Chapter 39 Jay
JAY
Guillotine Graham paced the smoking room, his expression hard. Coming to a sudden stop, he whirled around, jabbing his finger into Ryker’s chest. “These are incredibly serious allegations that undermine everything we’ve been working towards. Do you have proof that this involves the Volkovs?”
Ryker swallowed, his throat working, but he straightened his shoulders, meeting his father’s gaze dead on. “I interrogated him.”
“Proof,” Graham barked. “Your word is as good as useless without it.”
I saw Ryker flinch almost imperceptibly, but he recovered quickly, striding across the room to the wall-mounted TV. He got it connected to his phone and hit Play on the first video in his gallery.
I watched, my jaw dropping.
“Fucking hell,” Dan murmured, leaning into me. “Looks like he’s been taking torture lessons from Thorpe Senior.”
“Yeah.” I winced at the distinct crack of a bone snapping, followed by an almost inhuman scream. Glancing over at my dad, I saw him watching impassively. I definitely hadn’t inherited his surgeon’s iron stomach.
A string of Russian came from the thrashing man on the screen, and Graham inhaled sharply. Although his Russian was basic as far as I knew, whatever he could translate was enough to shock him, the colour draining from his face.
“Desmond. Get the Hoytons on the phone. We might need to bring in some of our other associates too, but we don’t know how far their reach has spread and who else is working against us.”
“On it, boss.” He tapped the unobtrusive earpiece he was wearing, waited for a moment, and then began speaking low and fast, issuing instructions to whoever was on the other end.
“Do you think—” Dan began, before the door flew open, ricocheting off the walls, and Volkov men poured into the room, armed to the teeth.
Oh, fuck.
“You sabotaged our supply lines,” Grigory Volkov roared, directing all his ire towards Graham, right before Anton burst through the door. His head twisted, scanning the room, and when he found me, he bared his teeth, his eyes glittering with malice. Reaching inside his jacket, he pulled out a gun.
A gun…which he was pointing at me.
“What the fuck?” I hissed, holding my hands up as he bore down on me.
I was unarmed, other than a small pocketknife, and this man was seriously aggravated.
“Put that fucking gun away.” We didn’t have guns here.
Not to hand, at least—other than the security team and Graham.
The rest were safely hidden away, as far as I was aware.
Maybe we’d been naive. I knew a substantial percentage of the Bratva owned them, and yes, I’d seen Volkov with one in his compound, but there was a code of honour in the underworld, and all-out gun wars between crime groups in our territory were extremely uncommon.
The last thing any of us wanted to do was to draw attention to ourselves in a place where firearms were so heavily regulated, let alone risk them getting into the wrong hands.
“Volks, the fuck you doing?” Ryker inserted himself between us. Volkov immediately pointed the gun at Ryker, and he barked out a disbelieving laugh. “You dare to point a gun at me? Are you trying to start a fucking war?”
“Idi nakhuy,” Volkov snarled. “You have your own fucking problems to deal with, Thorpe.”
“Why don’t we all calm down?” Dan stepped up to Volkov and placed his palm over the muzzle of the gun like it was nothing. “What’s your problem with Jay?”
“I saw the photographs,” Volkov ground out, shoving Ryker out of the way so he could meet my gaze again. He ignored Ry’s warning growl, his icy eyes boring into mine. “I warned you of the consequences.”
A chill ran down my spine. “Photographs? What photographs?”
Volkov yanked Dan’s hand away from the gun and stepped right up to me, pressing the muzzle into the underside of my jaw. My fingers curled around the knife I carried, but I honestly wasn’t sure if I’d be able to disarm him at this close range before he pulled the trigger.
Would he pull the trigger? Surely not. Fucking hell. My palms were sweating.
I swallowed, my Adam’s apple pressing uncomfortably against the solid, cool metal of the barrel of the gun. “What photographs?” I rasped.
“You with my fiancée.” His lip curled. “You are not the only one. Who knows who else she’s been fucking?”
“What?” The word tore from my throat without permission, shocked out of me by his words.
One thing I was absolutely sure of was that Nova wasn’t seeing anyone else.
We had a connection. I fucking loved her.
More than I ever thought was possible, and I hadn’t even realised the depth of my feelings until that moment.
Even if her feelings weren’t as strong as mine, there was no way—
“Yes. See?” The pressure of the gun disappeared, although he still held it beneath my jaw. He brandished his phone in my face, and I blinked, focusing on the screen. I was looking at a map with a blinking red dot.
Ryker and Dan crowded around the screen, exchanging confused expressions.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“My fiancée has a tracker in her engagement ring. A fail-safe should she encounter any difficulties. Out of respect to her, as we are not yet married, I had not activated it.” Volkov glanced towards Grigory. “Despite my father’s wishes.”
“Looks pretty active now,” Dan muttered.
“Yes. An anonymous source delivered a set of photographs to me this evening, and I realised I had been far too trusting. Too naive,” he spat.
Ryker jabbed at Volkov’s phone. “So what is this map? Nova’s here. Probably upstairs.”
“She is not here. She is with another man. This is not the address of any of her acquaintances.”
I wanted to ask how he knew that, but then I realised it was a stupid question. Of course the Bratva would have an extensive dossier on anyone they allowed into their circle, allies or not. Then the full meaning of his words hit me.
“She’s not here at the manor?” My head shot to Ryker’s, my eyes widening as I took in his expression. “She’s here, right?”
His throat worked as his gaze darted towards the door. “Yes? Fuck. I’ll be right back.”
He ran, swerving around the large group of men arguing and gesticulating. Des must’ve called for backup because the Thorpe men now outnumbered the Volkov men, but the Volkovs still had far too many weapons, and they were out for blood.
I caught my dad’s eye. He was standing in the corner of the room with his hands clasped behind his back, ostensibly a neutral party, although I knew his loyalty lay with the Thorpe Syndicate.
Okay? I mouthed, and he nodded. His brows flew up when he took in my position with Volkov still holding a gun to my chin, and he made a step towards me. I frowned, discreetly lifting my hand to still his movements. Him coming over here would only exacerbate the situation.
Ryker rushed back into the room. He glanced over at Des, who was locked in a silent face-off with Grigory, and exhaled harshly. “Fuck. I need to speak to Des, to find out which one of our men was bringing her here. No one’s seen her, and she’s not in her room.”
“As I told you,” Volkov ground out. “She is with another man.”
Ryker got all up in his face. “There is no fucking way my sister is with another man voluntarily. Get that through your fucking head, right now.”
“We will see.” Lowering the gun, he wrapped his fingers around my wrist. “Let’s go.”
“Let go of me. I’m not gonna resist, asshole.” I yanked my arm free. “Ry, speak to Des. I don’t fucking care— I can’t—”
“I know.” Ryker’s gaze met mine, hard and determined.
“That’s my fucking twin. The most important person in my world.
I’m not gonna let anything happen to her.
” With that, he stalked across the room towards Des, interrupting his stand-off with Volkov’s dad, speaking low and fast. Desmond’s eyes widened, his hand going straight to his earpiece.
As he spoke, he kept his gaze on Grigory, but when whoever was on the other end replied, he swore harshly, turning to Ryker.
“She was collected by one of our men. Bill Smith. He was there with me when we picked her up. We had no intel, no reason that we needed to be suspicious of anything, but we haven’t been able to reach him since the game finished. He’s gone radio silent.”
I was already pushing through the arguing group, Volkov and Dan at my side.
“Your man. We did not have anything to do with this,” Volkov said, glancing at his father. “Attwood. Hoyton. Thorpe. You will come with me. We will follow the map, and we will find out what trouble my fiancée is mixed up in.”