Sold to the Bratva Boss

Chapter 1

Chapter one

Rafail

The phone rings at four-forty-five in the morning—that dead hour when Moscow wakes and Boston staggers toward sleep. Viktor’s timing is always calculated. A call at this hour, over an encrypted line, means something has gone wrong enough that spoken words are a liability.

Sleep is a casualty the moment my hand finds the phone. My voice is gravel, edged with the irritation of a man who doesn’t tolerate interruptions to the careful order of his life.

“What the hell is it?”

Viktor’s response carries none of the deference my tone demands, which is why he’s one of three people on this earth I trust. “Check your inbox.” His voice is steady—the calm he uses when delivering news that will ignite my temper. A steady hand on a gun, even when it’s pointed at his own head.

The command tightens my gut. The instinct that’s kept me alive through four decades of blood and steel, recognizing danger before my mind catches up. He won’t say it over our secure line, which means whatever sits in my inbox is inflammatory enough to require deniability.

“Why can’t you just tell me? It’s too early for reading.” The grumble dies on my tongue as I swing my legs out of bed, kicking free of the tangled sheets. The cold wood floor shocks me fully awake, a reminder that even my own home keeps me sharp.

I cross to the desk without bothering with lights. My cock hangs heavy, morning hardness not yet faded.I grab yesterday’s boxers from the floor and step into them, cradling the phone against my shoulder.

“How’s Daniil?” The question is automatic, buying time while my laptop boots, my mind racing through possibilities.

Viktor’s sigh is impatient. “Time is money, cousin.”

The screen flickers to life, bathing my face in a blue-white light that deepens the shadows in my office. My inbox loads, and the top message makes my pulse kick—an encrypted folder marked with Viktor’s personal code, timestamped twenty minutes ago.

The folder opens to a catalog of faces. Girls, mostly, though all technically legal according to the documentation Viktor has meticulously compiled.

Pretty, posed, packaged for sale. Blondes, brunettes, all between nineteen and twenty-three.

Every single file includes medical proof of their virginity.

Rage burns behind my ribs. The words come out as a low growl. “What the fuck, Viktor? Did you wake me up to fix my love life? What is this shit?”

His laugh is dry, humorless. “Your love life’s not fixable. If you haven’t found the one in forty-two years, you probably took her out in a killing spree decades ago.”

I should be offended. Instead, I scroll past the faces—each one smiling, posed, trying to look appealing to the kind of men who bid on them. The cheerleader with her ponytail and wholesome grin. An honors student whose glasses scream innocence. The medical student with dreams in her bio.

“I’m glad you have jokes. Now tell me what I’m looking at.”

“A virgin auction.”

The words steal whatever warmth the laptop provided. An auction. Selling women like assets.

“I figured that out.” My voice drops, cold as steel. “What the hell does it have to do with me?”

“Check the place and time.”

I scroll to the event details. A cold fury washes through me, sharpening everything to a single point of focus. The Onyx Room. My fucking club. He’s put this filth in it.

“I will murder him,” I say, the words conversational, matter-of-fact. “I will skin him alive and lay his carcass out like a rug in front of my fireplace so I can wipe my feet on him every night.”

I force myself to scroll through the images again, slower. They’re all so young, smiling with varying degrees of enthusiasm for the monsters who would buy them.

Then my thumb stops.

My breath catches. Every muscle in my body locks. The world narrows to her face.

She’s not smiling.

Jana Spears.

Where the others pose with arched backs and parted lips, she stands straight in jeans and a sweater.

Her darker skin has a glow that even the unflattering photo lighting can’t diminish.

Her hair is loose around her shoulders—the only concession to attracting a bidder—but her body language screams refusal. She’s not selling. She’s enduring.

And her eyes. Those marble-brown eyes stare directly at the camera with a wary intelligence that sees too much. She knows exactly what kind of monster would bid on her.

And she came anyway.

A raw hunger coils in my gut, something I don’t fucking recognize. I’ve looked at thousands of women. Beautiful women, available women, women who made themselves easy to want. I’ve never felt this—this immediate, visceral pull that makes my cock twitch and my hands ache to touch.

What the fuck is happening to me?

I try to scroll past her, to assess the full situation like the businessman I am. But my thumb drags back to her image, an involuntary pull, a need to own what I’m seeing.

The defiant lift of her chin. The refusal to beg, even in a photograph. This one knows what she’s walking into, and she’ll meet it with her spine straight. And I want her with an intensity that feels like it could strip flesh from bone.

“At least no one looks battered, drugged, or forced,” I say, my voice rough, unfamiliar. “Are they so fucking young they don’t realize what they signed up for?”

But I’m not looking at the others anymore. Just her.

Jana Spears. Twenty-three. Business management major, three credits from graduation. Two part-time jobs. Grandmother dying in a Medicaid hospice. No other family. Desperate enough to see this as her best option.

I understand desperation; I’ve built an empire on it. But this woman, with her lifted chin and her refusal to perform—she’s courageous in a way that makes me want to burn down the world that put her here, then lock her away where only I can see her.

“Any man who would pay a starting bid of fifty thousand isn’t going to be a knight in fucking shining armor.” The number sits at the bottom of each file. Fifty thousand feels obscene. Too much. Not nearly enough. Nothing could be enough for what she’s willing to sacrifice.

Viktor’s voice cuts through the fog in my brain. “Who knows what they think? If I understood women, I wouldn’t be on the phone with you. I’d be at home eating a meal she prepared while she rubbed my feet.”

The absurdity makes me choke on a laugh. “You really don’t know women.”

“Neither do you. Now, what are we going to do? I wanted the go-ahead to change management.”

Change management. Put a bullet in Volodymyr and move on. It’s the logical solution. But my thumb hovers over Jana’s image. Logic has no place here. There is only this pull, this immediate certainty. She’s mine. The thought isn’t a choice. It’s a fact.

I scroll through the files a third time, and each pass ends the same way: stopped on her face. Every other girl tries to entice. Jana stands in baggy clothes, daring a buyer to see her value without the advertisement. The defiance in that choice ignites a raw, possessive hunger in my gut.

“I’m canceling the auction,” Viktor continues. “I’m tempted to take a pistol and beat every man who even thought an Ismailov would sell a stupid woman.”

“Don’t call them stupid.” The words snap out of me, sharp and defensive.

“Huh?” Viktor’s surprise is audible.

I’m surprised, too. But dismissing her intelligence—it makes my teeth grind.

“No. Don’t stop it.” The decision crystallizes as I speak. “I’ll catch the next flight. I just wrapped things up with the Aslanovs.”

“We got the route?”

“Yes. When I get home, we’ll celebrate.” It’s a major win, but all I can think about is getting on a plane, crossing an ocean, and seeing this woman in person. “First, I handle Volodymyr. And the auction.”

My thumb returns to Jana’s file. Her dark eyes seem to see through the screen, through me.

Hers is the only file I print. The laser printer whirs to life, and I fold the paper carefully. I’ll add it to my wallet where it will rest against my chest.

“Have Daniil make the arrangements to pick me up. When we get to the auction, I want him and Maxim on this.”

“You know Maxim is more than a little insane. Are you sure you want a machine gun when a knife will do?”

Silence stretches across the line. I let the quiet build until Viktor understands his error.

“Fine. Max it is.”

“And Viktor, one more thing.” I open Jana’s photo, looking at it again because I can’t help myself. “Put guys on each of the ladies. Discreet protection. Only interact if needed.”

The request is unusual enough that Viktor goes silent for a beat. “You’re the boss.”

“I want you on Jana Spears.” Her name lingers on my tongue. “The girls need protection. We’re not the only predators with their information now. Not every man will wait for the auction. Why pay when they can take?” My fists clench on her picture before I sigh and straighten out the creases.

“And Jana Spears?” Viktor’s voice drags me back from rage.

“She’s under mine.” The statement is final. A claim I’m making before I have any right. Looking at her photograph, at the desperate dignity in her eyes, I know with bone-deep certainty: Jana Spears is mine. I just have no fucking idea what to do with it.

***

Three days of daily reports. I memorize Jana’s routine, studying a target I have no intention of harming. No, not at all. Each update from Viktor arrives punctually, and I’m hell to be around when they’re delayed.

She visits her grandmother every evening at the hospice—Dorothy Spears, late-stage renal failure, no donor match.

She’s finishing her last class for her business degree.

She works too damn hard delivering food to strangers.

My girl, walking into danger for a few measly dollars.

I consider buying the company, just to fire her.

She can keep her ass at home, safe. But I bide my time, Viktor is covering her, and he knows the price for failure.

She has no one. Nobody gives a fuck about her except an old woman dying in a Medicaid bed.