Chapter 41 - Laurel
There was no way to tell how much time passed while my captor filled me in on every criminal thing the Fokins were involved in. I learned more than I ever could have hoped, and it made me realize that the saying about being careful what you wished for was true.
And for the life of me, I couldn’t zone out. For the first time ever, I wasn’t able to disappear and make it all go away. Every gruesome and gritty detail made it past my defenses.
The wonderful people who took me in and treated me like one of their own were killers. Some kind of special, extra-sinister form of the mafia called the Bratva. Bandana boy was American and admitted he didn’t know what the word actually meant, but you had to have balls of steel to mess with them.
He seemed to spook himself a little and reverted to speaking about how badass the people that he worked for were. They were once under the thumb of the Fokins but managed to break free, and were now reclaiming what was theirs.
Most of it didn’t make sense. For one thing, the people on his side were brought over from various parts of Europe, so how were they reclaiming anything over here?
What little I knew about Mik’s American family was that they were born and raised in Los Angeles after their father emigrated from Russia when he was still fairly young.
Some of it made too much sense, though. It explained why Mik wasn’t all that freaked out about a gunfight breaking out at his restaurant.
It explained the bruises and the late nights, and definitely explained the secrecy.
I counted all the chances he could have told me, but my mind tapped out when I wondered what I would have done if he did.
Would I have run sooner?
The one thing I gleaned from Bandana Boy’s ramblings while we waited for Mik to fall into the ambush or for Rand to show up was that Mik had lied to me. Not just about his father, which I could chalk up as being a kindness to protect my feelings. About his entire life.
My chatty captor wouldn’t shut up, and since my hands were tied, I couldn’t clap them over my ears. He didn’t care much if Rand or Mik showed up. He assured me he was prepared to get the drop on Mik, showing off his knife-throwing skills by slinging a couple past me to get lodged in the wall.
“See? I can hit anything I want. I actually won awards for this.”
“Your parents must be so proud,” I said, the first thing I uttered since he began enlightening me. He didn’t catch the sarcasm, or he might have forgotten I wasn’t supposed to be hurt.
To my shock, it was Mik who showed up first. Part of me hoped he would, but now that I knew the truth, it was mostly doused by anger and fear. What did I really know about him?
Poor Bandana boy didn’t stand a chance, even with his award-winning knife skills, and while there was a moment when I thought the last thing I’d see on this earth was Mik pointing a gun while one of those knives was digging into my throat, all of a sudden it was over.
I was tossed aside to safety and managed to get back on my chair before flopping helplessly to the floor like a fish. There was no way I could stay upright and slumped over, my heart and mind both racing.
So, was I captured again? As happy as I was to be rescued by someone I was pretty sure wouldn’t hurt me, what kind of life did I have to look forward to with this…
this Bratva king. Whatever that meant. I was resigned, too exhausted by everything I learned to do anything after I begged him to help find Nell.
Which he did without hesitation, but it barely made a dent in my anger and confusion.
Until I heard him say he was waiting for Rand to show up and claim me. My head jerked up. Every good memory raced back at full force. It might have made me feel pathetic, but Mik had given me a sense of peace and safety since that little white lie to get me to marry him.
Maybe his family ran a criminal empire, but Mik was happy to brew beer and start a restaurant.
Nobody as hard and cold as he was supposed to be would track down such beautiful glasses from a Czech artisan if he was only obsessed with money and power.
And then fight so hard for them when he found out they were all wrong. He cared about things. About me.
There was no denying that. I couldn’t let Rand get anywhere near him. Whatever betrayal I felt, he didn’t deserve that. And I couldn’t stand by and watch him get hurt, because Rand would go for him first, just to make me watch him suffer.
“You don’t know how dangerous he is,” I said desperately.
Mik had freed me from the zip ties, and I grabbed his arm. The warm security of holding onto him was too much, and I let go. There was no future for us, not with everything between us. Thinking about the good times was just a form of torture.
He laughed bitterly, seeming to know something had changed in me, that I had learned more than I was supposed to. “But don’t you know by now that I’m dangerous too?”
Oh, he was infuriating. He reminded me he had his brother with him. I was glad he sent his other helpers to find Nell before it was too late, but… “He’s not going to come alone. You’ll be outnumbered.”
He refused to listen to reason, and it was on the tip of my tongue to blurt out that I was pregnant, but then he’d really never leave me. And then I’d have to watch him die.
“What makes you think I want to stay married to you?” I spat, trying reverse psychology in hopes he’d get mad enough to save himself. “You’re a criminal, right? Bratva? You’re as bad as my ex.”
He gave me a long look. “We’re most definitely staying married,” he said calmly. “And I’m not as bad as your ex. I’m worse.”
He was stone cold and left me in the room to confer with his brother. Mik stayed just outside my room, occasionally looking back at me, but I never met his eyes, too angry at him and too scared for him, and too frustrated at myself for not being able to get either one of us out of this nightmare.
It might have been a few minutes or a few hours, but I overheard Luk say something from the other room that chilled me to the bone and had me snapping out of my daze.
“He’s here.”
“How many?” Mik answered, holding his hand out as I started to rise.
“Enough,” Luk said.
“Let me go,” I whispered. “I’ll walk out, and he’ll take me and—”
“Sit back down, Laurel.”
With that, he closed the door, and his footsteps faded down the hall. In another moment, there was a loud crash. Shouting. Sounds of something heavy hitting a wall, and grunts of pain. The first gunshot was muffled, but the agonized wail had me jumping up.
Who was hurt? Who might be dying or already dead right now? And why was I once again cowering in a corner, on the verge of slipping into unconsciousness? Opening the bedroom door, I crept down the hall, my heart slamming against my ribs and making it difficult to breathe.
It calmed only slightly when I saw Mik, alive and swinging a chair at someone I didn’t recognize. Luk was on the other side of the room, standing over a bleeding man on the floor, just turning with his gun raised as Rand jumped forward to crack him over the head with some kind of small club.
I swayed on my feet, grabbing onto the wall. Everything was moving incredibly fast, but I seemed to be stuck in quicksand, hardly able to turn my head from one person to the next to keep up.
As soon as he saw his brother get knocked out, Mik roared with fury and began to pull out a gun.
But somehow, Rand was all the way across the room, his club swinging in a raised arc, knocking the gun out of Mik’s hand.
I watched it land and skid across the scuffed tile floor.
Then Mik was down, his hands raised, and as he fell, he got in a swipe at Rand, who barely staggered back a step.
Mik’s back hit the floor, his head bounced, his eyes closed.
No.
Everything flickered out. I clawed my way back to see a knife in Rand’s hand, long and evil-looking. In another blink, it was going to plunge into Mik’s chest. Hell, no.
All my confusion about his true life melted away.
How his family made their fortune was of no concern when the father of my child was about to be killed right in front of me.
The man who’d saved me and showed me how to speak up for myself without fear wasn’t about to die while I clung to the wall and tried to stay upright.
Finding a strength that was only possible because of my time with Mik, I hurled myself forward, my palms hitting the floor hard, my knees skidding into the gun that had been knocked out of Mik’s hand.
Rand looked my way, his mouth curling in a smug grin. What the hell was I going to do? I was useless, after all.
I shot him. Watched the smile turn into a grimace of pain as he crumpled into a heap, grabbing his shattered kneecap. I didn’t know how it was possible, but it was me who was smiling now, looking down at the gun while my finger slowly squeezed.
Mik grabbed it away from me before I could pull the trigger again, and got between Rand and me, one hand firmly on my shoulder as he aimed the gun at Rand’s head.
He only moved it when another guy ran into the living room, taking the newcomer out with a single bullet.
I closed my eyes against the blood splattering onto the wall behind him, but found it didn’t make me dizzy at all when I opened them again at Mik’s gentle squeeze.
“Help Luk,” he said, his gun trained on Rand again, moving slowly back and forth as Rand squirmed around in pain.
Pain I inflicted. There was that smile again.
I shook Luk’s arm, and he came to, jumping up to realize the situation was pretty well under control.
I ran back to the bedroom and found the bag of zip ties, but Luk must have had his own stash, because when I returned, Rand’s arms and legs were already tied.
He’d gone pale and limp, shaking from the pain of his blown-out kneecap.
I could have said so many things to him, but found I didn’t need to. He lost. That was enough. And I helped bring him down.
Luk grabbed him under the armpits and unceremoniously dragged him out front, and a moment later, I heard a door slam. I smiled again, imagining Rand in the trunk, fearful and in agony.
“Thanks,” Mik said, rubbing his wrist, which was swelling up from where he’d been hit by the club. “You saved my life.”
“I did?” I shook my head.
No, that was all Mik, saving me. It wasn’t me hiding in the closet this time, but Rand stuffed in a trunk. I wasn’t the one bleeding this time. In fact, I didn’t have a scratch on me, save for the slight marks from the zip ties.
“You were fucking amazing, Laurel,” he said, looking at me like I was some rare prize.
Yeah, I fucking was, wasn’t I?
It was only then that I was able to burst into tears and collapse. Straight into Mik’s arms.