Chapter 71
“…choose which Mancini gets to walk out of here alive.”
Serafina. She’s the only option.
Serafina yells behind the cloth while I try to tell Vanessa my wish with my eyes because the assholes also bound my mouth after I woke up.
Serafina’s noises get the attention of Ivan and he twists to her, an evil glint in his eyes. As much as I’d like to warn him away from her, I take the chance of his distraction to speak to Vanessa.
Seeing her stride in earlier, steps unfaltering, even as two soldiers lined up behind her, fucking terrified me in ways different than waking and finding Serafina here. Though her confidence can be felt by everyone in the room, it didn’t stop the rage from tensing my muscles when the guns aimed at her back.
I’m stuck without a way to help her. And she’s weaponless and trapped in her own way.
Shadows encompass her and a silent conversation passes between us, her eyes flicking to my sister and back before bobbing her head in a barely-there nod that has me blowing air from my nose.
“Let’s make this interesting.” Ivan’s slimy voice is quickly replaced by my sister’s gasps when he yanks the cloth off her mouth. She sucks in a large gulp of fresh air—as fresh as this aged warehouse allows for—but before managing another sound is stopped by Ivan’s firm, “Do not say a fucking word, devochka .”
Then he turns for me and without meeting the hatred in my gaze, he yanks the cloth out of my mouth, but unlike Serafina, I won’t listen no matter what he orders.
“Giuro che la tua morte sarà lunga e dolorosa.” I vow, your death will be long and painful.
He watches me with contempt. “Mhm.” Then turns to his niece. “If you’re going to make a decision, it’s best to hear both sides, don’t you think? So who will it be?”
He grins like a child who was just given candy for the first time. He’s loving the power. The show of force. The knowledge he has Vanessa chained.
Serafina sniffles and I watch concern pass over Vanessa’s face, but with her next blink it’s gone. She replaces it with a cooling grin I recognize from my numerous stand-offs with her.
“This is stupid,” she drawls. “You forget this is the organization who kidnapped me. Why would I choose when I don’t care for either of them?”
“So I’ll kill both.” Ivan’s voice picks up at the end.
Vanessa remains focused on her uncle, but there’s a slight shifting of her feet, telling me she’s still in there. “You didn’t kidnap them to make me choose one. What is it you actually want?”
A redness flashes over Ivan’s face and his hands fist by his side, suggesting Vanessa’s correct and there’s more to this. While they banter, I look past him to Serafina, but she’s entirely focused on the Volkovs, tear marks staining her cheeks.
“You’ll have to pick before I tell you. That’s the deal. If you don’t…”
The soldier behind my sister prods the back of her head with his gun, silently warning Vanessa of the outcome Ivan would choose. Serafina bites down on her whimper, and I’m caught between being proud of her staying strong and pissed that she’s here at all.
“Don’t touch her,” I growl, but no one, not even Vanessa, looks my way.
“I’m growing impatient,” her uncle drawls, stepping closer to Serafina. He strokes her hair once, and she jerks back with a hiss, leaning away as much as the rope allows for. “Come now,” he coos, and I’m ready to snap.
Vanessa meets my gaze again and twitches her head to the side, telling me no. I don’t understand why she’s stalling and risking my sister’s wellbeing when we both know she’s getting saved over me.
“Leave the girl alone,” Vanessa says with a lazy sigh in her voice.
Ivan’s hand drops from Serafina’s face, but she still remains angled away. “Is she your pick?”
“Save her.” My words are no louder than a harsh whisper, a reminder of what she’s agreed to and a prompt to end her suffering.
Her jaw clicks firmly in place while her eyes bounce around the room, brushing the edges where Ivan’s men remain.
Ivan steps forward. “Vanessa?—”
Tires squeal to a stop outside the warehouse, interrupting all of Ivan’s planning, and Vanessa tosses him a smirk right before twisting to the two men at her back, kicking her leg out in a flash.
As Bratva soldiers led by Lev and Anastasia storm inside, I realize Vanessa was stalling until backup arrived.
Chaos breaks out when Ivan’s soldiers step from the room’s edges and attack the stream of a dozen or so Bratva soldiers that enter armed. The men behind Serafina and me also join the fray, letting me breathe a bit easier now that the immediate threat is gone.
Vanessa goes for one of the men, sending a punch into his face and a kick into another. Like a dancer, she’s lithe, never staying in one place for too long while using everything she has against men who could easily overpower her—if they could catch her.
A nearby Bratva soldier takes on one of them, leaving her in a one-on-one fight with the other. She kicks his kneecap, crippling him until he drops to the ground, accidentally releasing his gun. She snatches it from the ground, points it at his forehead, and shoots, killing him quickly.
Then she turns for me, viciousness pouring off her in thick waves as she stalks forward. When I was passed out in her forest, I first believed her to be an angel coming to take me away, but then I woke up and the haze over my gaze fell, and there was no way Vanessa Volkov could ever be something as gentle as a celestial being. I now take the thought back. She’s an angel of war, come to claim her triumph.
Another one of Ivan’s men breaks away from the fight and looms over her, and she doesn’t see him about to take her down.
“Vanessa, behind you!” I yell, and with only a second to spare, she ducks to the side, narrowly missing his attack.
She readjusts her stance for his quick attack while her command rises above the noise. “Get Serafina!”
Lev immediately rushes from the fray with a final shot toward a man he was engaged with and runs for us, a knife in his right hand. He reaches my sister first and quickly slices through her bindings. She makes a sound of relief as she takes his hand, and he propels her my way.
“No, go! Get her out of here!” As much as being tied up while a fight is happening isn’t good, I won’t be able to live with myself if Serafina’s hurt. Once she’s out of here, it’ll be better.
Serafina’s shaky on her feet, her gaze darting around the room with a fear I wish I could save her from. Lev ignores my demand and drags her toward me, cutting through the rope and freeing my wrists. With an acknowledging nod, he drops the knife onto my lap and takes off for the door, pushing Serafina in front of him.
Once they’re out of my immediate view, I lean down to cut the rope around my ankles and with only a knife in my hand, join the fight.
Close by, Vanessa gets tripped and her gun goes flying well out of her reach. Her head thumps to the cement and for a moment, she doesn’t move. As her assailant stands above her, his own weapon in hand, I don’t think twice. Don’t wait to see if she’s awake.
I throw myself at him, wrapping my arms around his waist to take him down. He releases an oof of surprise, having not seen me coming. He swipes to knock me away, but I avoid his arm easily, and twirl Lev’s knife around in my hand until it’s blade down. It’s a small weapon but effective that with a bit of strength, I lodge directly into his throat. He gurgles, choking on blood, and dies quickly.
“That’s for trying to hurt her.”
I twist, finding Vanessa still on the ground, now partially sitting up. Her hand’s on the back of her head as a dazed gaze stares at the fight in front of her. She positions her other hand onto the ground to stand, only to immediately sway.
Despite the fact that turning my back on the numerous enemies around us could mean an instant death, I fall to my knees beside her, wrapping one arm around her back to help her sit up as I check the spot on her head, only breathing once I see there’s no blood. The cut on her mouth is a different story, as is the one above her eye with a small trickle travelling down her cheek.
“You okay?”
“Knock on the head really winded me.” A smile ghosts across her face, but as fast as it appears, it’s stolen when she abruptly shoves me out of the way and a stray bullet clashes with the cement behind us.
A bullet that would have hit me had she been a few seconds slower.
I reach to help her up, lifting her as I go myself. “Should I start tracking the number of times you’ve saved me today? So far, I’m up to two.”
Her hand is still in mine when she replies, “You saved me too.”
I’m about to reply when her gaze catches on something above and I follow her trajectory, spotting it as well. One of Ivan’s soldiers, hidden in the shadows on the balcony, a sniper pointed at the warehouse’s doorway, right where Lev and Serafina’s about to exit from.
“Lev! Up, eight o’clock!”
Lev understands immediately and throws himself to the side opposite of Serafina, yanking her out of the sniper’s path. The two quickly dart from the warehouse and the sniper visibly growls with anger before heading for the metal staircase.
With my sister safe again, I turn to the nearest soldier while Vanessa does the same, rushing toward where Anastasia’s fighting, another about to come up from behind. I manage a single step before a sharp stinging pain ricochets through my arm, making me cry out. Instinctually, my hand immediately covers the pain, my finger coming away red, bloodied.
I’ve been shot, but only a graze. Regardless, it hurts like a bitch.
Vanessa looks up from her own battle, finding me immediately across the way. Her face flushes paler, her mouth opening as she rushes toward me. So focused on her, I don’t hear the steps until too late. Until the voice of the man who began all this utters in my ear and he wrenches my arms behind me, a gun’s barrel jabbing into my neck. The new angle sends a wave of fresh pain to the injury, my vision blurring around the edges.
“The next one won’t miss,” he says loud enough for Vanessa to hear. His next snarl is directed toward her. “ Plemyannitsa , have them drop their weapons or he dies.”
A silence falls across the entire room as both sides cease fighting and look to Vanessa for direction. Her own people for her command, and Ivan’s for her surrender.
Vanessa breaks away, her shoulders rising with her deep breaths. Her tank’s been torn, one strap hanging ripped. The blood from her earlier cuts seem to have grown, with a deep red now dangerously close to one of her eyes.
She looks like death personified as she stalks closer. Like a queen about to slaughter the traitor and protect her throne.
Frustration pours off her as her gaze drills into me, not her uncle. She has an expression I know all too well. One she spent all of yesterday fighting to hide from me before allowing me a peek when I left the club. Her attention is on my injury, her lips pulling up on one side. It’s in her eyes, with her next blink, she reveals it to Ivan as well.
She turns her head to the side, uttering her command without hesitation but packed with a desire to deny. “Lower your weapons.” She counters her own words when her fingers clench tighter around her gun.
After a second’s hesitation, her soldiers obey and their weapons landing on the ground make the worst song ever, with Anastasia following last, her glare directed toward Ivan.
“Yours too.” Ivan pushes the barrel bruising into my head, making his point to her.
She ignores him.
He cocks the gun, the sound of the bullet entering the chamber excruciatingly loud in my ear as death hovers one click away.
“Now.”
I shuffle my feet for a better stance and try to imagine the couple of ways I can fight my way out of this before my brain ends up on the ground.
Still, she calls his bluff because she’s fucking smart and knows. As she stated earlier, Ivan wouldn’t have gone through all this trouble only to force her to choose between two people’s lives that he has no stake in.
“Serafina’s gone, so what is it you actually want?”
“The Bratva. Round two, Vanessa: Mancini’s life or the Bratva?”
“So that’s what this is about.” She smirks but it’s empty. Nothing like the ones I know, but rather the one snapped in pictures when I was stalking her. “This is all about you trying to take what’s mine.”
“The Bratva shouldn’t be yours.” Frustration drips through his statement, his control slipping bit by bit. If only she keeps him talking, he’ll become more unhinged, easier to break.
“When will you realize, Ivan, you’ll never be Pakhan? The soldiers will never follow you.”
“They’ll follow or they die,” he replies as he shifts the gun from the back of my head to beneath my chin, his arm pinning me by my neck. He thinks he’s gaining a better hold on me, but he’s actually given me easier access now that his arm is in reach. “Choose, Vanessa. Name me Pakhan, swear fealty, and you and Mancini walk out of here alive.”
Vanessa looks from her uncle to me.
I see her struggle, her fear.
I see her concession, her apology.
So many choices led to this moment. My plans, all of which failed. My addiction to her, making me a target for Ivan. It’s almost fitting a Volkov has my life in his hands, like a full circle. Like there was no other path meant for me.
Vanessa holds up her hands, one folded around her gun, the other open and empty.
It’s the hand with the weapon she opens, one finger at a time as she reluctantly loses her protection.
“Let him go, Ivan. You’ve won.”