Chapter 29
NIKO
THE NOOSE - A PERFECT CIRCLE
“What the hell are you waiting for?” I blink rapidly through my tears, not giving one single fuck that I’m crying as I try like hell to get my vision to clear up enough to go after our girl. I watch her peel out of the barn, my heart breaking as the distance between us grows. “Let’s fucking go!”
I go to shove past Leon but he catches me around the waist and holds me back, bear hugging me from behind as I throw elbows, barely ducking when I try to headbutt him and start kicking my legs in hopes of connecting with his shins.
“Let her go, baby,” he says softly next to my ear. “Not forever, just for now.”
“Are you fucking mental?” My chest heaves as my heart pounds against my ribs, slamming out a panicked rhythm as my anger simmers right under the surface. “Let her go?! Let our fucking girl, our bonded omega, go? What the hell is wrong with you?”
Leon sets me on my feet, but he doesn't loosen his hold as Rune comes to stand in front of me and cups my cheeks. “He’s right, Nikolai.” The gentle giant smoothes his thumbs back and forth under my eyes, wiping my tears and trying to soothe my nerves. “Olive needs time.”
“Time? Time for what?” I lift my hands and wrap my fingers around his wrists, squeezing hard in a sad attempt to ground myself. “The more time we give her, the further away from us she gets, and the closer we are to never seeing Liv again!”
Rune sighs as he searches my eyes then leans down and presses a kiss to my forehead, but he doesn’t speak.
He doesn’t need to, not when he sends a wave of calming energy through our bond and pushes it out to all four of us, but it’s not going to last. Not for me, and definitely not right now.
I’ve been a fucking basket case the last few weeks, riding the rollercoaster of emotions that is our girl while hanging on for dear life.
I’ve barely been able to do that, not when it felt like Liv was slipping through our fingers, building her walls higher with each passing day.
When the six of us finally got our shit together, I thought maybe things would be different.
They felt different. They were different.
Better. Right? Everything felt the way it was supposed to as soon our pack was whole, but I should have known.
Who am I kidding, I did know. We all knew, and Liv basically told us in so many words that this was going to happen for one reason or another, and leave it to us to give her the best fucking reason without even trying.
“You,” I growl as I quickly duck to the right, breaking both Leon and Rune’s holds as I dart past Styx and go right for Dimitri. “This is all your fucking fault.”
I cock my fist back and let it fly the second I see the blue of his eye, his head snapping back on his neck with a muffled grunt.
“Feel better?” he asks like an asshole as he uses the back of his hand to wipe the blood from his lip. Dimitri turns his head and spits on the ground, blood mixing with his saliva in a small puddle at my feet. “Or do you need to do it again before we talk this out like fucking grown ups?”
“Bastard.” I swing at him again but he catches my wrist, holding it between us with ease despite the way I try jerking it away. “This is all your fault.”
“My fault?” Dimitri spits again as he glares at me. “If I’m not mistaken, you were on that goddamn roof with me, mylak. I wasn’t the only one firing Winchesters through the walls of that fucking house.”
He’s not wrong, not at all, but I don’t want to hear that right now.
I want someone to blame, I need a target for my fear and anger.
One I can see and feel, one I can hurt. I want Dimitri to hurt as much as I do, I need him to hurt.
I want every single one of these men to experience the same fucking pain I am, the same fear and worry that’s coursing through every inch of my body.
I need my mates to feel everything I’m feeling and at the same level, so I know I’m not alone in my heartache, that I’m not the only one who’s terrified of losing our girl forever, and maybe that’s enough for us to find a way to get her back.
“We will,” Styx says as he starts rubbing gentle circles against my back, taking my hand from Dimitri then leading me to the picnic table. “If she doesn’t come home to us first, we will go get our girl and bring her here ourselves.”
I shake my head and wipe the remaining tears from my eyes. “Why would she want to be with us after finding out Dimitri and I murdered her previous pack? Liv isn’t coming back, and I can’t fucking blame her for it.”
Leon sits on the bench next to me, effectively sandwiching me between him and our beta. “Our girl is smart.”
I slowly turn to face him, my brow furrowed in confusion as I wait for him to explain.
“She needs time to process. That was big, it was heavy, and it also put an abrupt and unexpected end to the vendetta she’s had for nearly three years.
That’s a lot for anyone.” Leon pushes my hair behind my ear and gives me a soft smile.
“Once she can wrap her head around everything she just learned, Liv will see it for what it is.”
“Which is…”
He chuckles and pats my cheek. “A job, baby. You and D were doing your job. It wasn’t personal, neither of you had a horse in the race. You were following orders and nothing more. Liv will see that once she’s had a little time to digest things.”
“She’s not going to believe that.” As soon as the words are out, I can hear how full of shit they sound, but there’s no use in taking them back.
“Liv’s been so hellbent on getting her pound of flesh for such a long time, I can’t see her just shrugging her shoulders and saying, no harm, no foul, boys, I know you didn’t mean it, you were just doing your job.
I’m not sure I could do that if I were in her position. ”
“You did,” Rune grunts. “You forgave Dimitri after he explained what happened between you.”
Styx nods as we all watch D pace back and forth a few feet away.
“He’s right. It’s not that different. Dimitri tried to kill you, he abandoned you right after you mated and all because Boris made him do it.
He broke it down for you, he risked rejection and a broken heart just so you could get closure, and you still managed to forgive him. ”
“Love, my sweet boy,” Leon says as those washed out green eyes move over us, lingering briefly on each of our faces with a very satisfied smile.
“You accepted what Dimitri told you as the truth because of how strong and unbreakable the love you have for each other is. It’s the same with all of us.
I don’t need to have years of experience to understand that, and Liv is no different.
Our girl might be a stubborn ass, but she’ll come around because at the end of the day, she loves all of us too much to stay away.
” He kisses my temple with a grin. “Even if you and D did execute the men who had her before us.”
I scowl in his face but it only lasts a second because I can’t help but hope he’s right.
They all had valid points.
I didn’t want to do it, I wanted to make him suffer for a while first, but it was easy to forgive Dimitri after he explained things, and it was only because I love him with all my heart.
I’d do the same thing for any of my mates because of how fucking much I love them, and I can only hope that Liv feels the same way.
But, because I do know how stubborn she is, and that she can be extremely leery and guarded… “I want proof.”
Dimitri stops pacing mid-step and turns to face me. “Proof?”
I nod and cross my arms against my chest. “Boris kept detailed records, right? We both know that. He’ll have a copy of the written hit, one that will show Hayk ordered and paid, while your piece of shit father was, and in turn, we were only the middle men.”
“That doesn’t change what we did, Niko, and that’s what Liv has to process and ultimately decide how to handle.”
Fucker isn’t really wrong. “I want it, anyway. The orders, the transaction records. The entire fucking file so she can see we didn’t even have names, just a number and address.
I want that fucking information, Dimitri.
I need it so Liv can see that we would never knowingly do anything to hurt her.
Ever. It doesn’t change what happened, it’s not going to bring her previous pack back to life, but if we can at least prove to her that it really was just a job, maybe it will help her process things a little better. ”
He stares at me for a few beats, one bright blue eye and one milky white one searching my face in silence before D nods. “We need to leave as soon as possible.”
Relief washes over me and I get to my feet. “I’ll start looking at flights.”
“I’ll go pack,” Styx says, smiling wide when he sees me frown. “You two are literal walking dead men the second you set foot on Bratva property. Do you really think we were just going to let the two of you go alone?”
“No,” Leon sing-songs, his phone in his hand, quickly scrolling and tapping against the screen. “You need backup, and you need my brain. I just got the four of us on the red eye to New York, and if I bring my laptop, I’ll get us in and out of daddy dearest’s fortress as quietly as possible.”
I blink a few times then turn to Rune, who shakes his head. “I’ll stay here and wait for Olive.”
“You’re sure?”
“I am.”
“You don’t need any of us…” I roll my eyes at myself before I finish my sentence. “Of course you don’t need anyone to stay with you. You’re a fucking tank, and those puppies are hellhounds in disguise.”
Rune cracks a smile and we all disband, getting our shit together for an impromptu trip home, and a welcoming committee full of hardened thugs, back stabbing family, and semi-automatic weapons, locked and loaded to greet us as soon as we roll up to the gates at the Volkov mansion.
Oh, the things we do when we’re in love.