Page 17

Smoke curled in the air, the scent of expensive perfume and spilled liquor thick around us. The men were in good spirits, and the music in the club was great. I didn’t expect any less when my brother owned the place.

Damien had a blonde draped over his lap, laughing at something she said, while Damir was busy with a girl I’d known for less than twenty minutes.

Me? I had a drink in one hand and a cigar in the other, and that was all I needed.

“You’re no fun tonight,” Damien drawled, swirling his whiskey. He looked from Genevieve, who was busy giving Damir a lap dance, to me. “I could have sworn you liked her.”

My brother had a voice as loud as two mega speakers, so she heard. She held my gaze, and something fleeting, almost like hurt, passed her green eyes before she turned around to stuff her face in Damir’s neck.

I didn’t care, and I didn’t like her. It was twenty minutes of fleeting attraction.

“I thought I did, too. Damir’s a better pick, though. He’d pay attention to all her needs.”

Damien snorted and spanked the blondie’s ass. “So, what then? Screw her. All these gorgeous women, and you’re just going to sit there, acting like a goddamn monk?”

I exhaled a slow stream of smoke, watching the bodies move on the dance floor, heat and sweat and hunger in every glance exchanged. None of it interested me. “A man who eats steak at home doesn’t go looking for scraps in the gutter.”

“And he’s a motivational speaker now?” Damien’s laughter caught Damir’s attention. “Alina’s got you by the balls, huh?”

“Assuming it’s Alina,” Damir added, and if looks could kill….

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

My brother wasn’t laughing now. The smug, stupid grin was off the bloody idiot’s face, and he raised a questioning brow at me.

Damir just smirked, tapping his cigarette against the glass ashtray. “I’m just saying, what if it’s not Alina that’s got him by…you know?”

I turned my head slowly, meeting his gaze. The table went quiet. The bloody bastard was of great value to me, but sometimes, he talked too much.

“Careful, Damir,” I murmured. “You’re starting to sound like a man who doesn’t value his tongue.”

The girls watched on expectantly, and with a gaze to kill, Damien flicked his wrist, silently ordering them to leave. The women scattered like leaves in the wind.

“He’s messing around, right? Damir is just talking like he always does. Is that not so, brother?”

The alarm in my brother’s head was going off; I could tell by the unsettled look in his eyes, but I leaned back in my chair, swirling the drink in my hand, feeling their stares burn into me.

“He is not.”

“ Fuck . What the hell, Miron?” Damien ran a hand down the growing stubble on his chin. “Who is she?"

“His therapist.”

“Do you really want to fucking die, Damir?” I glared at the smirking bastard. My little brother was an inch away from killing me, and he was finding this funny.

Damien continued firing. “Her name?”

I narrowed my eyes at Damir, just in case he wanted to offer up himself on a platter again. “Hazel Sinclair.”

The details he required were necessary routine checks for when we were dealing with anyone or anything we were not already acquainted with, and Damien needed to know to confirm that I wasn’t mingling with an enemy.

Damien paused. “Never heard of a Hazel Sinclair.”

“You haven’t because she’s just a therapist. She works in Amelia’s medical center.”

Damien’s jaw dropped. “You’re putting your head on the slaughter for an ordinary girl? A no—”

“Take my advice, Damien: Do not finish that fucking sentence.”

Hazel was far from being ordinary or a nobody. She was somebody enough to make my control slip two weeks ago and somebody enough to make every other girl suddenly look bland and uninteresting, including my fiancée.

I clenched my jaw. “Look, it just…happened.”

Damien snorted. “Bullshit. You let it happen.”

“You fucked up,” Damien continued, his voice even, but the steel underneath was unmistakable. “You gave your word for Alina. You are under a fucking duty to the Pakhan , Miron.”

I exhaled slowly. “I know.”

A beat of silence. Then Damien scoffed. “You know? I’m pretty sure you don’t. But tell me, how bad is it with this Hazel girl? Maybe we can fix it before the Pakhan finds out. Is she clingy? Trying to get between your legs? Blackmail?”

I leaned forward, placing my glass on the table with deliberate force. “I fucked her,” I admitted. “No point in pretending otherwise. I already cheated. And I don’t plan on stopping.”

The room went silent.

“Do you even hear yourself?” my brother muttered. “We have rules, Miron. You know how shit goes down when we try to play without them. You’re promised to Ivanova’s daughter, and he will demand respect.”

“Enough. Don’t talk to me about rules. I know every single one of them. This time, it’s different. I’ll take what I want and deal with the consequences later. That’s the game. End of discussion.”

Damien’s eyes darkened. “The Pakhan won’t see it that way.”

It didn’t matter because one thing was certain: I wasn’t letting Hazel go.

Ignoring my brother and a quiet Damir, I plucked my phone from the table and went back to the messages I’d been scrolling through before we arrived at the club—the ultimate reason I was in such a sour mood.

The first three messages were sent two weeks ago, the afternoon after the most amazing, intense fuck I’d had in a while.

Me: Hazel.

Me: Hi.

Me: If your phone’s bad, I can get you a new one.

And the last two were sent a week later, when she missed our scheduled session at the clinic.

Me : Amelia said you called in sick. Get well soon. I don’t want to have to tell the judge my therapist needs treatment. Yeah. L.O.L.

Me : Hazel. Hi.

Looking at the blue ticks now, I wanted to throw my phone at Damir’s head—because he deserved it. All the messages had been sent at different time intervals, hours apart from each other.

And she’d read all of them.

It was obvious she was avoiding me. I couldn’t even look at another woman for more than two seconds, but she could stomach reading my messages without responding. The effect it had on me was devastating—like I was sliding downhill, rolling, tumbling, and not being able to do anything about it.

Was this what she meant by feeling powerless?

If it so, it was fucking pathetic.