Chapter Thirteen
Dmitri
I sat in my library, a closed book in my lap and a measure of whiskey in a glass on the small table beside my armchair. There was a roaring fire in the brick fireplace, and I stared into the flames.
The burden of running the Bratva weighed heavily on me in quiet moments like this.
It was all I’d ever known, the job that was my birthright, and I was mostly content.
But sometimes, when I got lost in thought, I wondered what my life would be like if I hadn’t been born into this.
If I were a man who worked a regular job and didn’t have to worry about evading police or overseeing the activities of dozens of men or the underhanded actions of a rival mafia.
I wasn’t sure if I felt so introspective tonight because the trial began today or because I saw Sarah and it stirred up so many strange feelings I’d never had for a woman before. All I knew was that I was in a piss-poor mood, and even the whiskey wasn’t helping with that.
Still, I drank down my last mouthful.
I’d just placed the empty glass on the table when there was a loud pounding on my front door.
I sighed through my nose and got out of my chair.
I always had men watching my house, guarding against any intruder, so I knew whoever was at the door was one of the few people I trusted enough to give permission to show up out of the blue like this.
Especially since it was ten o’clock at night. Late for basic social visits.
Based on the fact that the person was pounding on the door instead of using the doorbell, I surmised it was Maxim outside. He always preferred the battering ram approach to things, even getting me to answer the door.
When I swung it open, I clocked the tension in his stance and the cold rage in his eyes. Stepping back, I silently invited him in, slamming the door shut and locking it the moment he was inside.
“What’s going on?” I asked. I hadn’t heard from him since I told him to follow Sarah outside of the courthouse. That was eight hours ago.
“I’ve come to give you a status update about the witness.”
“Sarah,” I said automatically, wanting him to use her name because it showed she wasn’t just a witness in the case against me. She mattered in a way I hadn’t quite figured out yet.
“She’s home,” Maxim said without acknowledging what I said. “After the courthouse, she went home for a while. Then she ran some errands. Nothing of note happened until she was leaving the store.”
I followed Maxim into my kitchen, and he helped himself to a glass of whiskey. It looked like I wasn’t the only one who needed a drink tonight.
“What happened when she was leaving the store?” I asked. I had a bad feeling about what he was going to say. There was something dark in his eyes as he tossed back a big gulp of what was supposed to be a sipping whiskey.
“I think she spotted me in the produce section, so I slipped outside while she was checking out. I hid in the shadows near her car while I waited for her to come out, and I noticed that a big, windowless van had parked right beside her while we were inside. Mind you, this is in a mostly empty lot.”
“Fuck.” I could tell where this was going.
“A couple of masked men jumped out when she tried to leave. They threatened to harm her and her daughter if she didn’t testify that you were the one to directly kill Moss and that she saw it.”
I ground my teeth together as my heart thumped against my ribcage. It was no wonder Maxim looked disturbed. We both grew up in a household with an abusive bastard who didn’t hesitate to put his hands on our mother and us. It shaped how we viewed the world and what morals we had.
I’d hurt people before, even killed, but only men, and only when they deserved it. I never hurt women or children, and I knew my brother wouldn’t either.
“I told you to make sure she was safe. Why didn’t you do anything?” I asked, suddenly pissed off at my brother.
And the masked men.
And myself.
I shouldn’t have let her go off on her own today. If I’d had anything more than a vague idea that she might be in danger, I would have stuck with her myself.
“They didn’t hurt her. It was just some threats.”
My fist clenched. It had been a long time since I thought about punching my brother.
Probably since we were both hot-headed teenagers and I had a chip on my shoulder that made me angry at the whole damn world.
We’d grown up since then, and we had a good relationship.
But right now, I was really thinking about giving him a right hook to the face.
The only thing that held me back was that I wanted more information, and fighting with him—because he would definitely hit me back—would delay learning what I needed to know.
“Tell me exactly what was said,” I demanded.
Maxim relayed the threats that were made against Sarah and her daughter. There wasn’t much said, but it was enough to piss me off, and I was sure Sarah was utterly terrified.
“She has a daughter? Did you see her?” I asked.
“Her apartment is on the third floor, and her curtains were closed, but I called Nikolay and had him run a background check. It’s a very basic one since I wanted the results quickly, but I learned that she has a three-year-old daughter named Alexis.
She’s also thirty years old and works as an officer manager at an advertising company.
She got that job a couple of weeks after her old boss was murdered. Nikolay can dig deeper if you want.”
Three years old. Her daughter was a helpless child, and those fuckers threatened to take her away if Sarah didn’t lie on the stand. The protectiveness I felt toward Sarah suddenly extended to this little girl I’d never even met, and I didn’t know what to do with that.
Who the hell was I? I’d never been like this, never been a man who cared about other people without already having a close personal connection. One night in bed didn’t count.
But I cared about Sarah. I even cared about her little girl.
“I got the license plate of the van,” Maxim said. “I’ll contact one of our men in the NYPD and have them run it down.”
I nodded. “Go ahead, but we already know. It’s the Italians. Baldoni is enough of a bastard to threaten a woman and her child, especially if it puts me behind bars.”
I knew the Don hoped that getting me out of the way would weaken the Bratva enough that he could move into our territory without much resistance.
He’d be wrong about that. My men were well-trained, and he wouldn’t like it, but as my brother, Maxim would be obligated to take over if I got locked up.
He’d make sure the damn Italians couldn’t move into Brooklyn.
But I was tired of being reactive. I wanted to get ahead of this mess. I had to admit that the Italians got one over on me with the current charges—I didn’t see it coming. But I was done letting them direct the narrative.
And threatening Sarah and her child changed everything.
If they were trying to force her into perjury, they weren’t just endangering her life—they were setting her up to destroy it themselves. Prison was a very real possibility for her, no matter how this trial ended. I needed to make sure she was safe.
I stopped questioning why I felt this way. I just needed to act.
Because Baldoni wasn’t just ruthless enough to threaten her. He was a callous bastard, and I was sure he’d follow through on the threat, whether she complied or not. I was sure he’d eliminate her just to tie up a loose end.
“Go home,” I told Maxim. “Call me when you get the license plate information from the police.”
He drained his glass of whiskey before leaving. Once he was out the door, I texted Nikolay. If he did a basic background check on Sarah, he’d have her address. I told him to send it to me and left the house as soon as it came through, plugging it into my GPS.
***
Her apartment building was in a decent neighborhood, not the kind of place where people were afraid to walk down the street or saw drug deals happening on the corners. My kind of business didn’t touch a neighborhood like this.
But the building wasn’t exactly secure. There was no doorman, and I didn’t see any security cameras. The entrance was locked, but one of the residents was coming out just as I approached. He held the door open for me without a second of hesitation.
Idiot.
I took the elevator up to the third floor. It was late, and all of the apartments I passed were quiet. That made my knocking on the door of Sarah’s apartment seem jarringly loud.
The door across the hall opened before Sarah’s, and I turned around to meet the annoyed glare of an old man with a cane.
One look at my stoic face, and his eyes widened with apprehension.
He stepped back inside his own apartment and closed the door, but I wouldn’t have been surprised if he was calling the police.
Good thing the NYPD had bigger issues to deal with on an average Friday night than a man knocking on someone’s door.
Finally, Sarah’s door opened, and I turned back just in time to see shock and fear chase each other across her face.
Her breath hitched, and I could see tension in the cords of her neck, her shoulders bunching up as color drained from her face.
She was holding the door open only enough to look out at me, clearly not about to invite me inside.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, a tremor in her voice that I could tell she was trying to hide.
My brave girl.
No. Not my girl. I might have been inexplicably drawn to her, but that didn’t make her mine. She was scared of me and would never consent to being mine.
But that was too bad.
“Pack your bags,” I said, pushing her door open enough to make my way inside. She let out a squeak of surprise and outrage.
“Pack my bags? What are you talking about? You can’t just come in here. This is my home, and I don’t want you here!”
There was that fire again. I almost smiled, but I didn’t think that would help things when she was so upset already.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “We’re both going to leave soon. You’re coming with me.”