Chapter 24
Gustav
Awoman in a thong bikini saunters across the deck. She is thick in the way many men like. She knows she is beautiful.
I didn’t want to, but I had to leave Peighton last night.
Council called an emergency meeting. So here I am.
Sunlight glitters off the Mediterranean, bright enough to sting my eyes.
It smells of salt and diesel and too much money.
I sit on the mid deck of a yacht that does not belong to me but to the Council, surrounded by men whose smiles are knives, pretending I am relaxed.
My hands rest loosely on the arms of the chair, though the tension coils through my shoulders, through my neck, pulsing behind my eyes.
The woman smiles at me like she already won something.
I ignore her.
She keeps coming.
She sits. Too close. Her knee presses my leg. Her perfume is strong, cloying. She is the opposite of Peighton whose scent is soft and warm and faintly sweet, like her skin is always remembering summer.
The woman twirls a lock of her blond hair. Her voice is breathy.
“You look tense. Want a massage?”
I twitch.
My jaw jumps. I hate that. I never used to twitch when women hit on me. Before Peighton touched me. Before the voices grew so loud that they attach to females like magnets.
“I am married,” I tell her.
She glances at my ring. Shrugs. “So am I. To Rupert.”
Then she undoes the top of her bikini. Her breasts spill out, glistening under the sun. A direct invitation.
A flash of Peighton hits me. Her smaller breasts. Pretty nipples. The way my own men stole glances at her cleavage in that tight dress. The flicker of her smile for them.
Heat floods my chest. My hand curls.
I stand abruptly. The chair scrapes.
The woman looks startled. I don’t care. My body moves before my mind catches up — away from her, toward the stairs, toward the shadows where the sun cannot mock me and where the ghosts in my head feel less exposed.
I take out my phone and call Micha.
He answers quickly. Obedient. Loyal. “Yes, boss.”
“Give the phone to Peighton,” I say.
A beat of silence. Then, faint shuffling.
My pulse drags. I should not care this much. I should not need her voice in my ear like oxygen.
I don’t want her to know this side of me.
But yesterday — in the car — when she came undone for me, her little body arching, her breath breaking... something inside me clicked back into place. For a moment, the world was silent. My mind was at peace. My darkness slept.
But afterwards, she was too quiet. Not glowing like the first time I had her. Not flushed and playful. Something in her had dulled. It bothers me. Deeply.
When her voice comes through the line, I freeze.
“Hello?”
She sounds distracted, like she has somewhere else to be. Someone else to talk to.
“How are you?” I ask.
The words surprise even myself. I do not ask such things.
“I’m fine,” she says, flat and distant. “Busy.”
A cold prickle slides down my spine. That is not a wife. That is someone closing a door on me.
Images flicker fast: another man’s hands, laughter not meant for me, her walking away without looking back.
“I gotta go,” she grumbles.
My breathing sharpens. Anger replaces panic. It’s easier to hold.
“Watch your attitude, or next time, I’ll feed you to the wolves myself,” I growl, and hang up.
Fuck.
It is the wrong thing to say. I know it the moment the screen goes black. But I cannot take it back. The ghosts swell and hiss in my ears.
She doesn’t want you. She’s fucking someone else. You failed to break her.
“Mr. Sokolov,” says Rupert.
Rupert is young. Mid-twenties, sharp-eyed, curly brown hair pushed back like he’s trying too hard to look older. The glasses don’t make him look nerdy, just calculating. Ambitious. The kind of man who watches power long before he earns it.
I shove the phone in my pocket and follow him up the stairs to the rooftop deck where the Council waits.
They sit around a table with drinks and sunglasses, looking like politicians vacationing instead of executioners discussing which leader to eliminate next. Rupert gestures to the open seat. I take it.
The eldest councilman clears his throat.
“There is an open investigation into the disappearance of the Morozov boss. You are the prime suspect.”
I sip my drink. “Both of us had Yellow Cards. You do not trust either of us. So why care?”
He smiles tightly. “Because you are volatile, Gustav. We know you may fail. If you do, we will intervene.”
I shrug. “No need. I am following the rules.”
He continues.
“We interviewed the Morozov leadership. They claim four men went to your place and didn’t return. We know Vlad wanted Peighton. That gives you motive.”
Maybe I am paranoid, but what if it was them... These men. They partnered with Vlad to take Peighton so I would crack and break mafia law. They set me up.
Father speaks.
No. Vlad was not trusted. The Council doesn’t like Yellow Card men. Not enough to plot with them. Stay calm.
But I feel the twitch again. My eye. My jaw.
Rupert leans back, smirking. “She is very beautiful,” he says, too casually. “Radiant. Young. Sexy. I imagine other men notice her, no?”
Something snaps cleanly inside me.
“Keep my wife’s name out of your fucking mouth,” I say, voice low.
Rupert’s brows rise with amusement. “There it is. The temper. The jealousy. Enough to kill a rival, I imagine.”
I want to slit his throat. Right here. Right now. Throw him into the sea and let the fish pick apart his arrogance.
But I hold still. Because I am not stupid. I am, however, outnumbered. Thankfully, they follow procedure. I’m not here for execution. Not yet. They won’t tell me. They’ll ambush and kill before I see it coming. It’s their way.
The elder from Brazil folds his hands. “Rumor has it your wife ran away.”
My spine stiffens.
He watches me closely. “If you cannot control your own household, how can you control a bratva? A man who cannot keep his woman from fleeing is not stable.”
Heat burns my neck. Shame or rage, I cannot tell. The only thing I do know is panic. Because they are right. She did run. And not because she is unruly this time. But because I failed her.
I failed to make her want to stay. Failed to teach her. Failed to build her trust.
I failed.
Mother’s voice hisses in my ear like breath leaking through teeth.
She will leave you. She will betray you. Just like your father.
I rise without excusing myself. Rupert tries to call after me. I ignore him.
I take the speedboat back to shore. The woman who drives it is still topless. She giggles and asks
“Where do you want to go?”
“Same dock.”
She nods. “Want me to come to your hotel?”
“No,” I say firmly.
I need to get back to St. Andrews. That sinking feeling in my gut is not baseless. Not after knowing the Council might use her against me. Not after Rupert’s little trap.
Peighton wants out, but she also said she would be faithful.
I might lose her, and I don’t know what I will become if that happens.
As the boat skims across the water, I close my eyes and whisper the quietest truth I have never allowed myself to say.
“I need her.”
And that dismays me more than anything the Council could ever do. I need her. She doesn’t need me.