Page 1 of Beautiful Trauma

PROLOGUE: MILA

Twelve years old

Someone was shaking me.

Hard.

As my eyelids fluttered, a familiar lavender bedspread came into my view. At the realization I was in the safety of my own bed, I had an idea of who the culprit was.

“Stop it, Kira,” I grumbled.

My six-year-old sister loved to sneak into my bed. Some nights I went so far as to lock my door to keep her out, but somehow she still found a way in my room. I swore our older brother, Dima, had taught her how to pick locks.

When the shaking continued, I shoved the offender away. “Go back to your own bed before you piss mine again.”

“Mila, wake up!”

My mother’s urgent voice cut through my drowsy stupor. Rubbing my eyes, I asked, “What time is it?”

“Just after midnight.”

Squinting in the dark, I peered up at my mother. “But why are you waking me now?”

“We have to go,” she replied frantically. Spinning from my bedside, she raced over to my closet and threw open the door.

When she flicked on the light, I grimaced. With a yawn, I pulled myself up in bed. “Where are we going at this time of night?”

“Away,” she replied as she began manically snatching clothes off of hangers and stuffing them into a duffel bag.

Since I didn’t know of any holiday plans that we had, I asked, “But where?”

Whirling around to face me, Mama held up her hand in warning like she always did when one of my siblings or I had pushed her to the edge of exasperation. Considering she was incredibly patient and kind, it usually took a lot to get her to that point.

Mama pinched her eyes shut. “Please, Mila. Don’t ask me any more questions. Just help me.”

Although I knew it was another question, I couldn’t help asking, “Help you do what, Mama?”

“I need you to get Kira’s things together for me while Dima is getting his and Lev’s.” After grabbing another bag out of the closet, she shoved it at me. “Put as many clothes as you can into a bag. Make sure Kira doesn’t forget her bunny. You know she can’t sleep without it.”

Icy fear prickled over me. Shaking my head, I said, “But I don't understand.”

Grabbing me by the shoulders, Mama stared into my eyes. My stomach churned at the panic radiating in her expression. “Your father has passed over Maksim as his heir.”

Most kids my age would never hear the wordsfatherandheirin the same sentence unless they were royalty. In my case, my father didn’t rule a country.

But he was a king.

He was the king of the underworld in our city.

More specifically, theBratvaunderworld.

In our world, heirs were named at eighteen, which was how old my brother, Maksim was.

But he had been passed over.

I didn’t bother questioning why. I knew the loathing my father had for his firstborn son. Although he was strong and brutal enough to command the Korolova men, he was defective in my father’s eyes.

Maksim had a debilitating stutter.