Ruthless Redemption (The O’Malleys #6)

Chapter One

Keira O’Malley stared at the empty bottle of vodka next to her bed.

She had a second one stashed in her closet, but the effort to climb off her mattress and retrieve it was beyond her.

Lethargy sapped what little strength she had, though she couldn’t blame that on the alcohol any more than she could blame it on the weed.

No, it was all her. She glanced at the digital clock painting red patterns across the clear bottle.

Almost four in the morning—there would be no sleep tonight. Again.

She didn’t sleep much these days—and not at all without some kind of liquid help—but this was worse than normal. Tonight, while she lay here with alcohol buzzing through her system and watching the smoke curl above her face with each exhale, she waited for news.

She hated that when shit hit the fan, her older siblings sent her to her room while they dealt with the crisis. She was twenty-one, and they treated her like a child.

Or a bomb about to go off.

She inhaled again, smoking her joint slowly, wishing the burning in her lungs could ease her racing thoughts. No one had come to update her since the whole house was put on lockdown. Right now, one of her brothers could be dead, bleeding out in the street, and Keira would be the last to know.

Like Devlin.

Pain slashed through her despite the barrier of numbness she’d carefully cultivated with weed and alcohol. One brother dead because of their family’s “business” dealings, another in immediate danger, and nothing she could do but lie here and feel sorry for herself.

A buzzing vibrated against her hip, and her heartbeat picked up even as her stomach dropped when she realized it wasn’t her normal cell. Not news, then. It was the burner phone Dmitri Romanov had given her, the one he used to contact her directly without leaving a trace for her family to find.

Her thumb hovered over the call reject button. She needed to be here for when news came in… but Dmitri often surprised her by knowing more than he should. Maybe he had news for her.

And maybe pigs will fly. You want to answer the call because you want to talk to him. It has nothing to do with noble motivations.

The phone buzzed again, and she answered before she could talk herself out of it. “Do you even know what time it is?”

“Are you still wearing my ring?” Dmitri’s voice rasped through the line, his Russian accent making her stomach do a slow somersault.

She looked down at the giant diamond winking in the low light.

Two weeks ago, he’d cornered her in a bathroom and slipped it on her finger.

It wasn’t the proposal she’d dreamed of when she was a little girl, but six-year-old Keira O’Malley never would have imagined a man like Dmitri.

There was nothing innocent about him, nothing noble or even a little bit good.

He was the villain of this story. The man who would take down her family—unless she became his bride.

And yet, Keira hadn’t taken the ring off, though she couldn’t begin to explain the impulse that had kept the jewelry in place.

Liar. That ring is nothing more than you deserve, and not because it’s worth a small fortune.

It’s a promise that you’ll do what it takes when the time comes… and the time is now.

There was only one reason Dmitri was calling her at four in the morning, while her oldest brother was headed to a dangerous meeting in New York and the rest of the family was otherwise occupied, facing down a threat coming from a different direction. Clever Russian. He’s making his play.

She swallowed hard. “Yes.”

A pause, as if she’d surprised him with her honesty. Keira sat up and took another hit of her joint. She needed all the bolstering she could get for what would come next.

When Dmitri spoke again, his tone was cool and distant. “Your brother intends to break his word to me and cancel our engagement.”

She froze. “What?” Surely she’d just heard him wrong.

Aiden was too smart to risk the safety of their family and the people who depended on them for her.

She was expendable. The youngest of seven—six, now—siblings, it only made sense to sell her to Dmitri.

They’d fought too hard to prevent a war to start one now.

Her family had dealt him three political blows in as many years.

If the O’Malleys reneged on this, Dmitri would see every single one of them taken out. She had no doubt about it.

“You can stop it, Keira. Come with me now and I’ll forget that he was going to break his word.” If the devil existed, he had a Russian accent and used that coaxing tone when offering his bargains. Come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly. I’ll eat you whole, but you’ll like it.

She suspected it was even the truth.

She was safe in her room. He wouldn’t bash in, shoot everyone, and take her. It wasn’t Dmitri’s style, no matter what anyone thought of him. But if she didn’t go with him now, the O’Malleys and Romanovs would go to war. Nothing would be able to prevent it.

Nothing but her.

Have to play this right. “If I come with you now”—her voice hitched, but she pushed on—“promise me there will be peace. Give me your word.”

He barely hesitated. “I give my word that I will do nothing further to antagonize your brother and the situation.”

She’d been around too many power plays in her life not to know hedging when she heard it. “But if he comes after me, you’ll finish what he started. No. I’m not signing Aiden’s death warrant.”

He cursed in Russian. “I will do everything in my power to broker peace if you come with me right this moment. The clock is ticking, Keira.”

He’d keep his word. Dmitri might be borderline evil with a dose of psychopath, but he had his own code of honor.

That promise was as good as she was going to get.

If she said no now, she might very well be sentencing her family to war.

Maybe they could win, but not without casualties.

I can’t bury another sibling. “Give me two minutes.”

“Be quick.”

Keira hung up and grabbed a bag. She kept an overnight one packed for emergencies.

She paused and looked around her room. There wasn’t a single damn thing that she couldn’t live without.

The jewelry her mother gave her hadn’t been touched in well over two years.

Her books lay unread. She finally snatched a picture of her and her siblings from the dresser and shoved it into the pack, followed by her bag of perfectly rolled joints and two bottles of vodka.

Dmitri was Russian—he no doubt owned stock in vodka—but she’d rather have her own stash close at hand.

And then there was nothing else holding her to this place.

She shoved the window open and climbed out.

It was a route she’d taken more times than she could count, no matter how often her brother threatened to install bars to hold her in.

She swung out of the window and climbed down the tree to the ground.

A bitter wind kicked her hair into her face and made her wish she’d thought to bring a sweatshirt, but it was too late to worry about it now.

Keira shrugged her bag over her shoulder and started down the street toward the black town car and the man who stood next to it as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

As if he wasn’t in the very heart of enemy territory, stealing her out from under her family’s nose.

Dmitri Romanov was striking in the way of fallen angels, his face a little too rough for perfection, his mouth a little too calculating and made for spilling lies, his gray eyes a little too icy to be anything other than exactly what he was—a cold-blooded killer who manipulated people to suit his purposes.

Against her better judgment, she picked up her pace, drawn to him despite everything that had happened between them—and everything that hadn’t.

“Stop.”

Dmitri moved. One second he was several feet away, and the next he pulled Keira to him—behind him. She blinked and peered around his shoulder to find her middle brother standing on the sidewalk, a gun in his hand.

A gun pointed at Dmitri.

“Put the gun down, Cillian.” Dmitri spoke softly, his hands out to his sides.

Shielding me.

More like protecting his investment.

“I don’t care if you helped Aiden and Charlie, you are not taking my sister anywhere.”

Keira bit down angry words. Right now, the only thing that mattered was defusing the situation. Her brother wanted to protect her—she got that—but he was putting everyone they cared about in danger with this bullshit. She opened her mouth, but Dmitri spoke before she had a chance.

“You owe me a favor, Cillian O’Malley.”

“The fuck I do.”

“Break your word and our deal is null and void.”

Oh God. If Cillian did that, it would be even worse than shooting Dmitri right then and there. Keira stepped around Dmitri and put her hand on his chest. “Cillian, please. Just let me go. I’m choosing this. I’ll be okay. I promise.” Soft and easy. Lie with your words and tone and body.

Cillian relaxed. The gun inched lower, finally aiming safely at the concrete at her brother’s feet. “Aiden is going to come after you, Keira. You know that.”

He couldn’t come after her, because if he did, Dmitri would have the ammunition he needed to attack. She leaned forward, her voice low and fierce. “He promised to respect my choice.” She had to get her message across or this would all be for nothing.

She turned and walked away, now gripping Dmitri’s shirt to tow him after her.

If she didn’t, the boys were liable to whip out their cocks just to see whose was biggest. Better to remove Dmitri from the temptation of poking at her brother—something he had a long history of doing, given that Cillian was living with Dmitri’s half sister.

Keira held her breath the entire time, waiting for Cillian to push the subject, waiting for Dmitri to make a snide comment.

But, miracle of miracles, both men stayed silent.