Page 133

He’s wrong. He’s always been wrong. His reign of terror ends today. My gaze moves to the goons still standing back, watching the show. They’re too far away to intervene in time to save him. My gaze drifts back to the man before me. His graying hair. His soulless eyes. The muscles he’s let soften.
Kill him.
“Adalie will marry Grigory, and Melody, the little slut, will go to the highest bid?—”
His words cut off when I collide into him. I knock him over and headbutt him. Stars dance across my vision, but they fade quickly. His skull bounces off the concrete. A chorus of laughter and Russian curses follow. I don’t wait to see if Darius recovers. Pinning him with my weight, I find the vulnerable part of his throat and sink my teeth intohis skin like a fucking animal, breaking skin. Hot, coppery blood floods into my mouth.
“Arrgh!”
Not enough.
I clamp my jaw tight and shake, seething, panting. Darius beats at my body, but I simply adjust my bite and bear down, tearing his neck open, hopefully destroying his jugular vein. The fucker can bleed out. When his hits weaken and there’s nothing left for me to rip open, I sit up and spit a glob of his blood at his face. “FUCK YOU!”
“Look at that, boys, we got a fighter.”
I whip my head toward the voice, thick with a heavy accent.
Darius groans and starts to rouse, so I bash my head into his again, grinding my teeth against the pain erupting inside my head. He falls limp. Stupid weak-ass motherfucker.
Chuckling, Grigory walks around the spotlight, keeping a good three feet between me and him. “I’ll admit, I did not expect this.”
The warm blood that’s run down my chin and throat starts to dry, caking against my skin. I can only imagine how rabid I look. The wolf they all talk about, the vicious boy all grown up. I spit a glob of blood, and it lands on the floor with a splat.
“Who forgot the gag?” he asks over his shoulder.
“Ivan,” one of his men replies.
Grigory pulls out a gun, turns, and fires it at one of the guys. The shot rings out, bouncing off the walls of the basement, and the guy collapses and tumbles down the stairs. His men stiffen, but to them, Ivan, no matter how close of a friend, deserved to die because he fucked up.
“Did you kill him?” Grigory kicks Darius’s shoe.
A breath rattles out of the bastard. He better enjoy that air, because soon enough, he won’t have any more.
“See, now you and me have a fuckin’ problem, Mace.” Grigory scratches his forehead, the gun pointing toward the ceiling. “Your sister is being difficult. You killed your father. My cousin is waiting for his bride.”
“He can keep waiting.” I work my wrists, straining against the restraints. “Adalie!” I shout.
Her muffled scream tears through the house. They gagged her?
Grigory tsks and points the gun at me. “Did I tell you to speak to my wife?”
“She’s not your wife,” I tell him, grunting as blood trickles down my hands, but I keep working against the rough ropes.
Adalie shouts from somewhere above me again, but I can’t make out her words, only the desperation in her tone.
“See? She agrees. Your father agreed to this too.” He sighs and glances at Darius, whose blood is pooling around him. “But you put me in a difficult place. The deal we made with Rex Technologies isn’t signed.” He lowers the gun. “You will sign for him.”
“And if I say no?”
Grigory’s answering grin has dread racing down my spine. “Your sister will pay.”
thirty-eight
CASSIA
Mamma Lucia’s is busy, full of hungry patrons, smiling families. On the outside looking in, it’s a typical restaurant, but all you have to do is walk in and let your gaze travel toward the farthest reaches of the dining room to see the difference. There, in the shadowy recesses, are made men standing sentinel in front of a table for eight. Next to that table is another full of mafiosos with steel in their eyes and blood on their hands.
Vito is sitting with his mistress, a pretty young woman with a pouty bottom lip and perky tits. She stares at him like he could give her the world. He’s more likely to kill her.