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He snorts, laughing, and waves his hand through the air. “No, it was an accident. I know what. I knew it from the beginning.”

“Oh. Then why did you get so angry with Nestor?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t expect you to understand, girl.”

“Do you miss your dad? Even losing someone in an accident is still painful. He was your father, after all.”

He rolls his eyes as though he’s talking to an annoying child. That’s fine. He can see me as an annoyance, as long as he’s still talking.

“My father was not the type of man I’d ever miss. All he ever did in my life was hold me back. He is the reason I haven’t been able to take over from Nestor yet. Fucking patience. He kept telling me to have fucking patience. Can you believe that? He seemed to believe that the power Nestor had would somehow just fall into my lap without me having to take it.” He laughs loudly, a bursting sound that erupts from him as he throws his head back and holds his belly.

“You didn’t need to take Nestor’s position to have power. You already have power.”

“I want more,” he screams, his smile gone. “My father was weak. He fell in love and forgot about our plan. He was pathetic. He kept pushing for peace and telling me to go with the flow, to work at my stepbrother’s side. He wanted me to grovel like a fucking pathetic little gutter rat until Nestor promoted me.” Heclenches his fists and moves as though he wants to punch the wall, but stops short of it.

I have an urge to tell him his father was right, that people do work for the things they have in life, but instead I bite my tongue and say, “Sometimes our parents don’t see things the way we do. Sometimes we might even be wrong.”

Miron’s face goes dark with anger.

“Ha,” he says coldly. “Are you saying my dad was right? That I don’t deserve the same power Nestor has? Are you saying Nestor is a better man than I? That I’m not worthy?” He’s practically screaming at me, spit flying from his mouth as anger pulses tin he veins over his temples. The sudden uncontrolled rage tells me he’s had this fight many times before—maybe with his father, maybe with himself.

“I didn’t say that,” I interject quickly, trying to defuse him, but it’s too late. His rage is boiling. He thinks I told him he’s unworthy, and there’s apparently no going back from that.

“Miron,” I say desperately. “I didn’t say that.”

He runs at me and grabs my throat in his broad hands. Locking his fingers tightly around my neck, he squeezes until the air cuts off and my eyes begin to water. “Do you think I give a fuck about what you think of me, bitch?” he hisses in my face, his breath hot against my cheek.

“Boss, we need her alive, for leverage,” someone says cautiously.

“He only has tothinkshe’s alive, you fucking idiot,” he growls, squeezing even tighter. I want to gag and choke, but I can’t. I can’t draw air in. I can barely see through my tear-soaked eyes.

I’m going to die.

This is how I die.

“Fuck,” one of his men screams and a bullet snaps through the window into the ceiling.

Downstairs, three stories below us, gunfire breaks out in every direction. Miron lets go and staggers away from me, his eyes wide.

“Tell your men to kill everyone,” he screams. “Don’t fucking let anyone come through that door.”

But already the gunfire is sounding up the stairs, and the scream of men as they fall from the third to the first floor, slipping over the railing of the curved staircase, is making Miron nervous.

Miron shakes his head.

“Fuck this,” he snarls and runs to the window, climbing out of it and onto the fire escape.

I scream Nestor’s name.

Again and again.

Miron’s men are confused, their boss having abandoned them.

Nestor, Roan, and Benedikt burst into the room, and Miron’s men drop their weapons and lie flat on the floor.

Nestor runs straight to me. He wraps his arms around me and holds me. “I’m here, I’m so sorry. I was so worried. We got here as fast as we could.”

He leans back, pulling a knife from his pocket. “Are you hurt? What happened?”