Page 64 of Avenging Azalea (California Made Men #2)

Chapter

Fifty

TITUS

“Have I told you today how beautiful you look,” I asked before Fawn could escape from the SUV.

The blush that spread across her face made it worth the delay. Cupping her cheek, I couldn’t resist her lips and kissed her.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were trying to seduce me into not going into work,” Fawn said, smiling against my lips.

“Is it working?”

“If Sheba wasn’t in there…maybe, but…”

“Yeah, yeah, I know where I rank,” I teased, and gave Fawn a soft kiss, trying to ignore the healing purple bruises.

“Are you pouting, Titus Mikhailov?”

“Maybe a little, but only so that I can use it later.”

“You are troublesome. Who knew all this deviousness was under that sweet demeanor?”

I smirked, but kept my hands to myself, or I might really try to keep her in here with me.

“I better get going, you’ve got mischief in your eyes,” Fawn said, calling me out.

I laughed. “I’ll be here early to pick you up. I’m glad Sheba comes home today.”

Fawn grabbed my hand. “Me too,” she said, squeezing it. “I love you.”

Opening the door, she hopped out. My world lit up when she turned back and smiled.

“You were made for skies, not cages. Loving you…that’s been the only beautiful thing in my whole damned life. I love you, too,” I whispered, and then smiled as Fawn opened her mouth, closed it, and looked completely lost for words. “Go see our girl and Winston.”

Nodding, she closed the door and walked to the back of the clinic. Before she went inside, she looked over, blew me a kiss, and disappeared. I rubbed at my chest, the ache she created was so raw that it physically hurt to be away from her. But this…I had to do alone.

Pulling out of the driveway, the procession of SUVs pulled away from the curb to follow me. I glanced in the rearview mirror at Bella and Daisy. They sat at attention, and the sweet, goofy looks from a moment ago were gone. It was like they knew what was coming next and were preparing themselves.

It took forty minutes to get to Mikhailov Enterprises with the heavy morning traffic, but it gave me time to think. Parking in front of the towering building, I hopped out. I’d never imagined not working here. Naji and the rest of my soldiers did the same as I got Bella and Daisy out.

“Here you go,” Naji said, handing me a small velvet bag. I tucked it into the inside pocket of my suit jacket.

“If I’m not back down in fifteen minutes…”

“Storm the castle,” Naji answered as he crossed his arms.

I looked at Oliver. “You ready for whatever happens?”

“I’ve got your back. Just point me in the right direction and I’ll take down whoever you need me to,” Oliver said. I was very happy that I’d taken a chance on him.

“Let’s hope it doesn’t get that far.”

Only Bella and Daisy followed me to the front door. The guards looked nervous but nodded as I walked inside. My father wouldn’t have bothered blocking my access, but he might after today.

I rode the elevator upstairs, screwing the silencer onto my gun.

When the doors opened on the top floor, I marched toward my father’s office.

The secretary he was fucking, stood up with her lips pressed into a tight line of disapproval.

Before she could order me not to interrupt his closed-door meeting, like she’d done so many times before, I lifted the gun and fired two shots.

One through her heart, the other right between her eyes.

She fell back into her chair, staring sightless at the ceiling.

Reaching his office door, I threw it open with a bang.

The men meeting with my father jumped and turned to look at me.

I knew exactly who they were. The one on the left was Boris, the head of his security team.

He did most of my father’s dirty work. The one on the right was Mr. Vilanova’s son, Alexi.

Striding in, full attention on my father, I lifted the gun and shot Boris through the eye as he reached for his gun. Alexi took two taps to the chest. The men slumped in their chairs while my father sat there with his mouth open.

Stepping up to the desk, I finally saw what I’d refused to see for so long. The Devil had claimed his soul somewhere along the line. The man who sat in the chair looking up at me was no longer a man that I’d willingly follow or call father.

“What…what the fuck are you doing,” Dimitri asked, getting over his initial shock.

Standing abruptly was a bad idea. Bella and Daisy put their paws on the desk and growled, teeth bared as the deep rumbling vibrated around the room. Dimitri swallowed and slowly raised his hands, easing himself back down into the chair.

He looked at the two bodies, steadily bleeding out onto the floor.

“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

“No, do you know what you’ve done?”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean? That was Pasha’s son. He was here for a job interview.”

I shrugged. “I really don’t give a fuck.”

Reaching into my jacket I pulled out the contract that he’d given Fawn at dinner. I held it up for him to see.

“Did you really think I wouldn’t find out or let this slide?” I swiped the lighter he used for his cigars off the desk and lit the contract on fire before dropping it in the metal waste paper basket. I tossed the lighter on his desk.

Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out the black velvet bag. Three keys and three fingers fell out onto Dimitri’s desk. He swore as he looked at the manicured nails and the fancy rings that had been purchased for his mistresses’ fingers.

“I want you to know that I know everything.” He opened his mouth, and I pointed the gun at him, snapping his mouth shut. “Don’t insult me and tell me you don’t know what I mean. If I squint really hard, I can almost see why you did it.”

Dimitri’s eyes hardened. “Everything I have ever done has been for this family. I built this for my sons,” he said, with the hollow tone of a man watching his kingdom decay from the inside out.

I scoffed. “What? You think I’m lying? Everything I did…

the deals, the blood, the sacrifices, all of it was so my sons never had to beg for power.

” He shook his head. “Then Nathaniel goes and marries an FBI agent, utter humiliation. Now you walk away to be with some penniless girl who…” I cocked the hammer on the gun, and the girls growled louder.

“Careful what you say next.”

“Are you planning to kill me, son?”

“No, I’m not. Because, unlike you, I’m loyal to this family and know that killing you would only tear us further apart.”

“Then what are you going to do to me?”

I smirked. “Nothing, at least not physically, but every time you see my empty seat at the table, you’ll remember this moment and how you drove a second son away.

I won’t ever forgive you, and if you push me again, or go anywhere near the woman I love…

” I gestured toward the desk. “Just know that I, too, can make people disappear.”

I let the statement I’d never thought I would say hang in the air between us. Our eyes remained locked, and after a moment, he opened the box on his desk that held his cigars. Pulling one out, he clipped the end and lit it.

“I didn’t think you had this in you, son. I really didn’t. It makes me proud,” he said.

“With the right motivation, you’d be surprised what I’m capable of,” I said, putting the gun away as I walked to the office door with Bella and Daisy pressed against my legs.

I paused in the doorway. “Oh, and you have a clean-up to take care of at your secretary’s desk.”

Dimitri didn’t move. He just sat there smoking his cigar like it was a regular Tuesday morning, like the world wasn’t shifting beneath his feet. But I saw it. That flicker in his eyes. The part of him that knew this wasn’t just another argument. This was the death of our relationship.

One of his sons had already walked away from the business. From him. And now, I was severing all ties. There was only one final thread left in a legacy built on blood and control, but if he wasn’t careful, Ronan would turn his back on him. He knew it.

No matter how composed he had stayed, this would haunt him.

Maybe not tonight. But later, when the smoke cleared and no one came home for holidays or Sunday meals.

When he didn’t get to see his grandchildren and wasn’t invited to yet another wedding, it was a fissure that had gotten wider until it was a deep, bottomless ravine.

The most fucked up part…he believed he was right.

Deep down, under all the ruthless decisions and warped loyalty, Dimitri Mikhailov thought he’d been protecting us. Building an empire. Saving a family. He never understood that the thing he built, and the control he wielded with no regard, were what broke us.

I wanted to hate him, but there was a part of me that still saw him as my father.

A part of me remembered throwing a football in the yard, how he ruffled my hair or took me fishing, and how he showed me the ropes of business.

Even if he’d destroyed what he sought to build, he’d instilled family loyalty in me, and I would hold the family together long after he was gone.

A part of me had simply hoped that he was capable of change. It was optimistic and would most likely never happen, but I could hope. I sure as hell wasn’t going to become him.

I might have physically stepped out of his office, but in reality…I’d stepped out of his life and into the one that I chose, not one he chose for me.