother was a slightly psychotic and excessively jealous bitch. She was willing to sacrifice a little boy for her vendetta.
“Did you know that Adrian was gathering up evidence against you too?” I asked him.
Vasili was too smart not to pick up on stuff like that.
His gaze, the same shade as Tatiana’s eyes met mine.
“I suspected it. It was the reason I started to look into his company, but he beat me to it. He falsified Tatiana’s signature, had it all transferred to his name, and then the accident happened.
I thought it didn’t matter after that. But here we are. ”
“Here we are,” I agreed.
“Did you destroy the chip?” he asked.
I let out a sardonic breath. “Such a small thing wreaking so much havoc,” I remarked dryly.
“Did you see what’s on it?” he asked.
Did I fucking ever! In Sofia Volkov’s hands, that chip would have been disastrous. For many families, including mine. It would have given her or the Yakuza leverage over every single member in the underworld.
“I did, but it doesn’t matter. It’s all gone. Nobody is getting any of that data.”
“I guess Adrian had been busy for a long time,” he remarked. I nodded. “Does it bother you that Sofia Volkov didn’t show up to that meeting with Adrian?”
“Yes,” I admitted. “It’s making me paranoid.”
“Ditto.” Vasili pushed his hand through hair. “Tatiana said not even Nikita knew that Adrian changed the deal from the Yakuza to Sofia Volkov.”
“No surprise,” I retorted dryly. “No honor among thieves.”
Silence followed, both of us lost in our thoughts.
My mind was on my wife. I ached for her, my balls turning blue, demanding her pussy.
But she was still healing and I couldn’t be that bastard.
So I jacked off a lot since the stabbing, thinking about her.
God knew I’d had enough practice with it over the last several years.
Except, it wasn’t the same. She was so fucking close to me.
The scent of roses even lingered in here and she hadn’t stepped into this room in weeks.
“Do you have a plan for Sofia Volkov?” Vasili asked, breaking the silence.
“Find her. Kill her.” My tone was slightly aloof, recognizing it wasn’t much of a plan. The woman had become an expert at hiding. She had years of experience with it. “Maybe her niece or her niece’s husband could get their hands on Sofia and do the job for us.”
The expression on Vasili’s face told me he didn’t believe they would.
“So what’s the deal with your sister?” He changed the subject and I immediately went on alert. It’d be hard to change that reaction. I was so used to killing anyone who learned about our connection. Now it fucking seemed to be a common knowledge.
Isla went back to her friends, still pissed off at me. There were still words left unsaid, except I didn’t know how to say them. Maybe it was better to let her continue to hate me than crush her ideal of her mother’s love.
Fuck if I knew. Tatiana thought I should tell her exactly what happened. I didn’t want to see the pain on my little sister’s face when she learned the truth.
I let out a heavy sigh. “She’s mad,” I settled for a half-answer.
“So she's preparing to kill you? Cut you up and burn you so she can hide your DNA?” Vasili asked half-amused.
“Maybe,” I grumbled. I still didn’t know what the fuck that was about. Isla was one of the softest, most gentle souls ever. You heard it in her music. You heard it in her laugh. The words murder and her shouldn’t be part of the sentence.
Though after that comment in the hospital, I wondered. When I asked her about it, she just shrugged and turned her back to me. My little sister detested me at the moment.
“She said she stayed with Marchetti when you followed Adrian from Paris?” he questioned.
I nodded. It was another thing that bothered me. At that time, I thought it was the safest decision. Now I wasn’t so certain. I kept getting vague answers from the fucker too. Jesus, maybe I’d turn a not so new leaf and kill everyone for a fresh start.
“Yes.”
“You don’t like it,” Vasili remarked.
“Would you like to leave your daughter with Marchetti?” I responded wryly.
“Considering his wife and mistresses turn up dead, no.”
Done with this conversation, I stood up. “I’m off to bed.”
My hand on the door handle, Vasili’s voice stopped me. “Konstantin.”
I glanced over my shoulder. “Yes.”
“My offer stands,” he said seriously. “It might be easier if I torture the woman.”
I shook my head. “Thank you for offering.”